Scorn: Evanescence/Ellipsis

After the extreme speed, power and auditory intensity, not to mention the famous "blast beat," unleashed on the world by Napalm Death back in the late 1980s, drummer Mick Harris decided to make an abrupt change in direction by 1991.  He was invited to join John Zorn and Bill Laswell with their PainKiller project, which has been covered in a couple of previous posts here, and this experience, along with his long-standing interest in electronic, dub and other music forms, led Harris and former ND band member,  bassist/vocalist Nicholas Bullen, to form Scorn.

It is understandable that the pair thought to gradually shift and evolve their sound through the first two Earache Records albums, 1992's Vae Solis and the following year's Colossus, where, on the first recording especially, thanks to the guitar work of Justin Broadrick, traces of the grindcore sound where very much present.  The second disc, though, pushed more into a dark, electronic sound world and the transition continued into 1994 and the third album.

Evanescence was perhaps the pinnacle of what Bullen thought could be done with the project, though there were apparently personal reasons for his exiting Scorn not long afterward.  Whatever transpired, he and Harris left a remarkable recording, with the 63-minute album a unified work with all of its pieces well-sequenced and consistent from start to finish.  A lot of labels get applied to this music—illbient, electronic, trip hop, dub, isolationist—but Scorn was in its own world at the time.

Bullen's bass playing harmonizes very well with the sampling and electronics, minimal guitar and Harris' drum programming, which is also extremely well done.  The detached, monotone vocals may do more to engender the feeling of "isolationism," but, while many might view the record as dark (and there's plenty of reason to feel that way given Scorn's extensive catalog over the decades, especially when Harris took it solo with the next album, 1995's Gyral), it doesn't have that feel to this listener. 

 

The success of Evanescence invited a remix album, Ellipsis, with contributions by such luminaries as Laswell, Meat Beat Manifesto, Robin Rimbaud/Scanner, and Autechre, and it is intriguing to hear the recordings back-to-back—to some, Ellipsis is better, though this blogger prefers to think of them as complementary and the latter as revealing different audio impressions of the original material.  Scorn's sound necessarily changed when Harris continued with the project, with percussion taking center stage and, therefore, becoming much more minimalist and, yes, darker.  

Fortunately, though he has put the brakes on a couple of times, Scorn is still with us, including albums in 2019 and 2021, while he has also, fortunately, also revived his amazing Lull project, as well.  It's been a remarkable career and good to see that, despite many trials and tribulations in a tough profession, Mick Harris continues to put his indelible and individualistic stamp on some amazing electronic music.