Cassette Review: Filipe Felizardo & Margarida Garcia "Limbo" (deadvox)

[€7 // https://deadvox.bandcamp.com/album/limbo] 

"Limbo" begins with static and guitar darkness.   It's somewhere between Nine Inch Nails and something off of "The Crow" soundtrack.   It has this vibe to it like something wicked is lurking on the horizon and while that might not be defined there is a certain sense of deep cello bass and abrupt surprise to the music that might suggest anything from an Alfred Hitchcock movie to Godzilla.  

In some ways the music can sound so low, so deep into the bass that it feels as if it is too late.   The monster is no longer approaching but it has struck without your knowing.    The monster has pulled you to the bottom of the ocean and there is no escape.    These sounds are eerie and haunting, the things which nightmares are made of and even I am not brave enough to listen to this one while I sleep.   (Though in all fairness, I don't have terrible demons in my nightmares, mostly just aspects other people would consider to be silly)

The notes seem to drop off at times, into the deepest, darkest of places and otherwise there is some whirrs and just other manipulation of sound within here- like Transformers even- but if this is the soundtrack to some movie I haven't seen then, believe me, I certainly do want to see it.   

On the flip side we start with some footsteps in the basement.   It just sounds dark and dank.   A ringing grows, it grows so loudly that it almost becomes uneasy to hear.   Whether it be that terror creeping up on you in the night or the sound of your screams it's certainly not one of the noises which you will relate with something happy.    Guitar notes drop like brimstone.    It begins to tick-tock back and forth like Willy Wonka as other distorted notes are seemingly smashed out.    I imagine this being as some story of a possessed guitar, bent on evil and killing but I'm pretty sure that happened when they remade "The Twilight Zone" and this is far more disturbing.

It's just that I've heard some pretty dark music in my time- the type of things which would send the toughest of goth kids home crying to their mommies- but I'm just not sure I've ever heard a guitar used as such an instrument of destruction as it is here.   And the sounds which accompany the guitar (which I've read are made by bass) only serve to enhance that experience.   As we draw nearer to the end, the music begins to fight itself and as we all know there is no greater monster out there than the one willing to hurt itself because if this monster will cut off its own face imagine what unthinkable acts it has in store for you.  

Through the end you'll find yourself in the darkest of places with the deep, dark drone of the bass.   It's got this feeling like you're watching a horror movie but one which hasn't been invented yet.   I will admit that when I watched "Saw" I liked it, but I liked "Hostel" a lot more, mainly because of that scene where the guy is tied to the chair and cut at the ankles but tries to stand up and walk.   Anyway, this feels like a movie that would go above and beyond that and, yes, in a real and actual way not just because it's something attached to a sticker on the packaging.    As ominous as it feels, up to that last second which sounds like a droplet of water (or blood), there is still beauty in it and of course large amounts of talent.   I do suggest listening to this but only with the lights on.