��In The Sign is the first of two cassette/newspaper sets that Locrian member Hannum released over the past year on the Washington DC label Accidental Guest, pairing his signature palette of gutted power electronics synths and hypnotic deathdrone with a thick zine-like publication filled with his strange, often disturbing collages and paintings. Tapping into the same sort of dark kosmische vastness that his main band Locrian has explored through their sweeping drone-metal soundscapes, this tape delivers a half-hour long exercise in morbid minimalist drones and primitive analog synthesizer rumble that is some of the most classically "industrial" sounding of his recent solo works, and is, according to Hannum, inspired by both Sodom's Teutonic thrash classic In The Sign Of Evil and French philosopher Paul Ricoeur's 1967 book The Symbolism of Evil.

�� Opener "Defilement" sounds like it could have oozed right off some obscure early 80's Italian power electronics tape, a five minute long slab of minimalist hum and buzz bathed in grimy tape hiss, the steady monotonous buzz of Hannum's synth boring a hole through the track's grim grey cloud-cover. "Ethical Terror" is cut from similar dark sonic cloth, murky drones pulsing in a sea of faint hiss, the sound extremely minimal, hovering in space, making for some of the most subdued material that Hannum has produced of late. There's that trace of the aforementioned old school death industrial vibe lurking within these simple, hypnotic electronics, especially when the deeper rhythmic throb of "The Impure" kicks in, a buried electronic rhythm beating like a withered black heart deep in the mix, the sound growing slightly more obscured by some faint streaks of atonal synth, swells of feedback and new layers of grimy thrum that begin to bloom further into the track.

�� The second side offers up some harsher textures via the high feedback hum that pierces through "Ritual Vision", a high pitched sinewave hovering over smears of vague distant sound, eerie distant whistling and slow building swells of dissonant synth, turning this into the creepiest sounding piece on the tape. And closer "Recapitulation" is the longest, finishing this tape with one last billowing fog of minimal hum and curling plumes of vaporous tape hiss.

�� The twelve page oversized newsprint booklet features an assortment of new digital drawings and gouache paintings featuring the sort of abstract visuals, sacred geometries, disembodied shrouds and visions of amplifier worship that have continued to surface throughout his work. Comes on a pro manufactured tape in a plastic bag, and limited to an edition of one hundred copies.