Kodiak / Nadja

Split EPs and albums are an ideal way to experience the work of two bands if you're not familiar with either one, especially if each band specialises in creating very long instrumental pieces of music, and this particular EP will get you a foothold into Nadja and Kodiak's respective bodies of work. Nadja have a tremendous number of studio and live albums to their name so it can be a daunting task for the first-timer to decide which of the act's recordings to hear out first.

The Nadja track "Kitsune Fox Drone" certainly doesn't disappoint as a typical Nadja-listening experience: layers of heavy distortion of guitar-generated howling drones and feedback, all groaning at once and travelling in no particular direction, over which a lone flute may flutter like a lost dove battling a storm, the effect of all which immerses the listener in a mesmeric sea of sharp fuzz and noise. Curiously though there can be a feeling of empty space at times and a yearning for connection and to merge with a greater force. Any vocals present are whispery and plaintive. There is a churning rhythm deep within the track which feels reassuring and soothing. This is very familiar music for me and one reason that I only occasionally listen to Nadja these days: I turn up hoping that perhaps Nadja will create something a bit different for a change and while the droning immersion can be a pleasant experience, in the end Aidan Baker and Leah Buckareff haven't given anything that's out of the ordinary and the track is generic Nadja featurelessness.

The Kodiak recording ‘MCCCXLIX The Rising End’ is similarly long and droning but there the similarities with Nadja end, thankfully as it turns out. It starts as a deep, almost cavernous dark-ambient / industrial drone piece steadily finding its footing before erupting into a mighty blaring electroacoustic / guitar noise monster with a simple fragile piano melody and soothing vibrato sounds that almost seem like choirs of angels crossed with windstorms. Spasms of pounding drums give the track some needed structure for the guitars and other instruments to bounce off and contrast with. Machine and chiming-bell chaos follows and at points throughout the track the music threatens to tread a depressive apocalyptic sludge-doom metal path in the manner of Australian doom metal band Whitehorse. Emphatic sub bass grind rhythm and lackadaisical drum-beats, each hit amplified, concentrate the mind on each and every note, as if the world's fate was hanging on every drawn-out moment of the track. Towards the end, the track starts dying in agonisingly prolonged guitar feedback screeches and fades out quietly amid elegiac piano notes and hushed cymbal.

Without a doubt the Kodiak track, whose Roman numerals spell 1349 (surely a reference to the Black Death of Europe in 1349), is a far superior piece in concept and execution to Nadja's "Kitsune Fox Drone" which compared to the Kodiak contribution has more and more the look of something cut and pasted from another recording. Kodiak approach their side of the split with thought and care for their composition and listeners can sense the intense concentration and whole-hearted application of the musicians. I really wish I didn't have to say Nadja come across as lazy and thoughtless but their effort seems very lax here.