ALTERNATIVE TV & THE GOOD MISSIONARIES – SCARS ON 45 (CD by Winter Hill/Fourth
Dimension) *
CYANOBACTERIA & HÜBSCH – ARE YOU AN ORCHID OR A DANDELION (CD by Toxo
Records) *
HANNA HARTMAN – GATTET (CD by Firework Edition Records) *
KLOOB – UNPREDICTABLE SIGNS (CD by Winter-Light) *
JACINTHEBOX – INCOMPLETE 1984/86 (LP by Supreme Tools Supply)
DIE STILLE NACH DEM SCHUSS (LP compilation by Psych KG)
PETER JØRGENSEN – ALT I STYKKER (LP by No Technique) *
DRONE-MIND/MIND-DRONE VOLUME 7 (LP/CD by Drone Records)
RUDOLF EB.ER – HEXENLATHE (CDR by Om Kult Osaka) *
JAKE BERGER – I’M DEAD AND I’M IN FELDMAN’S HEAVEN (CDR by Zvocniprepihi) *
HOWARD STELZER – CROSSING PARALLEL (CDR by Hologram Label) *
CULTURAL FOG – NYE (CDR by Hologram Label) *
ASHPA – 1 (CDR by Hologram Label) *
MINIM – CONSTRUCT (SD card by Kasuga Records) *
POSSET & ULYATT – A JAR FULL (cassette by Crow Versus Crow) *
CENTIWEEK (2 cassettes by Default Label Wroclaw)
POSSET – THE GOLDEN HANDSHAKE THAT ALMOST BROKE MY WRIST (cassette by Regional
Bears)
MELKINGS – MOVEMENT MUSIK (cassette by Regional Bears)
GAMMA FUNCTION – DO:XA (cassette by Important Drone Records) *
SUSANA LÓPEZ – FOUR SINUSOIDS TO ELIANE (cassette by Important Drone Records) *
EAR/WAVE/EVENT (magazine by Ear/Wave/Event)
ALTERNATIVE TV & THE GOOD MISSIONARIES – SCARS ON 45 (CD by Winter Hill/Fourth
Dimension)
It may at first seem perverse to reissue “Scars on 45”, a split cassette of live performances by Mark
Perry’s Alternative TV and The Good Missionaries initially released on cassette by the sub-sub-
underground label Fuck Off Records in 1979, on CD. After all, Perry’s first few proper albums are
essential listening for anyone with even a passing interest in the first wave of UK (or anywhere)
punk. This ultra-obscure and decades-old cassette, though, might be the archetypal Mark Perry
recording. It represents a pivotal moment when punk blasted open an underground of anti-
virtuosic, anti-commercial, genre-averse post-punk freedom, the reverberations of which are still
being felt here in 2019.
On Alternative TV’s 1977 debut album, “The Image Has Cracked”, Mark Perry wrote some of first-
generation punk rock’s most enduring sing-along anthems (“Action Time Vision”, “Love Lies Limp”
etc.). ATV’s sophomore album, “Vibing Up the Senile Man”, was more punk than punk, rejecting the
easy option of churning out more crowd-pleasing three-chord pub hits in favour of… no chords at
all! ATV’s skeletal, free-jazz-inspired songs about desperation, self-doubt and mental illness
shouted over crude piano and atonal noise horrified an audience expecting more snappy singles.
His lyrics weren’t merely provocative; they were aggressively intimate, painfully honest, and not
macho in any manner. No slogans, just startling discomfort. Perry’s cheerfully contrary stance
found sympathetic collaborators in the home-taper underground with bands who applied the no-
heroes DIY spirit of punk to free improvisation and crude avant-garde noise. Alternative TV
morphed into the even wilder and more dub-informed Good Missionaries, Perry played in other
like-minded bands like The Door and the Window and the Reflections, and eventually the first
phase of Perry’s “career” wound down. He’d return as a more conventional singer/songwriter, but
no matter how good his later songs were, it was this moment in the late 70s that alienated fans
but inspired tons more people to experiment for the hell of it. It’s no wonder that ATV didn’t become
the next Fall or Public Image… there’s a searing honesty and stubborn defiance to everything that
Mark Perry does, one that’s not instantly “enjoyable” in the conventional/expected ways… but all
these decades later it maintains its power because there’s still not much else that sounds like it.
