Venereology [Import]

Merzbow | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (September 20, 1994)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Import
• Label: Wea International
• ASIN: B000001122
• Also Available in: Audio CD
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (25 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #310,222 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Ananga-Ranga

2. Klo Ken Phantasie

3. I Lead You Towards Glorious Times

4. Slave New Desart

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Briliant! The harshest "Industrial" I've ever heard, April 12, 2004

By 

Crypt "thecrypt777" (Arkham) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Venereology (Audio CD)

It goes without saying that some people, (maybe most people) won't like this or even understand what this sort of thing is about. This might even be too much for hard core fans of the likes of Throbbing Gristle, Neubauten and most Power Electronics. I for one love it. Merzbow, despite his criticizers, is a genius of sound sculpture and noise orchestration. To understand this release, or any of his, one must throw every notion of what is "music" out. This isn't something to snap your fingers to. It is reflective ambience of the absolute most extreme variety. It's adrenaline rush inducing, breathtaking, and extremely interesting. It even screws with your brain if you let it. It's audial performance art. It's not pretentious, it is very honest and abstract sound sculpture. To those who appreciate this sort of thing, it has great meaning. However it's totally understandable if some don't get it. I would accept a statement like "This is too much for me. I don't understand it. etc...", but to say "this is talentless garbage" shows a great deal of ignorance

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The best you can do... in America, November 23, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Venereology (Audio CD)

The sticker on the plastic wrap covering the album when I bought it declares "the most extreme album you will ever own! You have been warned!" There have since been a few bands whose unrelenting walls of sound have surpassed those on here-- not least of which coming from Master Akita himself-- but it's still one of Merzbow's best discs, and one of the loudest pieces of digitized tin ever recorded. Someone once described Merzbow to me thus: "take all the noises of a factory. Record them. Filter and distort them. Turn the whole mess up to 11. That's what Merzbow sounds like." I think he'd just had his first taste of Venereology.

Not to say it's as chaotic as a factory. There are rhythms, both subtle and out front. There are pieces of sample or frequency that crop up throughout the disc to keep you on track and remind you of what you're listening to. And there's a whole lot fo unrelenting, harsh, brutal noise whose sole purpose seems to be to make your ears bleed.

To paraphrase Adam Parfrey, the "music" created by Merzbow and his legion of followers (noise, being easy to create and manipulate electronically, is an astoundingly popular genre from the artists' side these days) won't appeal to too many people. But those who understand the idea and feel the flow will find this to be a pure balm, an extract of what we hear around us every day and our ears filter into the background, but this time it's brought up and splayed in front of us like a piece of roadkill. And it's just as tasty, from the opening rhythmic burst to the last martial explosion.

If you've never heard a noise recording before, and you want to go to extremes your first time out... you could do a lot worse than this one.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars pitiless...and brilliant, July 21, 2005

By 

G. Laur - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Venereology (Audio CD)

You'll notice that this disc carries an "explicit content" warning. This is curious, because in the brief moments when vocals show up on the album, the words are not even intelligable, let alone offensive. Yet the explicit content is there; it comes in the form of the music.

"Venerealogy" is fifty minutes of harsh, punishing noise, amped up to an impossibly devastating volume, devoid of rhythms, harmonies, or a human presence of any kind (except for the aforementioned 'vocals,' which come in the form of distorted roaring and laughter and are really just another element of the music). It roars, screams, and pulses with a thunderous fury that is at first shocking, disturbing and overwhelming. Listen to a few minutes, and the "explicit content rating" actually makes sense. There is the potential here to permanently damage ears and traumatize the weak of heart.

It is also an album that is, if handled properly, potentially therapeutic. At first the sensation is of some massive ferocious beast preparing to tear you to shreds, but as the noise continues, unrelenting and drone-like, it quickly becomes familiar and you start to like it. The man behind Merzbow, Masami Akita, has stated repeatedly that his music is not about anger and destruction; it is meditative, and infused with eroticism. If viewed in this context, 'Venerealogy' has the potential to be as listenable as any CD in your collection. The noise will become a release of tension rather than a build-up of it, because there are no crescendoes or schizophrenic levels of intensity; the noise is up-front and relentless, and so overpowering that the rest of the world can be literally shut out.

I recommend a purchase of this, and other Merzbow albums such as "Pulse Demon." Play it for metalheads who think they are "hard," just to shut them up, play it at parties to get rid of the people who aren't cool, and play it on dates; if your girl tolerates it, she really is special.