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I’m not sure when exactly I came across Mold Omen, but there’s a solid chance it was in the Baltimore basement venue I ran ten years ago, at a show where I served as promoter, flyer designer, doorman, sound guy and janitor–a distressingly regular occurence in those days. It was thankless work, but it meant I’d occasionally see something special. Mold Omen was (and is) special.
A long-running collaboration between two unrepentant zone-chasers, Mold Omen is an experimental noise act that eschews the stereotypical macho theatrics of power electronics or harsh noise wall in favor of a kind of shambolic, ambient-leaning jumble of synth drones, prepared guitar, sampled percussion and effect-drenched horns. Thoughtful without pretense, challenging without affront, Mold Omen craft an endearing presence that shines on Worse for the Where, their most recent tape on the long-running Baltimore experimental label sPLeeNCoFFiN.
Baltimore duo Mold Omen has been consistently cranking out quality cassettes on numerous labels for over a decade now. While often exploring widely-divergent sonic dimensions with each successive magnetic transmission, Mold Omen’s approach to recording seems strikingly consistent - loosely improvised executions of focused pre-conceived ideas and structures.
Worse for the Where melds sub-aquatic bass rumble and feedback with saturated sax, guitars, and keys. In this sound world, buried industrial sounds easily rub elbow to elbow with jerky keyboard rhythms, conjuring a bizarre amalgam of early Konstruktivists and Blues Control. Art includes one of kind collage covers with pasted on diagrams from 1970s stitch books.
sPLeeNCoFFiN
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Baltimore Sound Document features new music releases from Baltimore artists. To have your music considered, email [email protected].
