Billed as the 905 house band, Wether is the solo project of Mike Haley, whose penchant for dirt encrusted cement atmospheres places him squarely in the deepest trenches of squalor-inducing noise practitioners. Split into two sidelong tracks, the album is a perfectly decrepit example of unforgiving sound adventures.

The first side belongs to “In the Belly of a Mountain,” whose tar black opening recalls the bleak sound of the Michigan practitioners like Sick Llama or Body Morph, only with a severely damaged tendency toward continuous rupture. Black expanses careen outward with abandon, etching charcoal lines in various shades of grey before teetering high end scrapes its way above the minefield. Really mobile and active stuff, though not for the faint of heart.

The following side belongs to “Holy Smokes,” a fitting title given the billows of smog ingested throughout. Grim material that manages to navigate the grounds between “what the fuck is that air-conditioner sound?” weirdness and heaving, almost orchestral dramatics. Buried somewhere beneath the debris there’s a softness here, its shimmer always caught out of the corner of the eye. Like some crystal wedged far up your vacuum cleaner and the only way to get at it is to crank up the power and hope it gets sucked in to the bag. Tough to find once all that dust’s built up though. Another nice one from 905, really dark and immersive stuff. 7/10 -- Henry Smith (4 June, 2009)