Week 34

VITAL WEEKLY ENDS WITH NUMBER 1500 – SEPTEMBER 2025

ASMUS TIETCHENS & ACHIM WOLLSCHEID – FUNDSTÜCK (CD by Klang Galerie)
DAVID LACEY – THE ROOT, THE INTERIM (CD by Krim Kram)
AMANDA FEERY – NEST (CD by Krim Kram)
TED BYRNES & JEPH JERMAN – PLAY DRUMS (CD by Krim Kram)
ETANT DONNES – LES CENTS JOURS CLAIRS (CD by Klang Galerie)
FEDERICO MOSCONI – FRAMMENTI (CD by Dronarivm)
HIROSHIMABEND – A KNIFE AND CRABERRIES (CD by Opiumdenpluto)
FALTER BRAMNK – VINYLAND ODYSSEE (CD by Attentuation Circuit/Bad Alchemy)
RSN & MIACINAMIDE – INDISTINCTION #1 (CDR by Attentuation Circuit/Burial Recordings)
AALFANG MIT PFERDEKOPF – ES IST GENUG (CDR by Attentuation Circuit)
BIO-MECHANIK (CD compilation by Eighth Tower Records)
IBONRG & GARAZI NAVAS – ÇUCEN HENBILQUEYEN (CD by Hazi Esporak!)
MODELBAU – MOOK (CDR by Reinterrupt)
DOC WÖR MIRRAN – SOUNDSCRAPE (CDR by Marginal Talent)
EFFECTIVE DREAMING – DREAM CATALOGUE VOL.1 (cassette by Fluere Tapes)
DESOLATION COLONY – THE IMPOSSIBILITY OF HAUNTING A BARREN WORLD (cassette by Throne Heap)
KATE RISSIEK – DARK ENERGY (cassette by Throne Heap)
ASYLUM SYMPHONIES – OPPOSITIONAL DEFIANT DISORDER (cassette by Benevolent Pain)
MÖRKERSEENDE – EXPONERINGSTERAPI (self-released triple cassette)
DE FABRIEK – ANTI RECORD SERIES 2024-2025 (Anti Records, CDR, tape loop by De Fabriek Records & Tapes)

ASMUS TIETCHENS & ACHIM WOLLSCHEID – FUNDSTÜCK (CD by Klang Galerie)

As far as I know, there’s no English one-word translation for the German ‘Fundstück’, which means ‘found piece’. If Asmus Tietchens is a new name for you, you haven’t been paying attention in the last 30 years, reading Vital Weekly. It’s also no news that I am a fan and have met him on many occasions. His work has been of significant influence. The same can be said for Achim Wollscheid. His name might not be as familiar, but that’s because he’s a lot less active these days. In the 1980s and early 1990s, he worked as SBOTHI (Swimming Behaviour Of The Human Infant), and also as a visual artist, creating installations with light and objects. His name came up recently when someone asked me privately about my love for recycling sounds and images, and I realised I owed much to both German musicians in my formative years. Tietchens and Wollscheid released a CD together, ‘Repetetive [sic] Movement’, for Staalplaat in 1998, in which Asmus worked with sounds from his installations and which can be heard between the regular tracks – hence not a standard red book CD. After that, they were on the same label, Ritornell, and they created cutting-edge music with computers. There was to be another collaborative release for this label, and sounds were exchanged, Asmus doing his thing, but the project got lost.
Recently, Asmus found a CDR that said ‘Radio X, September 02’, named after Wollscheid’s radio program from those days called ‘Radio X’. It turned out this was the Asmus reworking of Achim’s sounds (using software called Pure Data). What he uses on the input side isn’t mentioned, but my best guess is some of Ritornell’s releases, because I recognise one I know pretty well: Freiband’s ‘Microbes’ release, which is a dominant sound source in the second half. In that respect, I think the basic material is Wollscheid’s ’60x’ CD for Ritornell from 2000. These sound sources are a rather loosely orchestrated hotchpotch of sounds that is software running wild, with ever-changing parameters, no doubt run by some clever randomisation process. I assume that’s all Achim’s doing. What Asmus brings to the table is less obvious. I think there’s a colouring of sound effects here, editing and cutting, maybe some additional treatments, and Asmus ties the whole work together, brings some quietness at times, but all the same, it still is a vastly noisy work at times. Also, concerning the original ideas of recycling, this is a fine example of how these things can endlessly take new shapes. (FdW)
––– Address: https://klanggalerie.com/

DAVID LACEY – THE ROOT, THE INTERIM (CD by Krim Kram)
AMANDA FEERY – NEST (CD by Krim Kram)
TED BYRNES & JEPH JERMAN – PLAY DRUMS (CD by Krim Kram)

