Vampire Can’t – Key Cutter

Published in The Mic, December issue.

Chris Corsano is among the best drummers in the world of any genre, even though his specialism is the outerrim of improv and jazz. This is a collaboration between his sometimes band with guitarist Bill Nace, Vampire Belt, and Jessica Ryan AKA Can’t on screwed-up electronics. The opener comes on hard, like more tuneful Wolf Eyes or a Lightning Bolt who loosened up, lost the Slayer influence and took on board some AMM. Self-titled Debutante and Hand In A Box have a pronounced free-rockist flavour with some bits that might resemble riffs, albeit riffs overcast by a headache of dissonant wails, much like a less concise Naked City. Witness endless feedback and churning guitars, and so many brilliant moments where Corsano just lets loose and bangs the living shit out of everything in site. It’s a tense, unnerving release and it’s the moments of almost ambience that make it so much more interesting. Five Eyes, for example, sounds like the distant buzzing of vicious flies before all hell breaks loose. The final track, No Strings, is easily the best: a nightmarishly intense soundscape of clanks, squiggles, cymbal bows and scrapes, drones, quiet childish singing and careful, smart drumming. Well worth digging out.