The Body & Vampillia - Xorohabin (2015)

The Body are always experimenting and are never afraid of radical contrast (like their use of choir vocals in their grim indus / drone sludge) so their new collaboration with Vampillia, or anything they would do, shouldn't be such a surprise.  Still, among the different bands or people they have done music with, Vampillia is the most surprising, the farthest from their own musical universe. Vampillia comes from Japan (Osaka) and plays some versatile kind of post-rock with neo-clasical elements (with piano, chords, etc.) it's not possible to describe what they do because it's always changing anyway but most of the time their music is not really dark. So how does sound their collaboration record called Xorahabin? As expected it's interesting, we find elements from both bands but it's not just a juxtaposition of the music of the two bands. It succeeds to sound as a whole. So what do we have? noise, or even harsh noise, heavy beats, desperate screams and a bit of more melodic choir vocals, melodies with chords or strings, a bit of piano, a dark & ominous atmosphere that is quite cinematic. Four songs in a bit less than half an hour. If you like The Body you'll probably like this one, if you like Vampillia you'll like it if you also like rawer & darker stuff and you should give it a try anyway. It's a really good record, not just original & interesting but also "enjoyable" in it's special way. Not a realease you listen one time and say "ok, it's interesting" but dont listen to it twice, not I 've already listened to it quite a lot and each time I find something more in it. Recommended stuff.