This is uncompromising stuff.
Which brings us to “Scars on 45”. This album documents exemplary live performances by both
ATV and Perry’s related group, The Good Missionaries (which has overlapping personnel, plus
additional members). ATV’s set starts with “Nasty Little Lonely” from the first ATV LP, but here it’s
boiled down to not much more than a squawking saxophone and rudimentary percussion with a
halting bass valiantly attempting to tether the song to Earth as Perry shouts into the void. The rest
of the set’s songs are taken from ATV’s deeply alienating second album, which means that the
music gets more abstract and loose. The music has a casual quality to it.. instruments sound thin,
emaciated, hardly present. At times, it sounds as if no one on stage is even paying attention… not
much more than a shaky, dub-like bass line, a xylophone played about as well as a 12-year-old
might, powerless drums (or a minimally tap-tap-tapping drum machine), and then Perry reciting or
shouting. The parts barely hold together; the structures are so loose that each song might abruptly
end at any time and make just as much sense as if they’d kept going. It’s so egoless; it’s practically
a denial of being a rock band on a stage at all. The contrast between the scorching rawness of
ATV’s performance and the band’s tone lurching from blithe disinterest to sincere aggression is
what keeps this music off balance. Understandably, the audience audibly grows more and more
hostile, probably because they were expecting to hear the hits… which the band emphatically
refused to deliver. This music is so disarmingly sincere and uncomfortably raw that it remains
challenging even all these years later. ATV’s music doesn’t make itself easy. You need to let it
seep in for a while until it clicks for you if it ever does.
Mark Perry famously put no stock in punk orthodoxy and was proud of how diverse his musical
interests really were. And so it must have seemed natural for him at the time to play whatever
damn music he felt like trying to play: free jazz, progressive rock, reggae, Frank Zappa, whatever.
The Good Missionaries, whose performance takes up the back half of the disc (which was the
second side of the 1979 cassette) consisted of Perry freed from the confines of “punk” and
expectations of his other band. He roped in additional members Suze Da Blooze (of Here & Now
and Androids of Mu), Henry Badowski (The Damned, Wreckless Eric, some decent solo wax, etc)
and others to produce a massive, soaring racket that embraced psychedelic noise and slippery
dub. Compared to the difficult Alternative TV half of the album, The Good Missionaries’ side is
positively a party. It has a much fuller and busier sound, more people filling up the empty spaces
so that the songs propel themselves forward on damp clouds of noise. The longest track, the 15-
minute howl “The Good Missionary Goes For a Walk”, begins with a damaged dub groove,
meandering guitar doodles, tape blorp and echo-smeared horns… until it crumbles into a cathartic
free-improv soup. The set concludes with “The Morning They Took Me Away”, again held tentatively
to Earth by a dub-ish bass line and topped with horn squeal and radio noise while Perry tells a story
about being stuck in a room with no windows and nothing to do but read piles of books all day.
