CD, Ant-Zen, 2006
www.iszoloscope.net
Instead of resting on his laurels, something that’d seem reasonable for Yann Faussurier to do, considering the literal barrage of releases he’s had in the past year, he comes back in the centre of the noise scene with “The Audient Void”.
Of course, when one releases so much material in such a small time frame, a certain repetition in the overall feel and sound is to be expected. Apparently, this is a rule that Iszoloscope decided to break, “The Audient Void” being nothing like a repetition of any of his previous efforts. Not only avoiding that pitfall, he managed to isolate and combine the best elements of each of the four releases. His 2001 debut, “Coagulating Wreckage” was a behemoth of a record, pummeling in its harshness of violent musical imagery. “Aquifere”, his second album that came one year later, featured a much mellower organic sound, while still retaining its dark tinge. The 2003 “Au Seuil du Neant” was a masterpiece in speed and technique, featuring a much more balanced mixture of sounds than his first “harsh” release, while the 2004 release of “Les Gorges des Limbes” brought him back to ambient territory in a wonderfully immersive experience. It is in this fifth album that all this musical experience and elements are finally merged, resulting in a truly phenomenal album.
The title track, which opens the album, is a slowly unfolding noisescape, brimming with tension that remains unreleased until some point in the second track, where the initial screams of noise break up into a beat, quickly building up pace until it becomes a flurry of hectic percussion and noise. The many samples placed through the record provide an exquisitely dark feel, especially in “The Path Of Totality” and “Heard Voices”, which is probably the most outstanding track in an album that makes picking favourites one hell of a hard time. Overall, the record is a display of excellent musicianship, crafting elaborate and menacing patterns with its infectious rhythms and harsh noise.
With the speed and technique of “Au Seuil du Neant”, the aggression of “Coagulating Wreckage” and the darkness of “Les Gorges des Limbes” and “Aquifere”, “The Audient Void” is one killer record that any artist should be proud of and which could hardly be done any better.
[9.5/10]
— George Mouratidis