Review: Black Thread - Autumn Flowers

For how much longer will Autumn Flowers exist? At this point the sound is already shredded with the signs of age. Big folds of distortion have started to close up over its features. The tones warble and bow as the music’s skeletal tissue withers into sponge, and I freeze in morbid anticipation during those moments where the sound cuts out momentarily (is that it?), only to pop back into life again (not yet). The record was released last month, December 10^th 2014. By now the magnetic tape has probably perished entirely, and its death would have been slow and cruel; a gradual deterioration, scrubbing out the memory of that time where Autumn Flowers was colour-rich and graceful.

The tones on the first piece sound like missiles descending into the sea. They are engulfed by eachother, overlapping into a melody of unstable delays and great sprays of noise. On the second piece, I feel like I’ve tuned into a rough transmission of a brass band playing in the next nuclear bunker over. The loop stops in the same place each time, as though the chord it carries is too weak and miserable to sustain. Each time it comes around, it becomes harder and harder to listen to; I hear the heart stopping on Autumn Flowers again and again, as any remnants of survival instinct are engulfed by despondent mortal resignation.