Fresh from Hell’s Headbanger’s, Profanatica’s head sociopath Paul Ledney once again revisits his other, even more twisted project Havohej with Kembatinan Premaster. Although it may come under the guise of black metal, this album is more a corroded slab of industrial noise that’s closer to the likes of Wolf Eyes, Prurient and WOLD than it is to Darkthrone or Marduk. Indeed, Havohej represents the genre at its most boldly experimental.
In listening to Kembatinan Premaster, one can’t help but wonder what sorts of drugs Mr. Ledney was taking when he began to conceptualize this bizarre, hallucinatory piece of hell, or if he is simply one of the most deranged people in the black metal underground. Powered by a dilapidated drum machine gone mad and layered with mind melting layers of guitar, vocals, synths, cogs, gears and what may or may not be a malfunctioning vacuum cleaner, Havohej has created one of the year’s most disturbing listening experiences, bound to be embraced by the chosen few who are willing to approach their black metal with an open mind and scorned by the so-called purists out there.
Anyone expecting Profanatica part 2 is largely advised to take a hike. While both bands may wallow in black metal’s filth-ridden underbelly, Havohej is an even more abstract and perverse descent into the genre’s outer limits. Tracks such as “Bloud and Souls” and “Sundowning (Destroie Men and Beasts with Lookes)” would probably come off as standard black metal fare, were they not awash in layers of burbling distortion and noises that sound like they’re being transmitted from the depths of a black hole. “Melancholike” is a ten minute decrepit epic of slow, creeping doom and static glitchiness, creating an effect that is both hypnotic and unsettling. “Homerica Medicatio” as well as parts of “Bloud of the Word” are pure ambient soundscapes that come off like a lo-fi version of Lustmord. Ledney leaves no stone unturned in his attempts stretch the boundaries of black metal into new territories of cacophony, and this is what makes Kembatinan Premaster so oddly compelling.
With the progressive, quasi-psychedelic turn American black metal has started to take in recent years, it’s great to see folks like Ledney pushing things even further out there with a take on BM that is far more heavily indebted to early Merzbow than it is to Norway circa 1994 or Pink Floyd. While so many others talk about evil and ritualism, Havohej has actually created something that sounds truly aberrant and unnatural.
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