Although Chicago noise artist Mark Solotroff has been destroying eardrums for nearly thirty years, first with his early American power electronics outfit Intrinsic Action that combined rabid Whitehouse worship with an evil undercurrent of S&M sleaze, later with the extreme electronic abuse of Bloodyminded and the apocalyptic industrial sludge-scapes of The Fortieth Day, it hasn't been until recently that Solotroff has started to explore more rock-based delivery systems for his visions of dystopian violence and collapse. Starting with a self-titled 12" released in 2011 and followed by another, similarly untitled 12" the following year, Solotroff's new band Anatomy Of Habit (which also features Blake Edwards of Vertonen on metal percussion, drummer Dylan Posa, formerly of Flying Luttenbachers and Cheer Accident, bassist Kenny Rasmussen, and Greg Ratajczak of Plague Bringer and Winters In Osaka) has been building a sound that is equal parts crushing noise rock, 80's-style goth n' gloom, metallic sludge and hypnotic post-punk, with long songs that stretch out across an entire side of a record, marked by marked by slow buildups into pummeling sludgy heaviness and long circular grooves. Swans and Joy Division are obvious influences on the band's music, but there's also a bit of Om-like psychedelic repetition here as well, giving this a heavy, trance-inducing feel at times.

Released earlier in 2012, the second 12" from Anatomy Of Habit comes in a white glossy jacket with a new variation on the band's "five nails" image that has appeared on the cover of each of their releases so far. This self-titled record features two more long tracks of their crushing, hypnotic post-punk, "After The Water" and "The Decade Plan", and sees the band introducing piano and synthesizer into their sound. After a haunting introduction of simple laid-back percussion and jangling guitar melody, "After The Water" opens up into a kind of slow, brooding gloom-rock, somewhere in between Swans and some slow-moving math rock outfit, the heartfelt vocals droning over this slowly developing hook; somewhere around the middle of the song, it changes into an almost militaristic rhythm with clanging bass and the vocals becoming harder, more stentorian, right before surging into a blast of crushing, pummeling sludge. "The Decade Plan" follows with slowly cascading clean guitars and speak-sing vocals that make the beginning of the song sound like some early 90s slowcore, then blasts into a crushing doom-laden riff, a strange stilted heaviness with clanking metallic percussion rattling in the background, slowly but inexorably building into a majestic finale.

Comes on white vinyl, and includes a digital download code for the album.