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In the end of 2006, when Moscow-based math-core quartet I AM ABOVE ON THE LEFT decided to cease down joint activity for uncertain period of time, guitarist Artem Galkin locked himself in a studio and with a help from his friends produced a string of highly diverse recordings under the names KRUZR KEN and WEEPING CAMEL. The former project was conceived as a vehicle for exploring territories of live and improvised electro-acoustics, harsh drone, experimental noise, and cinematic music. Soon, Pavel Eremeev, a bass-player and sound-engineer for IAAOTL joined, and the project got shaped as a duo of Galkin and Eremeev handling guitars, hand-made devices, and drums. The next two years saw Artem Galkin and Pavel Eremeev teaming up with Sergei Ledovski, IAAOTL’s drummer, as a furious avant-core trio called USSSY. After finishing work in the recording studio, Ledovski left and Pavel Bogachev from PREA HRADA came on board for a short period of time. Here is USSSY / KRUZR KEN MyspaceMusic page.
uSSSy / Oko (2010) / CD $11.00
USSSY are back with the second studio album entitled Oko. It includes eight tracks recorded by Artem Galkin (guitars, oud, feedbacks) and Pavel Eremeev (baritone guitar, feedbacks, samples, voice) teaming up with Pavel Bogachev (drums) from PREA HRADA. The above line-up existed less than a year, but aside from extensive gigging managed to record over one hour of studio material. It signified an increasing interest of the core members in 20th century Serialism and authentic Persian Music. Pushing the boundaries of rock music, they adopted new techniques, including in rhythm, harmony, and voice, combined natural instrumentation with field recordings and feedbacks, and created truly innovative pieces. This is the music of divine grace, intense emotions and essential identity. This is dense and heavy! (8 tracks - 41 min.)
PRESS CLIPS
"Usssy are back and have evolved their noiserock into a way more encompassing and destructive approach than the simple sharp attack tactic they had before. Oko is nothing less than a noise and feedback missile equipped with a heavy distortion warhead... They make early Sonic Youth sound like a perfectly clean and straight pop band... They love to catch you in one mood and then kick you in the gut with something of the opposite. Such a feedback storm is not for the faint of heart. Oh, how much I would like to see these guys play live." – by Georg Gartlgruber of Monochrom-Cracked (Austria) (May 2010).
The album was also reviewed at: Perte Et Fracas (France), Psychotropic Zone (Finland), Sea Of Tranquility (USA).
Artem Galkin / Meet The Weeping Camel (2009) / pro-duplicated CD-R $7.00
Microsound Electronica by Artem Galkin (of I AM ABOVE ON THE LEFT, FOOJITSU, KRUZR KEN and uSSSy fame). Recorded and produced in 2007-2009. The disc is presented inside of an oversized chipboard folder which is made out of stuck pieces of Artem’s own original acrylic paintings, and on the outside there are 4 pictures taken from modern Russian papers and magazines. The bizarre design and imagery is a perfect accompaniment for Meet The Weeping Camel hallucinogenic visions. Strictly limited to 99 art-objects. (9 tracks - 64 min.)
uSSSy / uSSSy (2009) / CD $11.00
Recorded in autumn 2008 with Sergei Ledovsky on drums (who soon retired both from I AM ABOVE ON THE LEFT and USSSY), this album features three-quarters of the IAAOTL line-up and shows the most frenetic approach to modern avant-garde rock/metal. It’s music for baritone guitar, electric guitar, drums, and barely audible gargled vocals. Everything sounds like tightly wound mainspring and gets bigger and bigger as it goes. The various brutal-prog or avant-core comparisons have a certain sense here, but there's no proud boast, just a conscious harnessing of fury punk energy to distil souls and ruin a stasis of complacency. Compared to recent KRUZR KEN outing, the freewheeling exercises by Artem Galkin and Pavel Eremeev has been toned down and their USSSY sounds more like real songs with defined structures (except of extended dirdge-drone ending of the final track). No wonder they share ground with their primary I AM ABOVE ON THE LEFT band, though the musical pulse is more rapid and the mass is closer to critical. It's heavy, explosive, rushed and exciting… and it’s still a hard nut to crack. (11 tracks - 65 min.)
