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PHILLIP PIETRUSCHKA – ITINERANT LABOURS (CD by Cajid Media) *
EXPANSION BAY – STAR OBOLESCENCE (CD by Spanish Magic) *
AUN – MULE (CD by Oral) *
01EK – SUICIDE PREVENTION (CD by Oral) *
MIMETIC UNDER PRESSURE ULTRA (CD by Spectre)
KRAKEN CHAGRIN (CD by Spectre) *
CAMANECROSZCOPE ECHOES OV BECKONING ARCANUM (CD by Spectre)
SPECTRE DECADE: ANNIVERSARY COMPILATION (CD by Spectre)
SISTRENATUS DIVISION ONE (CD by Cold Spring)
TERMINAL SOUND SYSTEM COMPRESSOR (CD by Extreme) *
LESS-LETHAL VOL. 1 (CD compilation by Alku)
?ALOS – RICORDI INDELEBILI (CD by Bar La Muerte)
PEST SOUND – 76 KILOS LAUGHING (CD by Stunt Kite)
EVELINA DOMNITCH & DMITRY GELFAN & VARIOUS ARTISTS – CAMERA LUCIDA (DVD by Line)
TUPPERWARE – BETON INSEL (CD by Klitekture) *
KRATER – HARMONIC TREMOR (CD by Klitekture)
BLOKE – TEARS OF THE BROKEN WARRIOR (CDR by +G6PD Records) *
YVAT – CHROMA (CDR by +G6PD Records)
MARK SADGROVE/SAM HAMILTON (CITY PEOPLE’S FARMERS MUSIC) – SHITTY PEEPHOLE LAMA KUDOS (8″ Lathe Cut by A Binary Datum)
UN CIEGO – VINCENNES MONUMENT/KALI GANDAKI (7″ Lathe Cut by A Binary Datum)
ANDY GRAYDON – AT BAY (CDR by Winds Measure Recordings) *
EA – BALANCING ACT WITH CONTROLLED DYNAMICS (CDR by Winds Measure Recordings)
GREAT SPEECHES (compilation CDR by Chain Tape)
FILTHY TURD – SCHOOLGIRLS IN CHAINS (CDr by CutHands) *
LOVELETTERS – DOKE SMOPE (CDr by CutHands)
ADAM_IS – MOLES (CDR by Echo Music) *
INSECTS WITH TITS (CDR by 804Noise) *
EARZUMBA – REAL RUIDO PASTIZO (CDR by Editions_zero) *
LOVE HZ – LIVE AT BLA (3″CDR by Ambolthue Records)
PUIK – 26 (cassette, private)
PHILLIP PIETRUSCHKA – ITINERANT LABOURS (CD by Cajid Media)
This is certainly one of the stranger CDs I heard lately. Pietruschka studied electro-acoustic composition at RMIT (that is down under) and influenced by ‘studio production techniques inspired by Pierre Henry, Luigi Nono and Ennio Morricone and playing around with improvisation musicians. That doesn’t make this a strange release though. Each of the pieces ‘is a study or commentary on a particular film of films and the accompanying soundtrack. The films were chosen as provide a significant point of intersection between the cloistered world of avant-garde and experimental music and the populist world of cinema’. Five pieces, and I do believe all the films are from the genre ‘horror or phantasmagoric nature’. None of the titles did mean anything to me. Pietruschka found a whole bunch of people to play all sorts of instruments on this record. Many guitars, but also cello, vibraphone, percussion, trombone, oboe and accordion, mainly by people who we found on earlier Cajid releases. It’s strange music, since it links to film, perhaps but to which scene, if any at all. Or is it really merely a play with the type of sound tracks used, and are these films imaginary? (I know could investigate online, but I think I rather leave myself thinking about possibilities, than knowing for sure). The music itself is a rather nice, ranging from softly played to shrieking noise to cheesy almost poplike music in ‘The Evidence Of Love’. It’s in various places and that is the strange thing about it. It takes elements from soundtracks, the cliché’s perhaps if you want, and they are replayed in a strict musical sense. That makes this release not just a strange one but also a fascinating one. Because it’s so different and in various places, makes it quite a cinema for the ear. Great release. (FdW)
Address: http://www.cajid.com
EXPANSION BAY – STAR OBOLESCENCE (CD by Spanish Magic)
From New Zealand comes Nathan Thompson, who is a long term member of Sandoz Lab Technicians – one my favorites in the field of lo-fi drone noise rock. He’s also been a member of Sleep, Eye, Gate and many more, but Expansion Bay is his solo project. He plays ‘processed instruments and a g4 laptop, also utilizing field recordings and samples from various band projects’. Nathan is not a subtle man, but he moves away from the world noise but still maintains his way in making a bit more forceful music. It’s not that it’s loud, but he uses loads of sound files which he plays at the same time, seemingly adding a new one every time. Some of these files are the same as the before, but placed a bit of order, so that a swirling mass emerges. In ‘Three Peaks’ these are loops of church bells, with a little bit of what could be firework sounds. In this endless stapling the bells still sound like bells, so unlike Reich’s ‘Come Out’ the sound stay as they are. In the other two pieces it’s more difficult to recognize what is going on, but they might be violins, guitars and/or electronics. It music without a real focus, but that’s in this case quite appealing. It doesn’t go anywhere but it keeps swirling and moving around. Field recordings moved away from the microsound area, and one that makes a bit of difference. Very nice work altogether. (FdW)
