CD, Monochrome Vision, 2005
www.monochromevision.ru
Miguel Ruiz has released a multitude of solo releases, largely on cassette and through small independent labels, since his debut release on his own Toracic Tapes label in 1986. Adopting various pseudonyms depending on the style of the release such as Ventral Metaphor, Funeral Souvenir, Exhaustor in the late 1990’s, under his own name and, probably most well known, as Orfeón Gargarin. His debut full length release “Encuentros en la Tercera Edad” came after he sent a tape to Asmus Tiechens short-lived Hamburger Musikgesellschaft label in 1991. In addition to this, Ruiz also launched his own label, Batan Bruits, in 2005, releasing a remastered version of his 1989 collaboration tape with Héctor Hermández entitled “Han Ilegado los robots” on CD.
Recorded during the period 1989 to 1990, “Grosor” features an assortment of tracks recorded in Madrid including 4 from the “Encuentros en la Tercera Edad” album. Ruiz’s music is intensely dark and atmospheric, often conjuring images of dark desolate landscapes in an apocalyptic future or the soundtrack to the darkest of underground movie soundtracks. Often focusing on long swirling atmospheres and a dark demonic void of absorbing sound, Ruiz occasionally adds sampled vocal loops, which only help make the mood more disturbing. Venturing down another path, “Brain Velocity” and “Botulismus Terrier” are slightly less intense but throw the listener into a swirling maelstrom of hallucinogenic insanity. Even the calming choir and almost orchestral quality of “Sinister Life” has a vortex of foreboding hanging over it. The three closing tracks – “Ecumenical Worm”, “Purulent Horses” and the industrially grinding operatics of “Profilaxis II” – are all relatively lighter in mood but still heavy on tense atmosphere.
If you like your ambient music very dark, atmospheric and heavy, “Grosor” is definitely for you. It makes a harrowing and disturbing yet rewarding listening experience in its own right but could equally be the perfect soundtrack to the most nerve shreddingly tense movie ever made. Perfect mood music for the darkest of settings with off the scale intensity that is hard to match.
[9/10]
— Paul Lloyd