Where contemporary bands like The Pop Group or This Heat also made use of electronics, dub
effects and free structures, they came off sounding quite polished. Perry must have been allergic
to polish. His explorations were not marred by “good” production or smooth musicianship. Instead,
as is quite audible here, he revelled in emotion and immediacy over skill. Even more than Perry’s
studio albums from the same era, this bootleg-quality low-fi recording gets the point of ATV across
clearly and effectively. (HS)
––– Address: https://fourthdimensionrecords.bigcartel.com/
CYANOBACTERIA & HÜBSCH – ARE YOU AN ORCHID OR A DANDELION (CD by Toxo
Records)
Here’s a duo called Cyanobacteria (From The Arabian Gulf, is what is added on the inside, but I
have no idea if that is part of the name), consisting of Francesco Gregoretti (drums) and Renato
Gricco (double bass), teaming up one day in September 2016 with Carl Ludwig Hübsch, a well-
known improviser playing the tuba. The duo has a similar background, even when I only heard of
Gregoretti before. The five tracks span fifty-two minutes and form an on-going exploration of ideas,
textures and all of that within the world of improvisation. It is a meeting of like-minded people, with
one foot in a more traditional field of the genre and one firmly planted in something newer. You
can recognize each of the instruments pretty easily here, in all of these pieces, but at times they
also sound like something completely different; especially the tuba has a dual role in this. Unlike
some of the other releases on Toxo Records, this isn’t as loud and noisy but with amplification and
feedback, there are occasional hints towards that. There is some fine interaction between the
players, leaving room for the other to act and react, and none of the players seems to downplay
their own role in the overall sound. It is most of the time the sum of three equal parts playing the
music and throughout it works very fine. It is mostly an intense listening experience, which
doesn’t allow any loss of concentration. Not on behalf of the players, nor the listeners. (FdW)
––– Address: http://www.toxorecords.com/
HANNA HARTMAN – GATTET (CD by Firework Edition Records)
With quite long intervals, but still regular as clockwork, there are new CDs by Swedish born, Berlin-
based composer Hanna Hartman (see also Vital Weekly 498, 575, 769 and 1029). Despite that, I
don’t know much about her or her work. Previously I wrote that “apparently, doesn’t use any sort of
processing, but takes the world of sounds as they are and by using the microphone close by/far
away, the treatments of sound come by themselves, as it were”. I am not sure what was the basis
of this knowledge (her website, most likely) and if this still the case. Hartman’s music is for sure
based in musique concrete and she does a great job in creating some excellent ‘cinema for the
ears’. The titles of the three pieces might either be a clue or a notion; ‘Black Bat’, ‘Crush’ and
‘Fracture’. Let’s say it’s more a notion or a hint towards what the origins of these sounds could be
about. You can’t tell from playing the music, except that in ‘Black Bat’ there is the contrabass
clarinet of Theo Nabicht and in ‘Fracture’ the bassoon of Dafne Vicente-Sandoval. Listening to
these pieces a couple of times, I find it harder and harder to believe Hartman isn’t using any
additional processing and the most logical contender for that, I would think, is the use of the
software. As said the music is quite imaginative, even when it is also quite abstract. You couldn’t
say that this is music for a horror movie or, I don’t know, a documentary about the production of
glass. There is much dynamics in the music, going from sweetly quiet to quite loud, and it is all via
the use of the collage that this is put together. While some sounds continue, others are brought in,
expanded on and explored further, while earlier ones are slowly removed or sometimes abruptly
cut from the mix. There is occasionally a bit of reverb to add some more atmospherics to the music,
and sometimes these sounds are very close by; another dynamic in the music. It is all very
evocative and beautiful; it is another excellent release by Hartman. (FdW)
––– Address: http://ww.fireworkeditionrecords.com
KLOOB – UNPREDICTABLE SIGNS (CD by Winter-Light)
This is the follow-up to ‘Remarkable Events’, the previous release by Daniel Ferreira, who goes by
the name of Dani Kloob (see Vital Weekly 1120). This new album has something of a thematic
approach, it seems: “Unpredictable Signs. The current global uncertainty is all around us. A sign
of the times. What is to be expected in the near future? It is the mystery that will always be here.