Address: http://www.spanishmagic.org
AUN – MULE (CD by Oral)
01EK – SUICIDE PREVENTION (CD by Oral)
So far the Oral label from Montreal released CDs by people we already knew, like Angel, CM von Hauswolff or Joe Colley, but recently they shifted to some at least that are new for me. One Martin Dumais works as Aun. He comes from a classical background, but his label Hautec released Akufen, Champion and Deadbeat, and is DJing himself. However Aun is something different and sees him going back, apparently to his first love, that of ambient music and a bit more darker version thereof. I played this a couple of times, but I don’t seem to be making up my mind. What do I think of this? It’s pretty remote music, doesn’t grab you right away, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Also at times I thought it sounded a bit dated, a bit like mid-nineties Asmus Tietchens, certainly in ‘Meldal’, but that again doesn’t need to be a big problem. It’s all pretty decent music here, mixing some industrialized version of ambient music with more atmospheric textures, but it stays a bit too far away for my taste.
Perhaps a similar problem of not knowing how to make up my mind I have with the release by 01ek, which is one Alexander Wilson, who is ‘an interdisciplinary artist, musician, theatre director, and theorist’ in Montreal. The problem here lies more in the fact that it seems that Wilson can’t make up his mind. What does he want? A post-rock like opening, a CD skipping piece comes next and then a dark slow techno like piece. If one didn’t know better one could easily assume that this is a compilation of sorts than the work of one man. Maybe disinformation is the goal of Wilson? The best bits were the more ambient textures in which he cleverly hides some of the more hidden musique concrete textures, such a chorals. But this mixed bunch of musics called for a mixed bunch of reactions here. (FdW)
Address: http://www.oral.qc.ca
MIMETIC UNDER PRESSURE ULTRA (CD by Spectre)
KRAKEN CHAGRIN (CD by Spectre)
CAMANECROSZCOPE ECHOES OV BECKONING ARCANUM (CD by Spectre)
Three albums, from Belgian label Spectre, focus on various expressions of sonic ambience.
Being relatively different stylishly, the common denominator, apart from being released from the same label of course, is their experimental artistic approach to the genre. When something is “ultra” it means that it is beyond normal. Thus the title of Mimetic Under Pressure’s latest album hits right in the bull’s eye regarding the listening experience. “Ultra” is one musical piece running approximately one hour. Being an extremely complex work it is a hard beast to describe. If not exclusively based on, there is a great utilization of field recordings from the inside of the human body. With an almost inaudible opening, the first part of the album belongs to minimal expressions of deep rumbling and subtle noise drones (blood running through the veins?). As the album progresses the beats of a human heart organ add some discreet rhythm texture to the work. Slowly the work develops from sheer dark ambience to spacey tranquillity. As we approach the end (from approx. 50 th minute forward) the work turns into extremely beautiful and atmospheric sounds spheres reminiscent of Danna & Clement’s ambient/new age-milestone Summerland” (1987). “Ultra” is a pleasant and an extremely rewarding piece of abstract ambience. Equally operating in spheres of ambience, the stylish expression of Belgian project Kraken still stand as a contrast to the work of Mimetic Under Pressure. Where “Ultra” had its moments in the dark ambient territories Kraken second album titled “Chagrin” exclusively circulates in the world of blackness. In contrary to the opening of Mimetic Under Pressure’s “Ultra”, the opening moments of “Chagrin” is everything but inaudible. Like a very bad nightmare, first track “Drijvende honden” might scare the hell out of