1.13.21 by Ryan Masteller
I can’t friggin’ believe it!
Can you?
I can’t!
Serrater is a noise tape from none other than Michael Potter, who has made his fair share of “pretty guitar music” over the years by himself and in the Electric Nature and what have you. He runs the NULLZ0NE and Garden Portal tape labels, and he’s a fixture in the Athens, Georgia, underground scene. To say his music has been played around these parts* would probably be an understatement – it’s more accurate to say that his music has OFTEN been played around these parts. And that doesn’t even include the releases by other artists on his labels. Then we’re getting into more obsessive territory.
Can you believe Michael Potter’s made a noise tape? I can’t. And it’s a good one, and its presentation is striking. It’s not noise in the nuclear-blast-to-the-face-for-two-hours sense, but it’s still in the this-power-plant-is-outputting-some-serious-ampage one, a constant ripple of electromagnetic intensity. I wouldn’t go so far as to call it “soft noise wall,” but Potter himself has dropped the “dark ambient noise wall” hint for me to pick up on, and by “hint” I mean obvious categorical descriptor. I’m going to use it, because being in the presence of “Serrater” is like being in the presence of negative space, dark energy pulling you closer to its jagged knife’s edge. By the way, there’s lots of knife imagery on display here with this tape. It’s cool. It’s TOUGH.
It reminds me of a 1980s hard-R action movie poster. There’s even an “R” rating given to it on the inside of the j-card! This thing read my mind … So it’s not for kids, and that should come as no surprise. The rippling frequencies feel like liquid matter made sound that engulf you and leave you on the other end feeling … serrated? Certainly scoured, like I’ve been hollowed out, my innards replaced with black radioactive goop. I want to say the experience was difficult and painful, but … I liked it? Yeah, I sure did. I liked it.
Can you believe it?
This tape is already sold out from the source, Already Dead, and it just came out on December 11! But that doesn’t mean you won’t be able to find it. I know you’re a resourceful bunch.
*By “these parts” I mean my house, not the Tabs Out offices, although he’s probably been played there more than a few times as well.
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