Happier times

Rewinding a bit to earlier in the year, in that brief window post-lockdown-recovery and pre-MCL-and-elbow-injury, where things were bright and happy and full of climbing potential. Okay, okay, so things were mostly full of sitting on bolts at Peak Lime chossholes, but sometimes that sitting was interspersed with upwards motion and sometimes that motion resulted in success and confidence. Confidence that I was just about ready to apply to trad.....just before I found myself with two limbs out of action. Before then I'd just been dabbling, keeping my hand in, whilst using the sport for training, but still managed a few nice routes...

Frostbite, Wilton 2. 

I'd given this a thorough clean at last year's Wiltonfest (before trying to casually romp up Falling Crack, slipping off whilst casually clipping a cam, and ending up tangled in the rope, sizeable arse over tit, in front of Hank Pasquill, and then slinking off in a sulk). The diligence of my cleaning was rewarded as when I came back this year, it was both obviously unclimbed and obviously still in great condition. Thankfully a summer of anal retentive micro-beta note-taking about redpoint projects had erased all useful information gained from my abseil cleaning, so I could set off with a clear mind and discover that it was a very good, pushy little multi-crux two-star testpiece.

 

Jasper, Stoney Middleton

Notable for two reasons. The first was a sign that pushing myself regularly on sport was having some benefits: Coel was initially appalled by the idea - "You're REALLY warming up on an E3?!" - "Well yes, that's about F6b+, and I'm regularly warming up on/above that, and I can see the gear should be pretty obvious too". When F6c is not longer hard and F6b feels like a rest.... And yes it was fine, and yes this was a good indication I could have done okay this summer / autumn. Secondly....JASPER! My friends' Dunc and Berie's tabby tomcat whom I used to hang around with / cuddle / harass / get scratched by quite regularly when I lived in Sheff. Lovely grumpy old oaf! I'd always intended to climb this route with Duncan, but after a mere two days climbing with him this summer, he'd spannered his wrist with his mid-life crisis choice of skateboarding and trying to show off to teenagers, and I couldn't wait any longer. So sorry Dunc, but here's to the memory of Jasper <3.

Anyway....

It's now been nearly two months since I injured myself. I am still injured but things are easing off, just as the weather has started crapping out more reliably of course ;). Plentiful gym rehab, a fair bit of moorland romping / recceing, and sporadic light climbing is helping my knee feel more mobile and resilient, although I haven't tried running again after the last debacle. Easing right off on my climbing and tweaking my eccentric / rehab program is helping my elbow.....not get any more injured at least. Physio consultations imply it's not too bad, but it's certainly inhibiting me a lot. However there's a glimmer of hope! I started some tentative falling practise the other day (on lead, I'm still too wary bouldering) and that was fine on my knee swinging directly into the wall, so at least there is something (important) I can train. In the meantime, more bumbling recaps:

Piggy And The Duke, Crowden Towers

Coel was keen for Arabia, I was unusually willing to give Kinder a go as an alternative to the gym for leg rehab, so I forced myself up there. Fuck me it was grim. I had to rest 4 or 5 times on the final slog up Crowden Clough. No....it never gets any easier with DVTs. All I can do is be more gentle on myself and take it slower. Anyway, Arabia was in a howling gale, so we did a circuit of the South Eastern Edges, via this scenic sandbag, then on to Herford's Route on the Pagoda, an even worse sandbag on which the final ankle-breaking mantle-above-a-ledge had me seriously questioning whether this was sensible knee rehab, and finally down Jacob's Ladder and a vow never to go up there again until I've forgotten what the walk-in is like, which given I was just browsing Nether Tor whilst trying to find this route name, I might have already done, sigh.

