Cassette Review // Charlie Butler "Wild Fictions" (Cruel Nature Records)

https://cruelnaturerecordings.bandcamp.com/album/wild-fictions

When I listen to this cassette- even on repeat listens- one of the things I enjoy most about it is that as it plays out on the first side it feels like you're watching something unravel.  In this way, as the layers are peeled back, I can get lost in the sound and not know where it is going to take us next.   As this cassette is instrumental, there are times when I think it's about to take us into a Rush-like song.

Droning synths and little whirrs begin "Wild Fictions".   We are at a steady pace and the music really controls the sound in the sense that the synths and eventually guitars are singing.   These sounds almost like beeping are in next and then the percussion joins as well.  This whole first song could be electronic rock and as the deep bass distortion comes in you just know it has that quality where it adds a little bit more each time.

We go into a second song on the first side and it starts with big keys.  There are strings which remind me of a banjo being plucked, the beats return and then distorted guitar riffs come through with it all as well.   Those big keys return to start off the flip side, as they feel like church organs, and the percussion comes back as well.  Guitar rambles come through but the pace is slowed.  This could be somewhere between post rock and slowcore.  

Big, droning sounds bring out the doom guitar notes.  Before this one ends, the dark guitar riffs come out.   Everything is just raining down distortion and it feels like the end of the world.  These sharper tones come through but they feel like sirens, muted in the background as acid rain falls from the sky, creating fire and we're just watching as everything is being destroyed.  When there is nothing left, this cassette which saw a blooming pattern on the first side ends the second side with the destruction of it all.