the listener with its psychotic echoed female voices processed into swarms of satanic drones. Kraken creates spheres that drift in territories of noise and subtly distorted rhythm-textures. With its cinematic approach “Chagrin” would be the perfect soundtrack to psychic horror movies, though if it were ever used in a horror movie, you’d probably be too scared to watch it…! Disturbingly great piece of sonic horror! Third album-release is titled “Echoes Ov A Beckoning Arcanum” and comes from the project Camanecroszcope II. The musical style on the album sounds like a blend between the industrial deep space-ambient of Lustmord’s classic “The place where the black stars hang”, the sinister dark ambient of Inade’s “Aldebaran” and the early expression of the German post-krautrock/ambient-style of Tangerine Dream and Edgar Froese. The balance between cinematic darkness and musical atmospheres created by the floating orchestral soundscapes is quite remarkable here. “Echoes Ov A Beckoning Arcanum” nicely balances between utter darkness and atmospheric beauty. Highly recommended. Thus we have an impressively high quality of experimental ambience on all three albums from the Spectre label. Highly recommended, though do not play at your kid’s birthday party! (NM)
Address: http://www.spectre.be
SPECTRE DECADE: ANNIVERSARY COMPILATION (CD by Spectre)
10 years of powerful electronics are being celebrated on this new compilation from the Belgian birthday label Spectre. “Spectre decade” opens in the the non-rhythmic section with three ambient-based contributions from Iszoloscope, Ah Cama-Sotz and Kraken. All three belongs to the darker parts of the ambient scene. Fourth contribution on the album, “A cold night in march” from Antigen Shift, change direction with the excellent atmospheric technoid track with catchy rhythm textures and great melodic soundscapes. Loss continues the rhythm-oriented expression with his track titled “The wait”, though this track moves into much noisier territories compared to the previous from Antigen Shift. Distorted power noise-rhythms saturate the subtle yet quite remarkable orchestral dark ambience of Loss. A harsh but beautiful track. Empusae continues with another atmospheric track of technoid industrial, “Consaguineous pain” which is less harsh and more chilled than the Loss-track. Following track from Hybryds, “The woman in my head”, moves into nocturnal sound spheres with the passionate and dreamy downbeat track oozing of atmospheres and excellent female vocals. This Morn Omina contributes with the ethno-industrial track with great downbeat tabla-percussions. Towards the end, Mimetic Fake delivers a heavy dub-like track that slowly emerges into faster idm-like rhythm-textures (“10 angles”), before Hypnoskull closes the album with the great cinematic and rather dramatic breakbeat-track “The Arizona nightmare motel machine”. Thus we have a very nice compilation that demonstrates the wide musical spectrum of Spectre. Ten more years, please (NM)
Address: http://www.spectre.be
SISTRENATUS DIVISION ONE (CD by Cold Spring)
This is a quite interesting release from Canadian project Sistrenatus. British Cold Spring Records is known and respected for their orientation in wide spectres of genres, from Martial music across orchestral ambience and industrial to harsh expressions of noise/power electronics. Normally these various styles are not combined, though this is exactly what Sistrenatus does on this, their debut-album “Division one”. And they succeed in doing so! The overall expression is a mixture of harsh industrial and orchestral black ambience. Drones of noisy electronics permeates the works, sometimes subtly, other times with overwhelming power developing the work into harsh noise. Starting out with the sound of church bell, the opening two tracks set the pace and the atmospheres of the album with the blend of concrete sounds, industrial noises and subtle spoken voices. Chapter “III” represents the first assault of extreme aggression as hordes of crushing electronics wash over the innocent listener meanwhile evil voices of pure wrath strengthens the feeling of discomfort. An excellent mixture of power electronics and death industrial on this one! As chapter “IV” takes over slow and heavy martial rhythms occur assisted by screeching noises and ancient horns giving the atmospheres of Middle Age. “IV” represents the calm before the next storm, which comes as chapter “V” penetrates with deep rumbling buzz-drones. Throughout “Division one”, Sistrenatus nicely changes between expressive aggression and settling ancient atmospheres. Towards the end of the album (chapter VIII + XI) the gates of hellish noise open completely resulting in an anything but friendly farewell to the listener from Sistrenatus. Certainly a promising debut from this powerful Canadian project. (NM)