Sometimes there are hidden clues that can help to presage events. However, nowadays it is
almost impossible to second-guess the scenario that will follow. Such considerations have shaped
all these deep and intimate, sculpted soundscapes through the use of vocals, background noises
and ethereal drones”. Predicting the future is never an easy thing I guess, but the music is not that
unpredictable, nor subject to the mystery. This being a release by Winter-Light means that it is
filled with drones, crafted by synthesizers, heavily processed field recordings, perhaps also heavily
processed Tibetan bowls and bells and what have you in the department of sound effects (well
reverb and delay mostly), moving all back and forth with the same tranquillity and slowness and a
peaceful album is the result. Unrest or uncertainty seem far away here and it seems far away from
music from unpredictable signs of any times (are these time more unpredictable than they were
before? That would be a good conversation!). Dark ambient is the result and Dani Kloob does a
very fine job, moving away from the previous somewhat more cosmic approach and losing himself
in a black hole, further away in space. It is not something that should be a total surprise for anyone
who loves dark atmospheric, deep drone music, but once again, Kloob gives full attention and love
to the detail. (FdW)
––– Address: http://www.winter-light.nl
JACINTHEBOX – INCOMPLETE 1984/86 (LP by Supreme Tools Supply)
My daughter and I met some of my old music buddies the other day and I told her that the guy who
called himself Jacinthebox ages ago, is the one person in music I know longest. We started
corresponding back in 1982/3 when I was compiling a cassette catalogue of independently
releases on that format. We stayed in contact ever since, I have followed his various musical
moves, some of which acted by the two of us, and later on a bigger constellation. His work with
guitar bands such as Lewd and Bunkur was perhaps not my cup but his noise act DMDN sure
was. Before that he released a bunch of tapes as Jacinthebox. Hey, you might say, “I already know
that back in Vital Weekly 830 you already reviewed his ‘complete 1984/86’ release”. True that,
mate, true that. And now there is the ‘Incomplete 1984/86’ because there was too much music for
a single LP. You might also think “hey, you don’t like reviewing re-issues”, and again, you may
have a point there, but I am very happy to support my old friend and his lovely record store (when
in Tilburg, make sure to visit this wonderful place) and to push the sales of this limited (150 copies)
record. Back then I wrote: “…are excellent examples of rhythm driven experimental rock like tunes,
with that mechanical drive. As of his second release, he started to play around with feedback, as he
would later explore with PDM and solo, but sounding nicely raw and primitive here. Already on this
second release, he let’s go for the more song structures used on his first cassette in favour of more
free play in combination with primitive noise. It could have been a direction, which Whitehouse
could have taken post-Come’s ‘Rampton’, but they didn’t. Towards the end, things get really nasty,
loud and violent and it reaches its natural conclusion – no longer ‘song’ based but heavy free
noise rock.” From the sixteen-track CDR, it went to a 10 track album, remastered by Ruud Lekx
(Rude66), which includes the complete ‘Wipe The Multi’s’ C20 cassette, and the others are from
compilations. ‘Wipe The Church’, his first cassette is omitted entirely, thus emphasizing on the
later pieces of this short lived career. Remastered it sounds even more powerful; lots of rhythm,
lots of anger, lots of noise. That’s how I remember the 80s best. (FdW)
––– Address: http://www.antenne-tilburg.nl/
DIE STILLE NACH DEM SCHUSS (LP compilation by Psych KG)
“So, what can you tell me about this record?”, I asked Roel Meelkop when he handed me a copy
of this compilation, with two of his pieces, one by If, Bwana, two by The New Blockaders and one
by Komissar Hjuler & Frau. I was trying to be the journalist I am not; I know finding information
about the amazing amount of records that Hjuler & Frau do is very hard. Mister Meelkop’s answer
was simple: “I have no idea; I gave them some tracks for something and they ended up on this
one”. I assumed that the title might be a clue. ‘The silence after the shot’, probably very apt for
Hjuler, who is in real life also a kommissar with the German police. I was thinking about silence
while listening to If, Bwana’s piece, opening on the first side, and indeed being a very quiet track.