Emmenthal, The Range

Now on to the proper stuff. Proper knee AND elbow rehab as it's ledge shuffling in the most ledge shuffly sort of way. Proper spirit-lifting mental rehab as as well as being easy it's also bonkers, fun, inspiring, characterful and intriguing. The weather was good, the scenery was lovely, Jodie and Kai were game for an adventure and liked the fun of it all, and we got to watch an amusing seal ruckus . And my knee only got one tiny twinge, standing up from rigging an abseil. Okay I did get multiple torso lacerations from failing to post myself through the chimney slot on Big G's The Old Steam Piano (one to go back for when it's dry), but it was a small price to pay. After warming up at The Range and another tentative but eventually pleasing day at Smurf Zawn, I managed to nourish my soul further doing Mantrap in Mousetrap Zawn which was just brilliant and my route of the year I think, cheers Luke for coming along for the ride. All of which was perfect, if expected, confirmation that adventurous / esoteric sea-cliffs are exactly what is good for my mind and body in the current state, despite the rarity of being able to rouse partners for such pleasures. It's still in my mind for some winter sun days (albeit depending on how draconian the Welsh covid-5G rules AND associated racist vigilante nationalism get too).

The Crunge, Craig Y Forwyn

Williams and Muzza P were bleating on about how great Craig Y Forwyn was. I turned up and almost all of it apart from the Great Wall looked like a direct and dire mixture between Wye Valley and Willersley. Ugh. Turns out that despite most of the crag being less aesthetically inspiring than a single hold on The Range, the rock is actually quite decent, full of hidden horizontal breaks, and actually climbs really well for limestone. I should have more faith given it's A55 / Llandudno area which is infinitely superior to any greasy crumble in the Pennine dales. Talking of which, the BMC should stop pissing around renovating the world's worst sport climbing on the fringes of Horseshoe, and instead purchase Forwyn main cliff, nuke all the ivy, install some bolt lower-offs, and purchase a caravan in the park below as a climber's mini-hut #realtalk

The day after we did a bit at Marine Drive and Crinkle Crags which was great as usual, saw a goat, lots more seals, wind turbines, etc etc. 

Anyway that's it for now. I'm cultivating a fine balance of being grumpy that I've missed getting away, but also being vaguely inspired for gritstone which is pretty essential at this time of year.

Extremes.

Let's talk extremes. No not those extremes like Mild Extremely Severe i.e. E0. But extremes of media taste, in my case, music. I post a lot of stuff on Facebook and elsewhere that gets universally ignored so why not do it here too. Although this is a post with a purpose. Sometimes I wonder if I like extreme music through habit, or for the sake of extremity itself, or to keep playing the role as "that sociopathic weirdo who likes devil music". And then I hear some pure banging evil filth on my MP3 player and am headbanging to it at the wall or gym, and know that it's genuine. So in the spirit of that, here's some of the more extreme tracks I have genuinely loved recently and every time I hear them:

Kilbourne & Plexøs - Pain Becomes Pleasure (at 1:51:50 in video)

(Skip to 1:51:50 because fuck blogspot's inability to embed timestamps)

Only available as part of Kilbourne's mixes (including a better quality example here: https://soundcloud.com/discwoman/discwoman-94-x-kilbourne , an excellent mix overall). This is my headbang-of-the-year track, I can't resist it any time. In an era when a lot of hardcore is trying to be too clever with samples drops and chopping up tracks, this is refreshingly direct and banging as fuck. In fact it's as much like double speed techno as it is normal gabber. Fresh bleeps and stabs carried by relentless kicks and it works perfectly for me.

Leeloo - Sexta 

Also heavily featured on Kilbourne mixes. Christ, this track. This is the sort of track I heard partway through a mix and had to do a double take when it comes out of nowhere. Just listen to the melodic intro, this is the 1% of hardcore that is so fresh and invigorating. Uplifting and mesmerising and paired with beats that are bewildering and hard-hitting (do they run at 220 bpm.....or 440 bpm?!). Pure beauty and the beast vibes. I love it.

Drokz - Failure

Terrorcore (for those poor uncultured oafs who don't know) is a harder faster version of gabber (and actually used to be called speedcore before that got even faster) and is often a bit purposeless and pointless for me, speed and hardness for their own self-referential purposes. This 13 minute epic, rolling at 250 bpm after an intro longer than most actual pop songs) is NOT, it's a flagship example of extreme dance music that is properly crafted, atmospheric, melodic and constantly evolving as well as furiously intense. 

