Bar Maldoror / CURRENT 93
The reason I chose this album out of all the Current 93 albums is because it was my first experience with them.
The album had two record access ports sealed with paper, which you had to tear to remove the record, giving it a handmade AC feel.
I found this album in an import record store, and although I had heard of Current 93, I had never experienced their music, and because it was sealed, I couldn’t even listen to it, so I bought it based solely on the cover.
When I listened to it back home, I was struck by a mystical, beatless sound (vocals), a sound that would now be called drone noise, which continued to play out endlessly.
I didn’t listen to it repeatedly, but occasionally when I was feeling depressed, I would listen to this sound and it would make me feel even more depressed.
I was completely engrossed in listening to the music, completely unaware that Current 93’s leader, David Tibet, who would later appear on NOISE WAR, was devoted to the black magic of Aleister Crowley, or that MALDOROR likely originated from Lautréamont’s books.
Current 93 then evolved into gothic folk.
At first, I was disappointed by their music, which bore no resemblance to noise, but the more I listened, the more I began to think that it was a good genre.
DEATH IN JUNE and SOL INVICTUS, who also worked with Current 93, have created gothic folk works, and it now feels like it has been established as a genre in its own right.
Current 93 still creates musique concrete pieces like this one, in addition to gothic folk works. Although the sonic forms are different, both contain magical elements, and they are sounds that I personally enjoy listening to.
It was in 1997 that I was able to see Current 93 perform live for the first time.
They performed gothic folk music at Union Chapel, a church in London that has been turned into a live music venue, and the atmosphere of the venue and the band matched perfectly.
They also performed a live show at Union Chapel in 2023, which has been uploaded to YouTube.