CD-R, T’an! Kaven!! Ash!!!, 2008
www.buben-info.narod.ru
A lot of the time when passed a purely experimental CD I grit my teeth. There is a hell of a lot of experimental ‘music’ out there that I appreciate and a hell of a lot I simply deem as ‘artistic masturbation’, being very polite. Buben come dangerously close to the latter.
Fannying around far too much, “Prayers of Steel” sounds exactly like its title suggests. Steely ambient sounds and trippy noises that are not too dissimilar to that of banging around in a kettle drum whilst taking a mild hallucinogenic. A lot could have been done with this album and I have heard a lot of this before, but done way better. A lot of Buben sound like filler areas of organic movie soundtracks and in some rare circumstances I could imagine this working – it just doesn’t as a stand-alone release in its own right.
“Prayers of Steel” has pointlessly over-lengthy tracks that meander on and on, and seemingly meaningless dull pissing around for no valid reason. There is a time and place for stuff like this, and to put it bluntly it isn’t on my hi-fi. Ever.
[4/10]
— Tony Young