The Satan - Gangzta Cash

One of the anthems of the year thanks to PRSPCT records continued good taste and output, it's been featured in many of their mixes, and gets me grooving every time. In particular the organic wood-style breakbeats, a nice throwback to older gabber in which breaks were an important part of the flow energy. Throw in some bouncy bass, ravey stabs and a clear crisp production, and it's irresistible. As a bonus the artwork is brilliant.

Monolog - Hook Echo (End.user remix)

https://soundcloud.com/monolog-madsl/07-hook-echo-enduser-remix

Another absolute gem that I first heard on a PRSPCT Quaranstream mix, from End.User himself. He applies his notorious breakcore skills to Monolog's dark EDM / DnB styles, and the result is fantastic. As soon as I heard it in the mix I knew I had to get it, and after a listen in the car I knew why I loved it so much - both the hugely expansive swirls of crystal clear sound, the wall of crisp breaks.....and the drop at 4:50, jesus fucking bass. Otherworldly sci-fi dnb masterpiece!

Dom & Roland  - Beach Bum

Well this might be a bit of a cheat as not only it is a fairly tame track by the consistently excellent DnB legend who created such ferocious masterpieces as Imagination, Maximus, Jungle Beast, etc, the main reason I like it is for the pure mellow surf twang vibes of the intro. Okay so the rest is pretty gnarly with a "grizzly bear with indigestion" bassline and militant beats. But it's the combination with those guitar licks that gets me. Who says harder DnB can't be fun??

...And Oceans - Cosmic World Mother

I'm not really a black metal fan, and I'm pretty not sure I'm not a symphonic black metal fan, so these Finns have done something pretty damn amazing to make this my album of the year. I listened to a bit one evening, thought it was promising, then listened to half the album on headphones in bed, and was mesmerised. A couple more listens in the car confirmed it: this album is a hell of an experience with the intensity starting immediately at 00:00 and finishing at 47:30. It does evolve somewhat from the starting blitz to a beautiful finale, but the wall of sound built from machine gun blastbeats, frenetic yet catchy guitars and soaring keyboards is epic, relentless, and to me, thrilling.

Ingested - Where Only Gods May Tread

Kings of SLAMchester!! I don't usually feel much affiliation with the city in which I skulk, but I'm happy to be sharing it with these guys. They sometimes get called slam metal or deathcore, but fuck it, I'm calling them the most reliable modern death metal band around. The whole sound is spot on, fast, heavy, varied, crunchy riffs, melodic leads here, blasts there, bassy drops now and then. But for me the vocals stand out - yes of course they're shrieked and growled, but Jason not only has a broad enough range to make you believe there's 2 or 3 vocalists at work, the vocal pacing matches the music perfectly, much better than most other death metal I hear. Having that extra "harmony" of sound, vocals used as an instrument as well as a weapon, it's great.

Disentomb - Collapsing Skies

A short but perfect intro to their "Decaying Light" album (with it's general high quality death metal and great cover). I just love the epic riff at the start of this, heavy and haunting. Throw in some methodical blastbeats and extra lead melodies, and it's pretty much perfect. 2 minutes is not enough!

Konvent - Puritan Masochism

I've got an entirely predictable "thing" for women doing extreme music, I find it particularly enticing to hear brutal sounds created by the so-called "gentler sex" (is that even a thing any more? who knows, who cares). But of course the music has to stand in it's own right, and bloody hell does this track and album. Mid-paced doom-death built on riffs, riffs, and, well, you've got proper vocals from the abyss and a lovely guitar tone with fuzzy distortion like a gentle caress of barbed wire, but....riffs!! Catchy as absolute fuck. If you're not head-nodding immediately.....there is no hope.

*BONUS*:

Technical Itch - Creature Of War VIP

Okay I had to stick another DnB track in to balance things out, albeit an older one from a few years back. This is utterly ferocious and that's pretty much why I like it. It's still recognisably drum and bass with all the rhythm and complexity that entails, just turned up to a level of intensity that perfectly befits the name.

Finally. If you like any of this stuff, go to Bandcamp or similar, search for it, buy it and more. Support these guys and girls, they're putting the effort in to creating amazing sounds.