PRESS CLIPS
"USSSY is another great piece of noise rock with intentions to fuck up all kinds of genres that come along with it. Their first album has an hour of ranting, rocking, raving, exploding, bass heavy, stupid noise rock on it... To describe this in detail: USSSY like to speed up things without making speed the only thing that matters. Because sometimes speed takes out the punch, and that is lame. USSSY like to hit hard and they use a heavily downtuned bass, drums and all kinds of chaos to reach that. In some ways they are quite disciplined and apart from the drone freak out at the end there are definite structures to the songs. But within these confines they let it run wild with feedback, screams and chaos. Anarchy and discipline is what it seems to boil down to. Another feature that marks almost all songs is wailing in all kinds and forms. Be it vocals that scream like a crazy banshee and which has several counterparts in underground metal, or guitar feedback that thrones over the rhythm section in a long winding bow, or just some random noise that wails through the song like a fucking cold winter storm, there is always some kind of long winded, sirene thing going on somewhere. This doesn’t corrupt the high energetic pulse held throughout. USSSY also likes to put weird things on top... The power of the classic three piece band multiplied by the force of noise rock and encaged chaos to fuse into something that could rule the worlds energy supplies." – by Georg Gartlgruber of Monochrom-Cracked (Austria) (June 2009).
The album was also reviewed at: Indievid (Russia), Rate Your Music (USA), Sonic Frontiers (USA), DisAgreement (Luxembourg), Progressive Ears (USA), Perte Et Fracas (France), Sea Of Tranquility (USA).
Kruzr Ken / Addicts & Satan (2008) / CD $11.00
What do the official anti-alcohol campaigns have to do with alcohol consumption? They scare normal people away from drinking, make people to think that drinking is not normal, and… make drinking more difficult and expensive. In fact, people don’t stop to consume alcohols: some definitely get ready to pay more for alcohols while others switch to cheap surrogates. What do Kruzr Ken have to do with alcohol consumption? Try their Addicts & Satan to learn… Not only they scare normal people (as well as alcohol abusers) to death by inventively reproduced feedback noise-droning waves and spasmodic drum-fitting… they send a special suggestive treatment for addiction to alcohol (note: it works internationally, one doesn’t have to speak Russian to get it). If you searching for in some way “la meme musique” you’d better stay away from this collection of titlelessly numerical pieces. But if you want to hear a new voice of social dissension and dissonance… here it sounds! (8 tracks - 64 min.)
PRESS CLIPS
"Addicts & Satan is truly something special. Feedback orgies counterparted with eerie screams and meauwing are back to back with bursts of chaotic drumming and no-end spliced tapeloops of noise... True, there is quite a big number of bands, especially instrumental duos, out there, who play some sort of more or less extremist noise rock, usually quite boring, to be honest, but there are also bands like Lightning Bolt and The Ruins – to name two from polar opposites of the bass/drum noise universe – who make the concept more appealing. Kruzr Ken on the other hand tune the whole concept down to its pure basics, hide away in some dark rehearsal space where it is probably cold and wet, and let it rip. Then take the mastering to the tapes, in a very primitive and basic way as well. But it is this primitivism that makes the CD stand out. Because the result is ruthlessly direct and as basic as possible in its execution... Sitting themselves between many different genres, the two do their own thing without care or regard for what the world around them might be doing. I like that. Their noise seems to come straight, well not from the heart, but probably that brain stem cells that some people like to call the reptile part of the brain... Now get me a drink!" – by Georg Gartlgruber of Monochrom-Cracked (Austria) (March 2009).
The album was also reviewed at: Cosmos Gaming (USA), Heathen Harvest (USA).
| Title | Media | Price |
| MP3-files (self-released) | free download | |
| CD (RAIG) | $11.00 | |
| MP3-files (self-released) | free download | |
| CD (self-released) | $11.00 | |
| pro-duplicated CD-R (self-released) | $7.00 | |
| MP3-files (self-released) | free download | |
| CD (RAIG) | $11.00 |
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