Foetus

The first fruits of Foetus' unexpected major-label career -- likely because somebody at Columbia realized The Downward Spiral had sold a lot of copies -- Null finds Foetus hardly compromising his own approach. "Verklemmt," the lead track of this and the first single from the Gash album, finds the one-man band again creating enough noise for a ten-piece or more, horn sections, ripping guitars, metallic percussion, and more whipping up a sonic apocalypse he gleefully sings over. Chernobyl, strangled chickens, and more form just a part of his lyrical imagery of collapse. Two further remixes of the song also appear on the release -- one can almost sense Foetus amusing himself with the theoretically more "commercial" "protecto mix" -- plus three separate B-sides. "Be Thankful" serves up death metal stabs of feedback and random video-game blips and bleeps before completely exploding at the end, while "Butter" tackles similar fun and "Into the Light" explores Foetus' slow, horror movie/mood-out side. Null was later combined with the Void EP on a re-release via Cleopatra. ~ Ned Raggett, All Music Guide