So far, Vital Weekly has reviewed three releases by David Lacey, and all were collaborations with Patrick Farmer, Paul Vogel and Fergus Kelly; there have been more, such as works with Rhodri Davies, Keith Rowe, Annette Krebs and Derek Bailey. ‘The Root, The Interim’ is the first solo work I’ve heard from him and his solo work veers more towards musique concrète than towards improvisation (if that’s the suggestion you may have from some of his collaborators. Krim Kram calls this one a composition in four parts. Lacey recorded his work over 14 months, utilising recordings made in various settings, including parks, hotels, kitchens, churches, and utility rooms, where he banged on objects and played old recordings in new spaces, employing different means. Let’s say this is the sort of thing that modern musique concrète composers do all the time. Which is not something negative, it’s how things work these days. The four tracks span 42 minutes (another case of ‘I would like to see this on vinyl’?), and contain some very delicate music.
Many of these sounds are hard to pinpoint; they could be anything from insects to coffee cups being moved around on a table. The narrative aspect is perhaps not the most important thing here, and it’s all about audio illusions; the film is in your ears, or as it went in the series ‘Cinéma Pour L’Oreille’. Lacey’s work has many influences, but none of them is too specific. Things are collage-like, but not always straight forward and events blur together. Drones play a modest role, similar to processing these recordings in some way or another. Much of this seems ‘clean’, but I wouldn’t vouch for the total absence of processing. All of this bears little significance, as what counts is the way Lacey tells his musical story, and that’s something he does pretty well. Each piece is a delicate delight; never very noisy or brutal, yet also never too quiet and introspective. This is music that demands the listener to listen, and not treat this as another album of background music. This is serious music demanding serious time.
Also, I never heard of Amanda Feery, and I quote Bandcamp, “a composer working with acoustic, electronic, and improvised music, with previous works for orchestra, opera, choir, film, chamber ensemble, and electronics. Her work has been featured at the Venice Art Biennale, Open Ear, New Music Dublin, Music Current, First Fortnight Festival, and Dublin Fringe Festival.” Here, she has work about which she writes (more long quotes) “NEST is a Mass for the Tenant, not a Mass in the traditional sense, but I see the piece as a Mass for the tenants of the past and the present. NEST is also a critical response to the theme of home in Éamon de Valera’s 1943 radio address, ‘On Language and the Irish Nation’. With a libretto by Eimear Walshe, the line, “they come to make a ruin”, repeats throughout the piece like a congregational response. A line that traverses periods and regions, it conjures different scenarios, from landlords to military forces to hired goons.” Feery plays organ, tin whistle, keyboards, and electronics.
Declan Synnott plays guitar and electronics, and the choral singers of 4 in a Bar, which is an excellent name for a group of singers from a country where singing and visiting bars are so connected. For Krim Kram, this seems to be a most unusual release, one that is closer to the world of modern composition than anything else. It comes with a libretto, and with the vocals being classical-like, this is a most serious work. I admit I didn’t understand what this was about, but that’s perhaps because I missed some of the context of the 1943 broadcast (the heat might be another reason). The piece opens with an excellent drone piece for organ and layered ti whistle, and has a beautiful folk-like character. The voices come in, and in a modern, composed manner, they are hard to understand. Voices slowly become more drone-like, maybe because they are processed and start mingling with the instruments again. This turns out to be a lengthy, atmospheric section, all moody with drones and voices clustering together and some sparse organ notes, until the church organ takes over and the whole piece ends with some sparse vocal lines. I found this a great work, even when I didn’t understand what it was all about and given the kind of music, that is perhaps the biggest surprise.
The final new release in this batch is a collaborative work between Ted Byrnes and Jeph Jerman. They already had a cassette out, ‘Passenger’ on TSSS tapes, which we didn’t review. On their second album, they play drums, as indicated by the title of the release. One may have forgotten that Jerman is a drummer, playing in the free jazz noise group Blowhole and had solo percussion cassettes out a long time ago. I admit I thought this was a matter of his past, but I was wrong. Like before (so I am told), they exchange recordings of drums playing, each adding to the others’ playing. It’s all acoustic, which is easy to believe. Their playing might not be conventional, but the lack of electronics is evident. They both play a traditional set of drums, but every aspect of it, including the wood the drums are made of, is considered, not just the skins or the rims. They recorded ten pieces, not very long ones, somewhere between two and four minutes, and each sounds like a controlled explosion. The result is often chaotic, making it hard to tell if there’s any interaction or if they’re just playing random stuff. Sometimes it falls in place, and there is some fine interaction between the two players. Among the recent releases, this is one of the most improvised pieces on this label, occasionally venturing into electro-acoustic music. At 33 minutes, I thought this release had the perfect length for the kind of thing it was expressing. (FdW)
––– Address: https://krimkram.bandcamp.com/