Address: http://www.coldspring.co.uk
TERMINAL SOUND SYSTEM COMPRESSOR (CD by Extreme)
This is a very cool release! Australian label Extreme Records has always had a great skill in finding the outer-limit-sound artists. If electronic music labels were a car industry, Extreme Records would unquestionably be a Mercedes! It was Extreme Records that released the legendary “Music for bondage performance”-series from Japanese noise maestro Merzbow plus the massive 50 cd-“Merzbox” from the same artist. Also pioneering artists such as Muslimgauze, Paul Schütze and Otomo Yoshihide are parts of the label’s catalog. And the story apparently goes on! Latest sound scientist from the Extreme camp is the Australian artist Skye Klein composing under the name “Terminal Sound System”. With a starting point taken in the drum’n’bass-scene “Terminal Sound System” takes the listener across a great number of impressions and expressions. With breakbeats and buzzing bass drones operating in the sub-levels, mr. Skye, takes everything from technical jazz rhythm-textures and aggressive thrash-like guitar riffs into his spicy soup of sonic complexity. As a metaphysical carpet above, drifting soundscapes of ambient create an excellent touch of nocturnal atmosphere on the album. “Terminal Sound System” brings something new and unexplored into the drum’n’bass-scene, simply by taking his starting point in the glory days of British experimental breakbeat-scientists such as Jacob’s Optical Stairway (a.k.a. 4Hero), T-Power and Squarepusher. Almost twenty years after the birth of jungle it’s a great pleasure to realise that there are still new territories to explore. Excellent album! (NM)
Address: http://www.xtr.com
LESS-LETHAL VOL. 1 (CD compilation by Alku)
It’s difficult to make a weapon that is sound based and lethal: you might killed yourself. But sound can be used as a weapon, in for instance frightening the enemy or in torture. The idea of sound as weapon has been an appealing one to many sound artists, from the trumpets used in Jericho via Throbbing Gristle to many of today’s noise artists. The booklet that comes with this compilation gives a nice survey of the various methods that have been used throughout the years. This is a CD that should be played of course to fully understand the weapon aspect of it. Some of the pieces seem to me a mere statement of noise, such as Dave Phillips, Justice Yeldham or Weasel Walter, or just a bit stupid like Lasse Marhaug mixing in Whitney Houston (but of course that can be effective torture to some). And in some cases it’s just very difficult, as in Mark Fell’s hyper active rhythm piece or the curious piece of popmusic and silence of Gaeoudjiparl van den Dobbelsteen. Although I quite enjoyed this compilation, I couldn’t help thinking of it as of ‘just’ a fine compilation based loosely around the theme of sound as a weapon. Charming looks don’t kill. (FdW)
Address: http://personal.ilimit.es/principio
?ALOS – RICORDI INDELEBILI (CD by Bar La Muerte)
PEST SOUND – 76 KILOS LAUGHING (CD by Stunt Kite)
These two CDs are offered by one company who does promotion for Italian labels, and they are musically connected. ?Alos is an Italian band of three persons, with ?Alos on vocals, guitar, violins, bells, DJ Tonnerre on bass and percussion and Mae Starr on piano. Behind ?Alos is Stefania Pedretti who was a member of Allun and Ovo, and who designs fashion. As ?Alos she does ‘culinary-musical’ performances, of which I have no idea what it looks, tastes or smells like. I do know what it sounds like, since I heard the CD. ?Alos sings in a rather free mode, and the playing is tightly placing rhythm structures around it. Popmusic with a strong twist, we would say. It’s too much in a common place to be ‘experimental’, but at the same time it’s too weird to be real popmusic. A bit of postpunk, independent, Ludus less a saxophone, music. Quite nice, but I am rather intrigued what the culinary aspect of this would be.