Meelkop is also quiet at the start but stereo pans some brutal small blocks down the line. Also,
The New Blockaders stay surprisingly quiet in their ‘Epater Simphonie (excerpt)’, which sounds
like it was recorded on a cassette, which was then erased and the not really blank tape was re-
recorded again. Meelkop’s second is quieter than his first and is like a collection of household
objects being recorded and later on looped. A strange piece, that one. On the other side, there is
a very long Hjuler & Frau piece, with their classic anti-music improvisation, with some highly
personal vocal purges and banging saucers and cups as percussion. You can find this genius,
stupid, outsider or nonsense; it sure has their own flavour to it. The Blockaders end with
‘Variations Pour Une Porte Et Une Brouette’ (“Variations for a door and a wheelbarrow”), coming
close to the original intentions of the founding fathers of musique concrete and surprisingly, this
too shows their gentle side, although not too quiet. It is certainly something with consideration
and that is something of a break with the past. (FdW)
––– Address: psychkg@online.de
PETER JØRGENSEN – ALT I STYKKER (LP by No Technique)
A while I lumped a bunch of releases together under the banner of modern classical music and
that perhaps these pages isn’t the right place for such music; and perhaps, oddly enough,
sometimes it is. That makes it more difficult than genres that I would think are always out of place
here, such as heavy metal, C&W, Dixieland or hip-hop. Not because they are bad, but we don’t
the affinity with it to say something of intelligence about it. But with modern classical music, it can
go either way. It can be something that fits these pages very well, especially when graphics scores
are used and the music comes close to that of improvised music, but sometimes not at all. I fear
Peter Jørgensen’s music is from the latter category. Two sidelong compositions, for a small
ensemble and vocalists, with a leading role for string instruments, but there is also trumpet and
percussion. All in pieces is how the title is translated and no doubt it is about the loss of something
and how we are in all in pieces. It has the sadness of an Arvo Pärt composition of Gorecki’s ‘Third
Symphony’ (see, we are not entirely philistines), and through it is very quiet, except for ‘Outro’,
which is right at the end of ‘Corale’ and is, by comparison, a very loud piece of music. A drone
played on synthesizers and church organs, merging together in a very beautiful way. That works
well by itself, but compared with the other thirty-one minutes it may seem a bit out of place. I don’t
know about this. I think I quite liked the music, but also I think I have no idea why. I am sure that is
not the sort of thing people want to read in a review. If you have an open mind towards the
complex nature of modern classical music, then I am sure you would want to out more about
this. (FdW)
––– Address: https://www.notechnique.org/
DRONE-MIND/MIND-DRONE VOLUME 7 (LP/CD by Drone Records)
The seventh volume of ‘Drone -Mind/Mind-Drone’ is something different and something the same.
It once again comes with lovely geometrical paintings by Pete Greening which was never
mentioned, I think, so here it is; all releases so far have his paintings and together creates the idea
of a library of drone music. Actually just as the music does the same sort of thing. The difference is
that there is now a CD enclosed by one of the bands, Opening Performance Orchestra, offering a
seventy- minute, full version of their piece, which is on record 12 minutes. Odd choice, perhaps, to
have this as a digipack CD enclosed inside the cover, but so be it. The same is also the approach
to the nature of drone music, certainly by the other three contributing musicians. There is
Specimens (also known as Alex Ives), Skeldos and from Bulgaria, Mytrip. Only work by the latter
found it’s a way to these pages before; Skeldos only once. Another aspect that is the same, and
spoiler alert: that is a pity, that these three also seem to have quite a similar approach and ideas
about drone music, taking leaves out of the Troum handbook of playing atmospheric and moody
music. On Side A there is hardly much difference between the three pieces by Specimens and
the one piece by Skeldos. The use of cassette loops, synth layers and field recordings (Specimens)
and “accordion, voice and other instrumental sources” (Skeldos) doesn’t seem to make much
difference for the outcome, nor does the guitar and loop devices of Mytrip, even when that was a
bit more melodic. Great music here, don’t get me wrong, but also nothing much different from all
the loopers, guitar wranglers and spacers that are already out there. They all do a very fine job
and this is some lovely music. Opening Performance Orchestra’s ‘Creeping Waves’ has something
to do with electromagnetism and low-frequency radio and offer something that is a different kind of
drone, which, on a compilation, is always a good thing. Make it different from the rest and stand
out, and O.P.O. certainly does that. There is also a bit of difference between the vinyl and the CD
version of this, and actually, both are most enjoyable. So far I heard the noise side of the group,