ETANT DONNES – LES CENTS JOURS CLAIRS (CD by Klang Galerie)

When I was a young man with an insatiable appetite for new cassette releases, I never had enough money to purchase all I wanted. Releases on the French Bain Total were out of my reach, most of the time. I only had two cassettes by Krylon Hertz (see Vital Weekly 1367) and Die Form/Fine Automatic. From a friend, I got some copies of the early Etant Donnes tapes, which I, oddly enough, didn’t play as much as the average cassette from a real label. Klang Galerie already released a fair bunch of these old cassettes on CD, and ‘Les Cent Jours Clairs’ was part of a double cassette, of which ‘Cinq Portes Soudées’ was the other one. I reviewed a reissue of that one in Vital Weekly 1449; I also recounted the small wallet there. ‘Les Cents Jours Clairs’, which translates as ‘The Hundred Clear Days’, uses a similar method of putting music on a reel-to-reel, and with a pair of scissors, this tape is cut up, looped, sped up, reversed and altered in whatever analogue way possible. It’s interesting to see both releases apart, as the music on this CD was recorded a few years after ‘Cinq Portes Soudées’. The instruments are now gone, or at least rendered beyond recognition, and there’s a much more musique concrète-styled cut-up approach in these pieces. At the time, there’s an excellent layer of lo-fi approach in these pieces, which results in additional layers of hiss, and there’s never any tarting up of sound. It’s been thrown on the magnetic canvas with the sort of brutality I know from their early music, when I came across it on compilation cassettes. While some of this sounds like a random set of sounds thrown together, there’s, on close inspection, quite some organisation. Sounds repeating, even in this linear cut-up process. That process isn’t their only approach. In ‘Le Coeur Enflé’, they experiment with feedback and distortion, again with that massive layer of hiss. This is more of a power electronics piece, and fits the time this was made. This disc is an excellent example of the classic early phase of Etant Donnes, making it a great place to start if you’re not familiar with this phase. (FdW)
––– Address: https://klanggalerie.com/

FEDERICO MOSCONI – FRAMMENTI (CD by Dronarivm)

There’s a fine line between ambient and new age music. It’s something I wrote many times before. In Vital Weekly’s universe, this means a lot of music falls on the ambient side, meaning it’s not always as smooth and sweet as new age music. I had not heard of Italian musician Federico Mosconi, who uses texts by Mirco Salvadori and Barbara De Dominicis, singing these. Texts are printed in the booklet, and ” are stages of a personal journey, stories, events or moments that marked us and stay inside us like shards, foreign objects we learned to embrace.” Another thing I often mention is my lack of appreciation or understanding of text, and this, too, usually goes right over my head. Mosconi creates music with synthesisers, electronics, and may sound effects, with the reverb taking a central position, and an occasional stab on the piano. Somewhere lost in this sea of sound is De Dominicis’ voice, not always easy to understand; they are in Italian anyway. She reminds me of some of those soft singing Japanese artists, which I gather is meant to be ‘soft spoken’ or ‘intimate’, but I am not a fan of this type of singing. That, perhaps, clouds my judgment a bit regarding the overall music. This meanders about, and because the voice is still of some importance, the music is a bit pushed aside. That’s a pity, as it sounds okay, albeit a bit sweet and smooth, with a tendency towards new age. Still, in ‘Frammenti III. Gorghi’, there is some kind of improvised guitar to be heard, dragging the music immediately into a much more experimental field, and immediately had more of my attention. Throughout this, it’s not bad at all, but perhaps by the end of Vital Weekly’s lifespan, I have heard enough of this. Nothing against Federico Mosconi, who seems like a most skilled musician, but more a general fatigue? File under: to be put aside for a year and see what I think then. (FdW)
––– Address: https://dronarivm.com/ https://fonodroom.limitedrun.com/

HIROSHIMABEND – A KNIFE AND CRABERRIES (CD by Opiumdenpluto)