Pest Sound is a band started by guitarist/singer Neil Ovey from Wales who stranded in France, where he started this band with Franck Mahmoudian on bass, Sylvain Dorange on piano and Frederik Guerin. They opened for David Thomas and Steve Albini recorded ’76 Kilos Laughing’ with them in Chicago. This is about everything I don’t like about this kind of music (not the Albini part): the singing with his dramatic bending, the ‘asymmetric’ playing, the raw men type music that the older girls love. The ‘true emotion’ music which alternative pop lovers like (‘see them sweat’ ‘thank god no laptop, but the real thing’). Even more than ?Alos this is the true alternative rockmusic, to which I am highly allergic. I do like an odd ball in Vital Weekly, but this is just too much. Maybe the press agent should realize we ‘don’t do everything’. (FdW)
Address: http://www.barlamuerte.com
Address: http://www.pestsound.com
EVELINA DOMNITCH & DMITRY GELFAN & VARIOUS ARTISTS – CAMERA LUCIDA (DVD by Line)
Perhaps the DVD will rescue the CD market. Less easy to copy and put on peer to peer sites. It might be, and perhaps that’s the reason why 12K/Line move into this territory with this, their first release in this format. Evelina Domnitch and Dmitry Gelfand have developed the ‘camera lucinda’ (maybe something like chamber of light or lucidity) which is ‘a 3-dimensional sonic observatory that directly transforms sound into light by employing a phenomenon known as sonoluminescence: ultrasound, propagating within a liquid, triggers the formation and implosion of micro-bubbles that reach temperatures as high as are found on the sun and emit lights in the shape of sound waves’. Quite a mouthful as they say. After reading the liner notes and press text, it’s not clear what came first: the audio and then the video, or vice versa. I understood that many, if not all, worked with hydrophones, microphones to record under water, to capture their sounds, which in return are processed in highly Line music. Working the extreme high pitches and the extreme low pitches which is probably necessary to get things moving visually. Perhaps just Coh and Asmus Tietchens have also something in the middle range of things. I couldn’t help feeling a bit lead around by the nose here. The visual aspect is a big black screen with abstract blue in it, in various changing patterns. Of course I have no clue how this exactly works with the video, but maybe a different kind of color could be possible? Or is it the music that is basically nine times the same thing? Careful high pitched music and a bit of low end bass sounds, which is a very common ground in the Line catalogue these days. Every artists, be it Taylor Deupree & Richard Chartier, Alva Noto, Alexander Kaline, Kenneth Kirschner, Matmos, Carter Tutti and the two aforementioned ones, plus a sound piece by Domnitch and Gelfand, wouldn’t sound out of place on any of the previous Line releases, but they all don’t reach their usual standard. Maybe I am missing a point? Maybe on a super deluxe sound system and with a high resolution beamer this might work much better and is regular stereo amplification and a computer screen not the most optimal play back. Perhaps I should go out and rent a cinema for an hour or so. (FdW)
Address: http://www.12k.com
TUPPERWARE – BETON INSEL (CD by Klitekture)
KRATER – HARMONIC TREMOR (CD by Klitekture)
BLOKE – TEARS OF THE BROKEN WARRIOR (CDR by +G6PD Records)
YVAT – CHROMA (CDR by +G6PD Records)
The reason for reviewing these four together, is quite simple. The music is in one way or the other related and when I played all of these I realized why this music is less suitable for CD than it might be for vinyl, except perhaps for Krater. And perhaps they come together because they originate from unusual places. Klitekture is a label from Tenefire and label boss Luis Ortiz releases MP3 as well as CDs. Tupperware is a band actually from Tenerife and they play intelligent dance music. Ten pieces on ‘Beton Insel’ of minimalist beats, but with highly psychedelic and spacious synthesizer sounds. The background, the foundation is that of slightly changing minimalist beats, but the sound itself is quite full with all sorts of cosmic sounds going left – right, up – down and that makes this quite a hectic and ‘full’ release. And even when ten of these full tracks is perhaps a bit much, I must say I quite enjoy this combination. It’s vibrant, sparkling and marks a change, at least for me (who don’t follow every fashion trend in dance music) in the minimalist dance scene. But a bit much perhaps.
Krater is also a trio, with Ortiz playing electronica and samples, along with one Raul Gonsalez on samples, efx and textures and Cristobal Montesdeoca on piano. This is indeed much more CD music than vinyl. The piano playing is at the middle of the playing, and around it fly the particles of electronic sounds. The piano is sampled and pitched up and down, but also along with this sampling there is all sorts of crackles, hiss, static and the other usual components of microsound. Less than Noto and Sakamoto this is about rhythm and the textures of Krater are much more freely played. Sometimes tones do form a sense of rhythm, but it’s even more minimal, just a bass bump, a high peep, but that’s not the big thing. If Eno and Budd would have the same technology and still be working together than their ambient albums could have sounded like this. Quite ambient but also rather experimental, and a combination that works rather well here.
