Schtick is an interesting thing and you have to admire anyone who thinks to himself, “Hey I know what I’m going to do! How about I attach some contact mikes to a piece of glass, then attach those mikes to an effects belt and then smear the glass all over my face and then yell into it! Won’t that be fun. It’ll make a whole bunch of really swell noises and get this dude … it is going to be so experimental that I will in fact be totally awesome. And sometimes the glass will break on my face and I will bleed and then I will bleed onto the glass and the sounds will be even more gnarly! And at the end of the performance I might just like .. . SMASH it on my head and I will bleed and sometimes I’ll bite some glass. Dude this will be so dangerous. Oh and by the way I’ll name myself after an Australian Supreme Court Judge who was falsely named in parliament as perhaps being interested in little boys and get this … the dude killed himself. How totally cool is naming yourself after a guy who kills himself like that. Dude! And then I’ll release a record and put a picture of band aids and blood smears because although it’s all about the music, blood and pain are my schtick.”
I’ve seen video of Justice Yeldham doing his thing on youtube. It’s pretty interesting and hey I’ll be honest it certainly got my attention. But if I’m being really honest, Cicatrix, for the most part, is pretty dull stuff. The highlights are the live stuff and sound checks that come towards the end of the disc. Some of those tracks especially the two pieces which I assume were recorded at the Chippendale Hotel in Sydney are actually pretty fucking good. But the initial couple of tracks are hands down some of the most boring noise I’ve heard in a while. As a noise disc it probably works well as performance art but I think that’s hardly the point. If the guy turns up in my town I’ll check him out but I doubt this disc is going to get very many more listens.
Ducks Battle Satan 