The previous occasion I reviewed music by hiroshimabend (no capitals) was in Vital Weekly 1312, when the project was part of the eighth instalment of Drone-Mind/Mind Drone compilation. Because it was one of four acts, I didn’t go into specifics, other than he is from Austin and now based in Austria. I found his piece a bit rhythmic and a bit gothic, but I loved the austerity of the music. There’s no rhythm in this new work, a 70-minute piece of music. The website says about this piece, “This Recording Is An Attempt To Convey The Fear, Confusion And Terror Experienced By A Woman Who Shared Her Story And Audio Evidence Documenting The Threats And Stalking She Continues To Endure At The Hands Of A Person She Had Allowed Into Her Life And Family.” (all in capitals, but let’s avoid the trump mannerism). It’s a massive piece of drone-based music, especially at the start of this work: a massively reverbed sound source, field recordings perhaps of a pumping station, with very minimal development, and this continues from roughly the 20-minute mark without the amount of reverb. After 35 minutes, the music slowly morphs into static hiss, noisily, but without the distortion that one usually gets with this kind of music. The last few minutes are, by contrast, tranquil. We’re still in field recording territory here, and it all sounds very suspenseful. I would have preferred this to be longer and include more variation in the work. There is a very consistent approach here, if not a bit long, but with some very refined drama lurking beneath all of this. It isn’t easy to know what all this drama is about, reading the cover text, but the intensity certainly comes across. It’s not easy to define this as dark ambient, ambient with a noise twist, or noise turned ambient; it’s a bit of all of this. (FdW)
––– Address: https://www.opiumdenpluto.com/

FALTER BRAMNK – VINYLAND ODYSSEE (CD by Attentuation Circuit/Bad Alchemy)
RSN & MIACINAMIDE – INDISTINCTION #1 (CDR by Attentuation Circuit/Burial Recordings)
AALFANG MIT PFERDEKOPF – ES IST GENUG (CDR by Attentuation Circuit)

I reviewed a few of Falter Bramnk’s previous releases, and he dabbles with various instruments and genres. On his latest CD, it’s the turntable. On the cover, he gets credit for “handling selected vinyl records, piano, guitars, synthesisers, percussion, drum kit, harmonic pipe, trumpet, voice and loops here and there”. There are a few guests playing accordion, bass guitar, alto & tenor saxophone, clarinet, voice, recorder, electric guitar and three people get a credit for ‘vocal presences’. There are 19 tracks on this CD, spanning 47 minutes, but just as easily, you can perceive this as one track that is 47 minutes. Bramnk takes a collage approach here, going through many moods in each track, and it’s never easy to say where one piece ends and a new one begins; at least, if you aren’t looking at your CD player. Vinyl plays the primary role in the music here, with crackles and speed changes. There’s quite a bit of spoken word in these collages, which makes it a crossover between a radio play and musique concrète. Sometimes Bramnk gets stuck in a groove, and there is a bit of a dub-like music or a free jazz explosion, but it’s never too long and doesn’t always create a too-coherent piece in such a genre. Maybe because it’s in this sea of sounds and ideas that such things get easily lost, but it also means if one thing isn’t for you (for me, that would be the free jazz elements), it’s never too long, and before you know, we’re somewhere altogether very different. Solid stuff.
Thomas Rosen is the musician behind the name RSN, and I reviewed some of his work before. He’s an avid collaborator, and this time he teams up with Thomas Mankowski, who goes by the name of Niacinamide. Instruments aren’t mentioned, but I know Rosen is a man playing the guitar and uses a fair bit of effects; I have no idea about the other Thomas. Although I would say RSN’s music is more akin to ambient music, the four pieces on ‘Indistinction’ are distinctly noise-based. Maybe I saw the title ‘Indistinction’ as amusing or confusing, as the music is far from indistinct. Each of the four pieces is a solid block of drone sound. Forceful and brutal, but not in the classical sense of noise music. There’s not an explosion of feedback and distortion. If there’s a wall of sound, then it’s a solid brick of drone sound. But, mind you, this isn’t a static block of noise, far from it. Each of these pieces sees a minimalist change of scenery, colour, and mood, which may not be easily detected if one plays this superficially, but only on repeated listening, this can be heard. Only in the last track, the tone goes down a bit, guitars become slightly more apparent, and set a hoovering tone for the end of part one of this collaboration. At least, by calling this ‘Indistinction #1’, I assume there’s going to be a ‘#2’. At 36 minutes, this is not the longest of releases, and ‘#2’ would be most welcome, and see what else there is to explore for these two musicians.
More ironic titles, so I thought when I realised that the latest Aalfag Mit Pferdekopf release is close to 80 minutes, and the title translates as ‘it is enough’. Well, yes, as you couldn’t put much more music on this CDR! It’s great to see Aalfang Mit Pferdekopf active again, following a period of hibernation. Their (his?) surrealist approach to ambient music is always close to my heart. I don’t know the modus operandi from Mirko Uhlig (he who is behind the name), but he knows how to create a massive drone scape, lingering about and on top there’s some sparse instrumentation; some piano notes, an accordion (a word I use a lot this week!), the rustling of tea cups or leaves. The cherry on the cake can be voices, radio transmissions, the crackle of vinyl, that kind of thing that enhances the scene further. Much like Falter Bramnk, this is the sort of thing that sees radio drama meeting musique concrète, but the outcome is much more homogenous and not scattered all over the place. That is, obviously, the kind of thing I find attractive, next to the fact that Aalfang Mit Pferdekopf is a powerful player in the world of ambient music, especially in this variation, which I like a lot. Think zoviet*france or Fossil Aerosol Mining Project, which have the same ‘ambient plus’ approach, and which sound quite delicate. This is not grainy lo-fi ambient! This is an extended release and a true beauty – for once, no complaint about the length. Is it enough? Hardly. (FdW)
––– Address: https://emerge.bandcamp.com/

