Uitgeschakeld - The Four Stages Of Enlightenment (2017)

Uitgeschakeld returns to AOW with a crushing, deeply meditative collection of four massive 80 minute HNW compositions concerned with Eastern philosophy and tradition. The pieces here will satisfy anyone familiar with the project's previous releases, as well as anyone looking for truly suffocating wall compositions, but here Uitgeschakeld also delves deeper into the relationship between nihilism and the nothingness of Buddhism, the place where nothing means anything and no longer has to, a place removed from meaning and open to possibility. Open to beyond, past suffering.

On a personal note, this record has been tremendous help to me during a difficult personal time. The depth and meditativeness of it, the calm in the midst of a storm...the ideas this record is getting at, the beauty they're hinting at...it's difficult to achieve, at times seeming out of reach. The pieces here have helped to drain me at times, to forget anxiety and hurt, and to simply focus on what is. I hope that this record could do that for others. Casper is one of the few people working in HNW that i think really understands what nihilism means and is, and his work as Uitgeschakeld has simply become the standard by which I will measure all other "nihilistic" projects.

Packaged as four separate albums, each with their own artwork, but united by a design and conceptual aesthetic. Released in a limited edition of 10 hand-numbered copies.