Back to the dancefloor, this time in Israel, where our Bloke is from. Bloke is Yaniv Navot, who also runs the +g6pd label, which stands for Glucose-6-Phosphate Dehydrogenase, which affected 400 million people. Music by Bloke has been reviewed before, but I don’t think it was never this big. Bloke plays melodic hardcore break beat music, loaded with lots of rhythms, but also quite warm synthesizer sounds. I am not sure if this music works really well at home. This is something you should hear really loud in an underground, smoke filled club and probably it will get your feet moving. Also at twelve tracks, clocking in at an hour or so, this is too much. Again, in a club it would probably make much sense. Pick the best four of them and get a 12″ made would be my suggestion.
On the same label but from another unlikely country is Yvat, who is from Bucharest, where he works a sound designer. Yvat has had many releases around the globe, none of which I heard (at least not that I can remember). He has only five tracks on his CDR, which is fine number. Yet the music of Yvat is less oriented towards the dance floor. It’s rhythmic for sure, but in a highly stripped down version and spiced up with electronics that are more on top of things. It hints towards some of the more experimental electronica music that can be found on labels such as Highpoint Lowlife or Expanding Records, yet it lacks the refinement of some of those releases. This makes that the music of Yvat falls a bit between categories, making it harder to place in any scene, but at the same time it doesn’t always sound that original either. A bit difficult this one. (FdW)
Address: http://www.klitekture.com/
Address: http://www.g6pdrecords.com
MARK SADGROVE/SAM HAMILTON (CITY PEOPLE’S FARMERS MUSIC) – SHITTY PEEPHOLE LAMA KUDOS (8″ Lathe Cut by A Binary Datum)
UN CIEGO – VINCENNES MONUMENT/KALI GANDAKI (7″ Lathe Cut by A Binary Datum)
Two new heavily limited releases by A Binary Datum, a label run by Mark Sadgrove of New Zealand, but these days in Tokyo. On the first record he is active himself. It’s a split record with Sam Hamilton, with whom he usually plays as ‘City People’s Farmers Music’, but for this occasion they each filled up their own side. Mark plays three songs which is him singing and playing rudimentary guitar. Here things are truly at the edge of lo-fi music. The whole production process is what it took to lay these down on a dictaphone cassette to ensure the lo-fi quality, but it’s captivating enough. Sam Hamilton’s side is very much along the same lines, but it doesn’t contain that low humming sound that comes free with the dictaphone.
Behind Un Ciego is one Andrew Scott, one half of Nest and occasional collaborator of Helga Fassonaki. Here he plays guitar, but it sounds half the time like a piano. Here too lots and lots of static and hiss sounds. Here is where the real lo-fi meet. A motor like sound might indicate that he has a battery operated amplifier and does his improvisations outside on the streets, feeding his guitar through two delay pedals. But perhaps I am entirely wrong and does he sit at home and records in 24 bit rate with some ‘degenerate’ plug in tools. Anything is almost possible these days. I must admit I am more pleased with Un Ciego, simply because it seems to me the one with a little bit more effort, and that it’s in a way connected to the New Zealand noise rock underground, which is something I usually like. Un Ciego is as such not too far away from this. Very nice. (FdW)
Address: http://www.abinarydatum.net
ANDY GRAYDON – AT BAY (CDR by Winds Measure Recordings)
EA – BALANCING ACT WITH CONTROLLED DYNAMICS (CDR by Winds Measure Recordings)
Winds Measure Recordings are steadily building a fine catalogue of what could called ‘careful’ music. Here they introduce me to the music of a band called EA and one Andy Graydon. I never heard of him, but the cover of his release lists the usual ‘field recordings, electronics, ukulele and processing’ and indeed it sounds like one could expect from this. Careful microsound like music. Or as some people would say ‘ambient glitch’. Graydon plays his field recordings in a highly processed fashion back to us, along with crackles, hiss and other static sounds. While I was playing this I was doing something stupid, a little manual labor thing, but fully concentrated on the music. I never thought, ‘oh well, I heard this before’ or something of that nature, but I was quite taken by his music, wanting to hear it from the beginning to the end, uninterrupted. I thought it was quite good, despite that it is perhaps a copy of something that I may have heard before. Especially Richard Chartier and Kenneth Kirschner’s work comes to mind. But nevertheless quite nice.
