Scorn

by Sean Cooper
Closely allied with post-industrial dub terrorists such as Bill Laswell, Techno Animal, James Plotkin, Robert Musso, and Anton Fier, Birmingham-based artist Mick Harris is something of a study in extremes. A drummer with noted death metal outfit Napalm Death through the groups late-80s/early-90s heyday, Harris began experimenting with monochrome ambient and dub styles toward the tail end of his association with that group. Releasing material through Earache as Scorn (his ambient dub aegis) and through Sentrax as Lull, in addition to other sporadic projects, his genre-spanning activities have done much to jar the minds, expectations, and record collections of audiences previously kept aggressively opposed. To the present, Scorn and Lull, along with John Zorns experimental jazz-dubcore outfit Painkiller have remained Harris primary ongoing projects, although one-off collaborations with the likes of James Plotkin, Nicholas Bullen, Bill Laswell, and Martyn Bates are common. Harris formed Scorn in 1991 in collaboration with bassist Nick Bullen, incorporating elements of ambient, industrial, dub, rock, and hip-hop. The group (though pared back to just Harris following Evanescence) have released a number of increasingly well-received full-length recordings, including the remix LP Ellipsis, which features outbound reworkings by the likes of Coil, Autechre, Laswell, and Germ. Harris solo work as Lull focuses on darker, more isolationist ambient soundscapes, some of which have been reissued domestically by Laswells now-defunct Subharmonic imprint. [See Also: Mick Harris, Lull]