BIO-MECHANIK (CD compilation by Eighth Tower Records)

Ever since I can remember, I have been an admirer of H.R. Giger’s works. Probably the movie Alien (1979) made such an impact – I was 12 back then – that in my later life, I always kept an eye out for books and art. A big poster of Debbie Harry’s KooKoo was in my little boy’s room on the wall, and as my musical taste shifted a few years later, it got company of an even larger poster of To Mega Therion by Celtic Frost. And now I am 58, and I STILL have a movie poster of Species hanging in my study. But what was it that appealed to me in his works?
While the music is playing – more about the music later – I get one of the many books I have about him, and I start reading and flipping through the pages. There are so many different aspects and things in his works that should give him the title of one of the most influential artists of the 20th century. His surrealistic fusion of organic and inorganic (read: mechanical, artificial, technical, synthetic, metallic, etc) is, of course, the most obvious. Additionally, the architectural aspects (for which he studied), the pornographic, and the functional (again: he studied architecture and industrial design) should be mentioned. I doubt that the Victorian era alone would have given rise to a steampunk movement, suggesting that Giger’s works facilitated the combination of elements. And the fact that he made the backside of a garbage truck erotic is something that not many others have done; No one, I think. Functional: Furniture and the Korn microphone stand (so beautiful), and as for architecture, the drawings and sketches he did for the many Alien movies speak for themselves. In the same way that Gaudí created a Barcelonian skyline, there should be a Swiss town somewhere with a skyline of buildings having intercourse, boobs or whatever. Not only that one building, Château St. Germain in Gruyères, with amongst others a majestic spiral-based ceiling, making it look like a cathedral.
Leaves me the difficult task of reviewing this album. Twelve artists who tried to capture the dynamics of ‘the master’ and how he made an impact on my thinking. In all honesty, whatever I write is not fair because I simply can’t write an objective review. This sampler is all good for a sampler. There are some old names (happy to see SSHE RETINA STIMULANTS and Modelbau), some new names (for me, never heard of Lars Bröndum or MoCM and Schema Musicalis before), some really nice tracks (“Birth Machine” by Mario Lino Stancati) and some a bit less (“Mute Body Reconstruction” by Red Stars Over Tokyo) … But as stated before, this is an album I am not able to hear without my personal interpretation of the subject. And because of that, it’s crucial you visit the Bandcamp page and at least listen to this one yourself to make up your mind. (BW)
––– Address: https://eighthtowerrecords.bandcamp.com/

IBONRG & GARAZI NAVAS – ÇUCEN HENBILQUEYEN (CD by Hazi Esporak!)

In 1545, the Basque language went into print for the first time, and 200 kilometres away, the first stones of the Elexabeitia hermitage in Atrea were laid. Five hundred years later, in 2025, those old poems (from the first printed book in Basque) collided inside the ancient walls of the hermitage with the voice of Ibonrg (also playing ttunttuna, whistle, percussion) and the accordion of Garazi Navas (also playing bells and voice). The label calls this “contemporary music, a cappella singing, folk, free improvisation and lyrical singing [are] the territories these songs traverse”. The whole language aspect is lost on me, and I assume the majority of Vital Weekly readers, none well-versed in the Basque language. That might be a problem for many others; there’s also my issue: I’m not a fan of music with vocals. Backed with some freeform music, the dramatic singing voice of Ibonrg makes this not easy to listen to for me. There are 13 songs on this CD, totalling 80 minutes of music, which is too much for me. I can see why the label thinks this is something we should write about, but I also believe we should pass on it. I know this isn’t a review, and I urge everyone who thinks this is some mediocre writing on my behalf: go to Bandcamp and make up your mind and ignore my ‘review’.(FdW)
––– Address: https://haziesporak.bandcamp.com/

MODELBAU – MOOK (CDR by Reinterrupt)

