POCAHAUNTED/ORPHAN FAIRYTALE 7" REVIEWS BOOMKAT New on Release The Bats, this split 7" boasts one track each from Californian duo Amanda and Bethany, of Pocahaunted and Belgian solo noisemaker Orphan Fairytale, aka Eva Van Deuran. In the past 12 months or so Pocahaunted have risen to become one of the most talked about lo-fi/noise/psych acts around, releasing split LPs with Christina Carter and scoring themselves gigs opening for Sonic Youth. Their contribution to this release, 'Warpaint' features the kind of murky guitar and vocal haze that's characterised their most readily accessible work, leaving their music sounding like some weird pagan ceremony administrated by Grouper. Meanwhile, the Orphan Fairytale contribution 'Made By Mermaids' is a very different recording altogether, drawing on homemade and hotwired electronics to fire off primordial circuit-bent noise signals far into the ether. Two great sides, and given Pocahaunted's current cache, this isn't the sort of thing that's likely to be around for very long. Highly recommended. DUSTED Split moaner. Pocahaunted tralalas over a even-keeled repetitive guitar line and a drone background that upratchets the tension, but doesn’t really offer anything in the way of release. The track sort of stops, leaving an air of dread behind it which isn’t fully realized or deserved. Orphan Fairytale delivers some whale song synth howling, oscillating in an unsteady sea of tonality and reverb. The brevity of the split 7” format makes both acts seem more disorienting than they actually are, and might not be the best fit for this style of performance. Silkscreened sleeve. 500 copies. - Doug Mosurock THE WIRE #292 Superb pairing of aesthetics - the droned-up "eagle rock" of LA´s Pocahaunted meets the catatonic stammer-volk of Belgium´s Orphan Fairytale. The musics of both warp around your head far enough that they meet somewhere between your ears and you´d be hard pressed, in some instances, to correctly identify the noise generator responsible. Perfect. - Byron Coley