EA is a large group of people including Gill Arno, Richard Garet, Andre Goncalves, Andy Graydon, Ben Owen and Gill Sanson – I believe all boys with laptops. They play scores, graphical ones that lead them through their improvisations. It seems that the bigger the group, the more quiet things get. I recently noted that also when I heard Plains from New Zealand. They have about the same size of members. It seems like some people, if not all, to be loud, or to be different from the group. Everybody waits to have that small particle thrown in and then fades out. The score, made by Goncalves, is not yet online, so it’s hard to see what kind of built up is needed. In all, I must say that EA does a pretty decent job, again alongside Plains, or a softer version of Mimeo and Freq_out, to mention two other big bands of this nature. Highly improvised, not always holding the attention required, but a fine start. (FdW)
Address: http://www.windsmeasurerecordings.net
GREAT SPEECHES (compilation CDR by Chain Tape)
My father used to have a record with the history of 1945 to 1970, as part of a series of books he had. Short excerpts of great moments in history. The Sputnik, Kennedy’s ‘Ich Bin Ein Berliner’ and probably Martin Luther King ‘I have a dream’. When Greater Than One used that prominently in ‘Now Is The Time’ I thought it was a powerful work, admist a crazy pandemonium of samples. Fabio Anile puts behind the same speech, of which he uses more than Greater Than One, a bunch of ambient synthesizers, but it doesn’t entirely justify King’s energetic speaking. Anile is also the man who organized this release. Chain Tape is a community of individuals who make theme based compilations. Great historical speeches. Of course it would be nice to, providing some historical knowledge, make a quiz out of it, and see if you could recognize Churchill, Mussolini, Gandhi, Micheal Moore, Jim Jones, Kennedy, Reagan and Albert Hofmann (the inventor of LSD, mind you). Norel Pref uses mixed ‘speeches from all American Presidents’, so that’s a bit difficult. Not just Anile uses a bunch of ambient like backing for his speeches. Same happens to all of them, except the rather clumsy drums that are pasted by Micheal Frank in his piece using Micheal Moore talking. Which is a pity, since it’s now a nice collection of people talking over a big wash of synthesizers. Some of the more uplifting speeches, like King, Churchill or Mussolini could have used a more spicy piece of music. Just like Great Than One once did. (FdW)
Address: http://www.ct-collective.com
FILTHY TURD – SCHOOLGIRLS IN CHAINS (CDr by CutHands)
LOVELETTERS – DOKE SMOPE (CDr by CutHands)
Schoolgirls in chains begins with strange digital intro then some very quiet and looped recordings from what could be a very gentle s&m movie (which is not particularly what one might expect from visiting http:/ /profile.myspace.com/ index.cfm?fuseaction=user. viewprofile&friendID = 77003272 where we get visceral noise feedback and mimed Sadeian activities with various electronica) – and the occasional coughing laughter and music band practice – again field recorded in an “actual” girls school – but processed and looped. which is further repeated with more processing to the point of disappearance and distortion – I think the cdr attempts a purely audible representation of such antics on myspace and with its breaks and glitches perhaps manages the trick – however cerebral that might be? The repeated band practice gets rather cloying as the ‘idea’ is pummelled into ones consciousness – but mutilation of an audio track is not the same as raw meat – as Frans pointed out (vital weekly 514) the difficulties or perhaps the Nietzschean nature of noise is it inability to progress, this represents perhaps an attempt at such, but fails in its nihilism light to over come the greatest of weights- one begins to wonder if the excrement covered body on the myspace videos is not in fact real but max factor? Whatever (my favorite new phrase) progress is not to be found in noise- which is why noise is firmly at the centre of post-modernity – and so like Disney Land incapable of evolution or real sex. Whereas with Loveletters Doke Smope despite the packaging which didn’t bode well (unlike F.T.’s) what begins with cut up noise collage of feedback / loops and such slowly over four tracks engulfs the audio spectrum, there is some discernible but minimal guitar, percussion, and speech in parts, but the disc stands out in both the intensity and clarity of its production, its both harsh and interesting with finer filigrees of high and low pitches- not the raging pornography of merzbow – but certainly ritualistic and totemistic in terms of sound to give it the credentials of a schoolgirl striptease act. (jliat)
Address: http://www.cuthands.net
ADAM_IS – MOLES (CDR by Echo Music)
