Private Archive – Honey Aspic Enema C30

Private Archive

My immediate visceral impression is that Private Archive is going for the particular type of tone and mood that bands like Sleep Chamber have capitalized on: incorporating drugs, sex, and manliness into the salacious din of fuck den synthesizers with some rhythm. It works for some artists when it plays out more like a dirty secret than a porn theater exhibition. Honey Aspic Enema leans more towards the former category.

Let’s get it out of the way: the packaging is kind of cooler with the outer plastic J-card piece intact, as its removal reveals some smut. The smut is no problem; it’s an obscurity behind plastic and it makes it all that more interesting and dirty like the knowledge of your father’s secret Penthouse stash. The braille adhesive on the cassette shell is also a nice touch.

The best tracks for me on “Honey Aspic Enema” balance the group’s ability to create driving EBM rhythms and just enough vocals (that sort of hover in the back of the mix a bit). “Private Archive (Dog-Whistle Mix)” is easily my favorite track…great mix of sounds and it paces itself well. “Piss On Piss” also achieves this to some degree offering more sputtering rhythms.

It’s always a delicate balance between slightly piquing someone’s lusty interest and force feeding them naughtiness. Besides the aforementioned more beat driven tracks, there are some moments of ambiance and repose. The opener, “Rhapsody In Piss” takes a very delicate series of background tones and propels them forward with craven vocals and feedback while “Coital Eel” dumps a thick cum rag lump of sine waves at your ears that will make you feel like you’ve been huffing glue all morning. These more atmospheric tracks help establish the dynamics of the album.

This is a very well paced album with plenty of atmosphere for the goth club reject to the casual scumbag…definitely worth checking out if you’re unfamiliar with Private Archive. The tracks favor more vague elements of perversion, though it will be challenging for the listener to pick out any of the near incomprehensible lyrics…but the overall sterility of this tape is a big reason why it deserves a listen even at the cost of offering a more organic and varied sound palette. It is recommended for fans of Sleep Chamber, Coil, Laibach, and Women of the SS.

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