New album, “Drawing Secret Circles”, out on November 3rd!
New York City-based avant-grindcore/death-infused hardcore act MANIPULATOR presents its most ambitious work to date with its second album Drawing Secret Circles, an expansive record paired with its own video game, art book, and more.
Somewhere between the shadows of NYC’s skyscrapers and rat-infested gutters, MANIPULATOR grinds forward as intensely as the city itself: fast, loud, and unrelenting. Created by Andrew Notsch – also of instrumental progressive/post-metal band This Is The Last Time and formerly of technical death metal outfit Sunless, among others – this solo project fuses death metal, hardcore, and grind into an explosive amalgam of decimating proportions.
Notsch brings forth music concepts from some of his past and current musical projects, sometimes paying homage to his time in Sunless with dissonant intricate passages but most often, listeners will envision his knuckles being worn to the bone from being dragged across the city’s unrelenting sidewalks. Beyond the music, Notsch also controls all of MANIPULATOR’s visual identity including all music videos, media, layouts, and merchandise.
Longtime collaborator Tim Bradley (This Is The Last Time) supplies MANIPULATOR’s lyrical narratives with an unyielding sense of urgency, brutalism, and commentary on the falsehoods and lies of mankind. Bradley also supplies the samples and sound work by manipulating and orchestrating their use much like an actual instrument.
MANIPULATOR isn’t redefining genres; it merely seeks to create a no-holds-barred auditory assault that is as brutal as it is fun. Catharsis through brutality. Release through aggression. With every blistering riff, every blast beat, and every scream, MANIPULATOR invites you to embrace the chaos to calm the soul.
Mercilessly unloading its salvo of twenty tracks in fourteen minutes, Drawing Secret Circles takes the MANIPULATOR attack to new levels of musical intensity. With Notsch handling the instrumentation and vocals, the record also features guest vocals from Derrick Karg, Tim Bradley, and Juan Vargas, and additional guitar on “Fear And Mystery Drown” by Lucas Wyssbrod (Monovoth). The final production and mastering were handled by Adam Tucker of Signaturetone (Ulthar, Thou, Sunless) and the record was completed with art by Notsch.
https://www.instagram.com/manipulatorgrind
https://manipulatorgrind.bandcamp.com