Yes! New Modelbau! I’m a sucker for Frans’ way of approaching a composition. There is a vast book written on his releases, which you can order through Korm Plastics (link); from it, you can learn a lot. Though not everything, because there is always the subjective part, a.k.a. the listener’s perspective. Having reviewed 26 Modelbau releases over the last couple of years, I consider myself an above-average listener. I not only listen, but I have to write about it, so every listen I listen to Vital Weekly, I try to ‘deep listen’. It’s voluntary work, but I take it seriously. If you send me a release of 3 full hours of harsh noise, yes, I WILL have heard it three hours and I WILL have listened to any change in modulation or depth or mix or … And don’t try me out by adding a little ‘Hello Bauke’ in your composition and then send it to us and to see if I notice!
“MOOK” seems weird to me. There are a few reasons, and I’ll go through them bit by bit. First is the release itself, the hardcopy. Modelbau is of a level that a CD or vinyl release is what puts the cherry on top. Like the vinyls on Love Earth Music and Moving Furniture (collab with Scanner / Robin Rimbaud). True beauties. But here is another side of releasing things. A thinline jewel case with an insert and a sticker on a CDR, like we saw in the 90s. People have labels and approach things with a high level of DIY. I have to say, there is a certain beauty in it, reminiscent of lofi art. But for my personal taste, it should have been a bit more on the higher end, especially when it comes to the music. The compositions are lofi, so with this release, it all fits. It’s grainy in the sense of choice of sounds and composition. It’s not the rounded form of sound but lots of square wave and (for lack of better words) crunchy sounds, molten into an ambient tapestry. There is a certain crudeness in the choice of these sounds, like an analogue mini synth. If so, you can compare this composition to an amalgamation of various sounds created out of experiments. Raw and unpolished, entirely in sync with the chosen format of release.
The compositions themselves are thrilling. There is constant movement, hypnotising loops and layers, and the three tracks, totalling almost 40 minutes, are very dynamic. It’s not a minimal drone where, after some time, you notice changes; no, it’s more like a drone/soundscape mixture without any addition of organic field recordings pushing a defined state or emotion. It’s the sound that creates the time and space in which you live. And as the sounds are minimal – at moments a bit glitchy – the time and space you get to occupy while listening is minimal too. It all feels very suffocating. And well, there are organic sounds (voice samples/radio), but these are taken out of their actual perspective and meaning, adding a different layer of weirdness here. And that was only the first track! The second and the third tracks are not much different in structure, which is in sync with the method of Modelbau using a similar setup for a full release. So it’s all in sync, though it must be said that the second and third tracks have a bit more noisy moments. Which I do NOT mind at all! So yeah, another Modelbau release has been added to my collection, and I’ll be listening to it quite often. Great stuff! (BW)
––– Address: https://re-interrupt.bandcamp.com/

DOC WÖR MIRRAN – SOUNDSCRAPE (CDR by Marginal Talent)

Here we have Doc Wör Mirran’s 224th release. Not an ironic statement to say they released a lot of music, but it says on the cover. There are very few Doc Wör Mirran releases that are solo releases by founding member Joseph B. Raimond, but here’s one. The other surprising thing is that the cover mentions the instrument he plays: Azaam Bells. That might be a misspelling on the cover, as online I find a company called Azzam Bells, https://www.azzambells.it/, who create “Unconventional musical instruments for Sound design, Soundscapes, Soundtracks, Experimental music”, which must be the same thing. This is something new for me, and the various devices look interesting; pieces of metal to be scraped, hit or bowed (and out of my price range). Check the link if you’d like to see what I am talking about.
I couldn’t say which devices Raimond uses on this almost 40-minute piece of music. Perhaps because this is a one-man job, the music sounds quite different from what we usually hear from Doc Wör Mirran, considering there’s no particular style they operate in. The title of the release serves as a program for this release. By scraping and bowing these instruments and applying sound effects, this indeed becomes a crossover between a soundscape and bowed scrap. While this is indeed noisy, it’s nowhere near a total over-the-top noise release. It strikes an excellent balance between being quiet and introspective, incorporating heavily processed drone sounds and some more piercing elements. This is a kind of soundscape that will hold your attention, as there’s not always a possibility to ignore it (like ambient music can). The sort of ever-changing power drone, moving around, poking at your ear, sometimes with force, sometimes gently. This release is quite a lovely surprise – a different side of Doc Wör Mirran!
Along with this release came ‘The Colour Of Panic’ by Joseph B. Raimond, subtitled ‘Travel Poems Vol . 3’. As I wrote before, on many occasions, I know nothing about poetry and am not qualified to review it. These neat little books are read and passed on, but as always appreciate the read. (FdW)
––– Address: http://www.dwmirran.de

EFFECTIVE DREAMING – DREAM CATALOGUE VOL.1 (cassette by Fluere Tapes)