The city is a noisy place – we know. Cars, metro, people – they all make a sound. About a century ago, Luigi Russolo thought of the city noise as music and since the invention of the tape-recorder it has become music, starting with the train sounds of Pierre Schaeffer. Michail Adamis is a new kid on my block, but he’s well known enough to be invited by the company which are building ‘an underground tunnel in the national road connecting Athens to Thessaloniki. In their offices Adamis made an installation using field recordings made during the construction. As far as I can tell it doesn’t use any sort of electronic processing, but that is not necessary: the electronica used in making the tunnel gives already enough electrical charges and subtle changes that it’s already an interesting release. Five lengthy pieces of environmental noise. Elevators, drilling sounds and cars passing. It may sound like it was all recorded in one go, but there is a piece of ‘score’ enclosed which suggest the contrary, and that makes it all the more curious. It all makes a pretty decent, not really surprising release. (FdW)
Address: http://www.echomusic.gr
INSECTS WITH TITS (CDR by 804Noise)
While things are quiet for Chefkirk, Roger Smith teams up again with Kenneth Yates as Insects With Tits (still a shitty name) for a work that was ‘recorded in one take, no overdubs, no synths, no mastering’. So does it include guitars, drums, vocals and the full orchestra? Obviously not, because Insects With Tits plays noise, and the no synths statement obviously refers to noise intentions of this release. It moves away from the previous self-titled release of Insects With Its which was more ambient. Here we find the insects buzzing with a mass of thousands, a whole big swarm of bees buzzing above your head. It’s more along the earlier work of Chefkirk, however with one big difference: there is a lot more collating of sounds going on. Sudden shifts and moves that do not always correspond with the eleven (!) tracks that last in total seventeen (!!) minutes. It’s alright, but perhaps a bit too much in an already overcrowded scene. (FdW)
Address: http://804noise.org
EARZUMBA – REAL RUIDO PASTIZO (CDR by Editions_zero)
Christian Dergarabedian is by now more known through his Earzumba than his previous engagement with Reynols, and releases a great bunch of great CDRs. More and more he relies on the sampler to be the crazy melting pot of sounds and here he seems to be taking matters a bit further. From the field recordings of ‘Intro’ to a heavily cut up reggae collage madness in ‘Descuidado’. Spinning vinyl by hand and picking up crazy fragments, and not by strange coincidence Editions_zero remarks that this is a nice soundtrack to a b-movie. I was playing this a couple of times in a row, and each time I turned it back on and discovered new themes in this crazy road movie. It has a strange appeal, this madness, this hotchpotch of music. A strange kind of radio play even when words aren’t really used here to any extent. Not even a real story actually now I come to think of it. Turntablism without turntables. A story of no words, but the perfect soundtrack to out and make your own crazy roadmovie. (FdW)
Address: http://www.void.gr/absurd
LOVE HZ – LIVE AT BLA (3″CDR by Ambolthue Records)
Petter Flaten Eilertsen is the man behind Love Hz, who ‘uses old equipment to make new music’, and in this case, his first live ever concert (from 2002, but recently polished into this release) he uses two Radionette Kurer Radios from the 1950s. And what else? I don’t know. It’s a bit hard to believe that this is it (there is electronic like processing), but perhaps it’s so. If you ever heard a detuned radio, off station, then you might know that this can be fascinating thing. As such it doesn’t make much different if you use one, two or twenty. I must admit I found it a bit hard to listen to Love Hz, as it sounded just a bit too simple for my taste. Drone noise but not really of a very engaging kind. Sometimes the notion ‘I can do that too’ plays up and this is one of them. (FdW)
Address: http://www.ambolthue.com
PUIK – 26 (cassette, private)
In Dutch Puik means ‘great’ in a sort of hip way, but it’s also the name of a four piece band from the USA, female singer, guitar player, drums and some sort of keyboard/flute player. The nineteenth release comes on a cassette and was recorded at the No Club in Harleysville. It’s been recorded on a cassette and presented in the same form to preserve that lo-fi quality that is so absolutely necessary for this kind of music. Slighty reminding the listener all those other new and hip american improv noise bands, which I generally think as quite old fashioned and outdated improvisation sessions of noise bands that were unleashed on cassette in the mid-eighties that is now hip again.
Actually I lied about the band: I have no idea who or what or when about this. They didn’t bother to write anything on it, no return address, no info. Greatly (not!!) obscure, but why should we care?
And that was the same review as I did for ’19’ in Vital Weekly 549. I have no idea why I should bother about this. Thank god I missed 20-25. (FdW)
Address: they didn’t care that much about it and for good reason