Drummer Bill Rieflin lived in Seattle, but he made an indelible mark on Chicago industrial music as a founder of Pigface and longtime member of Ministry and Revolting Cocks. (He’d go on to play with many other notable bands, including King Crimson, Swans, and R.E.M.) Rieflin died in March after a long battle with cancer, and on September 30—which would’ve been his 60th birthday—his friend and collaborator Chris Connelly released a tribute single, “Prayer,” with harpist and certified music practitioner Jessica Gallo. Based on an instrumental from Connnelly and Rieflin’s 2000 album Largo, its otherworldly ambience melds Connelly’s lovely, wavering vocal melodies and Gallo’s sparse clusters of twinkling notes. Proceeds from the single benefit the Floyd & Delores Jones Cancer Institute at the Virginia Mason Foundation, where Rieflin received care—and where Gallo played for him as a CMP.
Early this month, Chicago rap duo Angry Blackmen released the album Headshots! via Los Angeles indie Deathbomb Arc. It fits right in with the label’s many other noisy hybrids of pop and experimental music: on “Dance!,” for instance, Brian Warren and Quentin Branch trade staccato verses atop a low hum that sounds like a slowed-down siren. v