Iain Ross is the musician behind Effective Dreaming, and ‘Dream Catalogue Vol . 1’ is his first cassette. The cover is made from a “hand-worked, corroded copper sheet”, which looks (and sounds!) nice. In his work, he uses “electronics, signal processing, tape loops and field recordings”, all to “explore texture, organic processes, and the artefactual quality of sound as material trace”. Interestingly, the Bandcamp version has the music as two long tracks, just as one would perceive such a thing on a cassette. With a bit of hiss, the music in the download sounds like a cassette as well. I quite like that sort of thing, especially since Effective Dreaming has distinctly different pieces going on both sides of the cassette. It’s not one long drone piece of music, but lots of tiny and bigger vignettes of sound. All of these are very electronic, and whatever field recordings were used, I don’t hear them; maybe they are there to trigger the electronics, would be my best guess. There’s a neat, not all too dominant cosmic edge in these pieces, but the effect is downplayed by some of the brief character of these pieces. I admit to dreaming a lot, but I rarely recall them, and I have no idea if they are short or not. I’m not sure if Ross chose the name Effective Dreaming to create music that makes dreams more effective, but what exactly is an effective dream anyway? The second side seems a bit more experimental on the musical spectrum. Still, it’s all within that bigger field of ambient music. At times, the music reminded me of Günter Schlienz (who also has a cassette on this label, so there’s something to explore); the same refined electronics, some experiments, some sketches, and best heard when awake. (FdW)
––– Address: https://flueretapes.bandcamp.com/

DESOLATION COLONY – THE IMPOSSIBILITY OF HAUNTING A BARREN WORLD (cassette by Throne Heap)
KATE RISSIEK – DARK ENERGY (cassette by Throne Heap)

Throne Heap sends me irregular promos, and I always think of the label as the darker, noisier side of ambient music. These two are way louder than your average ambient release; for both, a health warning could be ‘there’s no ambient to be found in this release’. I hadn’t heard of either project. Desolation Coloy is the musical brainchild of Joshua Strachan, who has released music on Mannequin Records and aufnahme + wiedergabe (the latter also releasing this new Throne Heap cassette digitally). His music is quite aggressive and uses rhythms, vocals, and feedback, yet it isn’t some amorphous blast of noise music. For the lack of a better word, one could call these seven pieces songs. Through the melee of distortion and feedback, there’s a shimmering melody, a lingering song, or a coherent, repeating sound. Sadly, I don’t have many points of reference here, because, as much as I enjoyed playing this release, it’s not music I am wholly familiar with. I think of Trepanerungsritualen, releases from Cold Spring and Cold Meat Industry, and similar labels, with elements of power electronics, metal, and industrial music. Brutal force and pleasure through pain!
Kate Rissiek is a sound and visual artist, and her music is inspired “by the primordial earth and unseen cosmic forces” and “channels violent energies exploring the ongoing relationship between disintegration and renewal”. The first side is called ‘Cycle’ and the second ‘Decay’. Each side contains more tracks, but none get any specific title on the cover, and the label has no Bandcamp presence. No instruments are mentioned, and my best guess is a blast of feedback and distortion, possibly without many instruments, generated through feedback loops via effects. This could be similar to the no-input mixer approach, but without the refinement of David Lee Myers. The funny thing (if that is the right word) is that the music has a sonic overload that works very well on cassette, as that format adds its own dynamics to noise music, which is lost when this is played digitally. Even with the shorter sections, this music remains highly abstract, and here we have pieces instead of songs. There’s been a lot of distortion in these fifty minutes, and I’ve mentioned before that I used to be more of a noise-minded listener. Nowadays, I limit my intake. As no noise crossed my path this week, I think these two cassettes on Throne Heap will be the intake I need. It’s 80 minutes of sonic bliss, the perfect antidote for the ambient mind. (FdW)
––– Address: https://www.throneheap.com/

ASYLUM SYMPHONIES – OPPOSITIONAL DEFIANT DISORDER (cassette by Benevolent Pain)

