While Austrasian Goat and Never Presence Forever might be seperated by an ocean, their music flows together nicely on this split 10", the orchestral necro-thrash of the Goat acting as a supreme build and release that dissipates in the cold Stygian void of Never Presence Forever. The tiny Virginia-based label Small Sacrifice released this record in a limited edition of 300 copies, presented in a heavy vellum sleeve with ghoulish abstract artwork and clear spot varnish printing, and it is a powerful first offering from the label.

The first side is inhabited by The Austrasian Goat, the new solo project from Julien Louvet of French sludge-metallers Shallnotkill; we just listed the out-of-print debut LP from Austrasian Goat in our last C-Blast store update, which I described as "a creeping funeral dirge; plodding ultraheavy drums, swathes of grim minor key ambient keyboards, corroded slo-mo riffing creeping at a tectonic pace, and almost medieval sounding orchestral parts combine with Louvet's rasping, echo-chamber shriek into a bleak, atmospheric funeral fog interspersed with brief passages of dark ambience or weeping orchestral strings, a sort of crushing, abstract necro-misery somewhere in between Nortt, Skitliv and Burning Witch." The three songs that are featured here continue in that vein, beginning with the brief intro "Ab Irato", a mesmeric wash of abstract piano and blackened ambience with roaring distorted guitars surging up towards the surface from inky depths, and then moving into the swirling symphonic hellstorm of "AFBM". Still dense and asbtract, this is one of my favorite Austrasian Goat songs, a murky blast of funereal melody and blackened shrieks that drift on a sea of reverb, then suddenly the orchestral strings and glacial doom riffs and droning synths suddenly part and the music is overtaken by an AWESOME blackened thrash riff, all chunky and buzzing, shredding through the graveyard mist like an iron scythe, and it is one of the coolest songs that I've heard so far from Austrasian Goat. The third track "Ad Nauseam" is a majestic dirge, similiar to Agalloch somewhat, but cloaked in reverb and synthesizers and billlowing clouds of ambient drift.

From there, the record slips into a black chasm with Never Presence Forever. NPF's side features a single long track called "The Condition Of Not Existing", which had been recorded some time ago but was never released prior to this split. This piece is a perfect example of why Never Presence Forever is one of the most sorely overlooked artists in the dark ambient/industrial field; the track begins in a flutter of electrical hum and reverberations that sound like they are being emitted from an unseen engine, an endless buzzing and humming that eventually fades off, replaced by heavy, slow-motion drift and feedback, a mournful minor-key melody slowly unfolding around washes of heavy amplifier drone and cavernous rumblings. This piece is great, one of the better releases that I have heard from Never Presence Forever, like hearing Vinterriket performing with Troum and armed with heavier tones and louder amplifiers than usual.