Freak-D Out-Black Dice

Black Dice represented the cutting edge of New York City's postmillennial punk. The foursome started out in the Providence, RI, noise scene, which was established by Rhode Island School of Design students and centered on the legendary underground venue Fort Thunder. Unlike Providence's other leading band, Lightning Bolt -- a bass-and-drums duo who recycle riff-happy heavy metal into amphetamine-kicked skronk -- Black Dice set about tearing apart the rigid structures of '90s hardcore.

When Black Dice's lead screamer, effects-board maestro, and youngest member, Eric Copeland, elected to attend New York University, his guitarist brother, Bjorn, bassist Aaron Warren, and drummer Hisham Bharoocha decided to move with him to Brooklyn. Their first, self-titled release after the move, on respected New Jersey hardcore label Troubleman, sounds like a building collapsing: Screeching and buzzing guitar and bass crash into convulsing beats, while Eric's wordless cries approximate both outrage and anguish. Stripped of recognizable repetition and language itself, the songs don't even have names.*courtesy of Rolling stone.

Untitled, by Hisham Akira Bharoocha, RISD artist and former member of Black Dice, now involved in a solo musical endeavor called Soft Circle.