Q: What is pink and 40 minutes long? A: The latest release by the noise project Asylum Symphonies from Catalonia. The Aachener label Benevolent Pain is at it again and has released this tape with 40 minutes of pure analogue terror. And well, we do know that behind the label is Marcus from Dazzling Malicious, Persons Unknown, It Drones, etc., but from a project I had never heard of before. It’s a three-person outfit – Carles, David and Òscar – focused mainly on mental diseases outputted through pure Korg MS20 abuse. Next to the MS20, there is a lot of FX either with gear or in the computer, but you will have to listen to the tracks to hear what I mean.
So, I had no idea what “Oppositional Defiant Disorder” was, so I looked it up. Thankfully, we have something like Wikipedia, and the answer is that according to DSM-5, it is ‘a pattern of angry/irritable mood, argumentative/defiant behaviour, or vindictiveness’ and also ‘This behaviour is usually targeted toward peers, parents, teachers, and other authority figures, including law enforcement officials.’ And we all know what’s the best therapy, right? Right! Noise making! This release is the result of two sessions of group therapy for Carles, David and Òscar. No one was hurt during these sessions, thankfully. It’s not disclosed whether it’s regular group therapy or relationship therapy, but the MS20 had some difficult moments.
And without kidding, this is a very nice release—well-layered noise, which is nicely cohesive through the tape compression. Noisier distorted parts are scattered throughout, alongside a proper part for the pure MS20 sounds. At Discogs, Asylum Symphonies is mentioned as a noise and power electronics project. Although there are moments where the composition tends to become power electronics, this particular release should be considered pure noise. Not HNW, not extremely cut-up, not drony, but noise as noise should be. Old school proper loud noise. And I haven’t heard that in a long time.
And, as with all Benevolent Pain releases, it comes in excellent packaging, this time a black box with another artistic test tube. There are a few copies left at the label, and once they’re gone, they’re gone. (BW)
––– Address: https://itdrones.bandcamp.com/

MÖRKERSEENDE – EXPONERINGSTERAPI (self-released triple cassette)

The Swedish Mörkerseende, meaning Nightvision, originates from Uppsala. Behind the project is Johan Hjort, who has been active for quite a while (since the mid-noughties), but I hadn’t heard of him or his works before. Maybe it’s because there are so many nice sounds coming from Sweden that he somehow slipped through. I also don’t think he has been reviewed in Vital Weekly before because, well, the search engine, which has improved since we changed platforms, came up with nothing. Johan eloquently describes the project to ‘explore aspects of negativity through dark and raw noise,’ and I couldn’t have said it any better.
“Exponeringsterapi” means exposure therapy, and it’s a type of behavioural therapy where you expose yourself to triggers more and more. For many people, it works, and what comes to mind is that conquering one’s fears isn’t always necessary; in many situations, learning to live with them is sufficient. But that’s a different story altogether; we’re here for Johan’s works.
A whopping triple cassette in a case in a limited edition of 10 copies. Should this review trigger you, be sure to act fast because before you know, they’ll all be gone. It’s not a regular triple cassette, but it’s C60 cassettes with a total of 3 hours of HNW to hypnotise you. The whole conceptual approach musically is always challenging to find out with these types of music (noise, HNW, drone, etc), so I can’t really translate the track titles towards the concept behind this release. The six tracks, however, describe the steps in exposure therapy: “Riskbeteende”, “Metod”, “Behandling”, “Svacka”, “Turbulens” and “Ände”.
Musically, the tracks are straight forward very nice HNW. Some tracks are a bit more noise-driven (“Riskbeteende”) while others are based on heavy rhythmic patterns (“Behandling”, for example). “Svacka” seems to be based on a harmonic layer, but the noise layers in the background are filled with feedback and chaos. “Turbulens” is probably the track with the most activity and changes, which you might expect from the title. Very nice use of feedback. In each of the tracks, a lot is happening, though there aren’t many changes. A very positive thing about these works is that enough is happening to make listening an absolute pleasure. This is not the kind of HNW where there is ‘one setting to rule them all’, press record, have a wank and listen back after a few days to see what came out of it. This is well-thought-out noise and a proper way to have your ears cleaned for three hours. Or play it a bit less loud, and it’s great to get into a zen mode and get some work done. (BW)
––– Address: https://morker.bandcamp.com/

DE FABRIEK – ANTI RECORD SERIES 2024-2025 (Anti Records, CDR, tape loop by De Fabriek Records & Tapes)

We had the anti-record by Steffan de Turck in Vital Weekly 1492. I also received a broken record/object by Janek Schaeffer (more here: https://janekschaefer.bandcamp.com/album/what-will-be-will-be-will-be-broken-record-delivery) as a birthday present, not a review. Then, De Fabriek came with this box, filled with a bunch of anti-records. Grinded down vinyl, records using a Co2 Laser, silent records, a razor edge to cut your own anti-record, a tape-loop cassette and a CDR which mixes of ‘sound material’. Everything is designed to look like a De Fabriek record, and it looks perfect. Playable at any speed. I should dig out that old record player I have for this sort of purpose and play these records, and use them as source material, just as I did in the old days. The only playable element is the CDR, which has etching on the playable side of the disc, so after some 40 minutes, the music becomes no longer playable. If the music on the CDR is derived from the enclosed material, it remains to be seen. What can I say? It’s an art box of items that convey music, but maybe not as you know it. (FdW)
––– Address: https://www.universaal.nl/site/unifab/