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Bestia Centauri explores a vast, thematic world in the churning, vibrant electronic work The Antediluvian Earth. Spacious synthetic textures of moaning, resonant tones, pulsing harmonics and nervous electronic murmurs assemble an immense digital terrain that is simultaneously elemental and celestial . . . chaotic and structured . . . indistinct . . . visionary. The living, crawling sonorities that infuse The Antediluvian Earth mutate and materialize into a detailed and potent album that leaves a listener unsettled, pensive . . . and finally astonished.

Huge washes of ambient tapestry descend and fold in slow motion, suffocating the millions of tiny insects crawling beneath a dark, convulsing soil. Organ-like synth drones moan, build, crescendoing into clusters that swallow themselves, sinking into nothingness. Specks of glimmering metal splatter and multiply across this primordial landscape, assembling into dark and glassy curtains, shimmering, growing and finally dissolving. A lone entity howls across the pain of the surrounding metamorphasis.

Self-referenced is the influence of early modern composers Ligetti and Xenakis; the influence is notable, as Bestia Centauri aptly applies techniques of dense harmonic clustering and pitch bending to create and release tension, form, structure. The effect is a tumultuous, organic sound slithering, groping, struggling into ever-mutating lifeforms and structures. There is an inherent macrocosmic-microcosmic tension as smaller sonic entities amass into, and dissipate from, poised and monolithic forms.

Long after the disc stops spinning, echoes of The Antediluvian Earth resonate within, blurred memories of a deep and unspoken verse, timeless, expansive, questioning . . .

Innovative and intoxicating, Science Fiction is an expertly crafted beat-driven construction set that pushes the techno envelope through new dimensions of pattern, structure and sound. The dialogue is synthetic, animated and fresh amongst constantly changing sonic characters in a disarranged and fractured macrocosm.

Percussive electronic beats, pulses, scrapes, blips . . . and a billion other synthetic fragments revel in their creation and dissolution. Tattered, buzzing and futuristic, they ping and twitch and waver, they clumsily fall forward and collapse into spastic debris, they tap and pop and click in varied rhythms and intensities. Science Fiction is an eternal, self-destructing machine colony bent on recycling and remanufacturing itself into new and unexpected patterns and revolutions.

At times a strong head-nodding theme emerges; here the elements suddenly come together and agree on a distinct direction amidst the traffic. Yet these themes never seem repeated in the same way twice; even the most core, consistent patterns and beats alter themselves ever so slightly with each iteration while others spin off in even more chaotic and independent directions. Somehow, the result is an amazingly fresh, ever-colorful sound that constantly seeks and redefines it's own nature.

Science Fiction's effect is brilliantly disconcerting; it's fluid odyssey leaves you spinning and lost . . . and then found once again. The widely varied pieces remain dynamic and satisfying for many listenings to come.

Guitarist Eric Kesner presents a unique collection of dark ambient meditations in his recent work Absence. Deep, quiet and patiently beautiful, Absence eminates drifting and enduring reverberations which reflect a haunting, tranquil, wordless exchange between internal selves of a profound and imaginary communication.

Dense, ambient feedback tones penetrate and reverberate, slowly building upon each other and echoing away. The sonorities are simple and clear, the gestures sweeping, natural, deliberate. Ever-so-slight imperfections and arrhythmic resonances somtimes find their way through and add a living, breathing feel to the sound. Some pieces bury bass murmurs so low you will need a 16" speaker to fully appreciate their depth. But the true allure of Absence is how consistent and inexpressably subtle it remains throughout; simple, resonant and entirely effective.

Some emphasis has been placed by the artist and others commenting Absence and other True Colour of Blood works consist of nothing except guitars and effects processors (no synths); in the end this is really an insignificant point. Whatever the methods and tools, Absence is a mature and involving work that captivates and invokes a deep and reflective beauty.

Exsanguinate sets a new standard for death industrial in the tormented and relentless aural onslaught that is The Black Acts. Based on a theme of "a sonic exploration of torture techniques through the ages", The Black Acts is immeasurably desolate and overwhelmingly oppressive in it's smoldering aggression . . . an intensely difficult and disturbed journey into dark recesses of distortion and cruelty.

Humming and distorted drones surround, crush, demoralize. Piercing ringing tones overdriven to crackling, screeching white fire slash across a dim and desolate soundscape. Shards of glass and metal needle incessantly, repetitively, scratching and scraping at frayed nerve endings. A dull, amplified drum thunders and pummels internally beneath the many noise layers. A slow hollow breath exhales a muted and eternal scream.

As many times as you may listen to this disc, you are never fully prepared for just how ultimately dismal and scorching the sound. The pieces are difficult to remember, the methods so abrasive and anguished as to leave only dim trace reflections of how dark could this sound really have been.

The purity of purpose behind The Black Acts is astounding; the ultimate result is nightmarish and blistering. This is a disc that will stare unblinkingly deep into your mind even as it sits in silence within it's case clear across the room.