astroboy sirenophilia (c90 from ennui tapes)
woo, someone sent me stuff just for the purpose of reviewing! that someone was astroboy, and one of the things he sent was sirenophilia, which opens with 'our enemies are flat,' which feels like a slow ride into a murky post-apocalyptic swamp. seems a bit short, especially since it doesn't really have an ending: just cuts off into a short excerpt of what sounds like a dating service recording and on into the next song. most of the first side has an atmospheric soundtrack kind of feel, the score to a grainy film with an incomprehensible plot. occasionally very catchy too, listening to the song  'seishin' finally got the monster rancher theme song out of my head. some very weird stuff too, although i'm afraid i got lost so i can't tell you which track its on, but one has some low tech tape manipulation [play, rewind, play, etc] featuring someone saying "cardboard box for his penises" over and over. 'asuza II' starts of side two very nicely, energetic drum and bass beats with driving keyboard music [very purposeful sounding, if that makes sense]. 'ishtar' is a complete change, lots and lots of delay noise over a sparse, simple bass bit.  i think that i like the more beat driven tracks better than the atmospheric stuff on this side, although that could just be the mood i was in a the time. anyway, overall this is a very enjoyable listen, especially when you need a break from nasty noise stuff [like i apparently did].