but I admit liking this a lot more. Creepy? Not for me, I would think. I found this ambient drone
noise perfect suitable for a lazy afternoon of reading, chilling and it mixed nicely with the ventilator
keeping it cool here. Great record? On a day like this, sure! Perfect mind expansion. (FdW)
––– Address: http://www.dronerecords.de
RUDOLF EB.ER – HEXENLATHE (CDR by Om Kult Osaka)
Mister Schimpflug is Rudolf Eb.Er and he’s that since more than 30 years. Throughout all these
years I kept up with his work off and on; always with much interest, but there have been periods
that I didn’t hear much of his music. Sometimes simply because the editions are too small, such
as ‘Hexenholze’, an 8″ lathe cut record that was released on the last day of last year in a wooden
box. Only thirty copies were made. On this CDR we find both pieces, plus (I think) two pieces from
a 7″ from 1996. Eb.er plays his usual radical approach to sound art. As Howard Stelzer observed
last week there is a recurring motif of buzzing flies in his recent work. Here Eb.er applies cut-up
techniques to abruptly end sounds and start afresh with something else. While I like lathe cut
records, I can imagine it is not easy to translate the radical frequencies used by Eb.er easily on
the material that is lathe. Of course, you also know I am very much a lover of CD and as such, I am
quite happy with this collection. There is the 7″, at 33 rpm (I assume the intended speed), but also
both pieces slower (clocking in at three minutes longer for each), plus two short pieces
‘Bocksmilch’ (maybe the 7″ from the 90s) and three more pieces, which I think are bonus pieces. It
is not easy to describe what goes into the recipe to make a Rudolf Eb.er recording. I would think
there are quite a bit of animal recordings used, which he manipulates heavily with, I assume,
digital means. Much of this manipulation has to do with filtering the frequencies, emphasizing
certain frequencies and omitting others. This results in some spooky music; it is not noise (neither
is it quiet), but quite extreme anyway. It is ambient music for horror movies. The sounds of insects,
pigs, frogs, birds and whatever makes you feel like you are in a horror zoo or animal testing centre.
With the abrupt ending of sounds, you have this idea that violence to these animals is never far
away. It is music that is, I would think, best played when it’s not dark when you are not alone, and
certainly not for the weak at heart; and, as such, caution with volume. (FdW)
––– Address: https://rudolfeber.bandcamp.com/
JAKE BERGER – I’M DEAD AND I’M IN FELDMAN’S HEAVEN (CDR by Zvocniprepihi)
From the two recent releases by Jake Berger, I left one to Dolf Mulder to ponder on about (too
jazzy for me), but this one was something that grabbed my full attention. Not because of the Morton
Feldman reference, far from it actually, as I’m not really a big Feldman devotee myself, but just the
way the music unfolded. It is, and that should be no surprise, dedicated to the work of Morton
Feldman, and Berger composed a piece which aims to ‘create a sonic world of Mr Feldman’s music
and process sound with granular synthesis to achieve digital construction of organic sound”. The
piece he composed sees himself on “prepared snare, string objects and modular synthesizer”,
while Dejan Berden plays the piano. The piece lasts one hour and four minutes and doesn’t go
anywhere, nor does it have dramatic changes or movements. It is a long, continuous exploration
of the sound of these few instruments and upon closer inspection it seems to me (I might be wrong)
that the sound at the beginning is louder than towards the end of the piece, like it is gradually
decaying, and that the piano has a more dominant role in the beginning than in the end. In the
second half, the prepared snare and string objects have that role and the piano is moved to the
background; maybe even literally moved, when the microphone has changed its position. That is
the effect the music has on me, but of course, I might be wrong, again. Also, the music is not quiet
or toned down, nor is there is a lot of space between the notes. There is always something to hear
and usually the sound is quite upfront, but Berger captures the spirit of Feldman in his own way
quite well, drawing his own picture of a different kind of music language, that is not about dramatic
changes and simply something that exists for a while in time and space and that works really well.
Maybe turn down the volume a bit and put it on repeat, to achieve a Feldman-like duration and
you will have a great musical afternoon. (FdW)
––– Address: https://zvocniprepihi.bandcamp.com/
HOWARD STELZER – CROSSING PARALLEL (CDR by Hologram Label)
CULTURAL FOG – NYE (CDR by Hologram Label)
ASHPA – 1 (CDR by Hologram Label)
‘Crossing Parallel’ is the second time that Howard Stelzer creates music for a film by Joe Taylor.
The first one was ‘The Crossing’, which we didn’t review (no favouritism there, so it seems) and
that was a narrative film. This new one is perhaps not a film as such, as it called “an “extended
film” audio-visual performance piece” and it is “using human-free images of the American
Southwest (sunrises, mountains, deserts, landscapes etc.)”. The subtitle of this release is ‘Live In
Boston’, as it was recorded at the School of The Museum Of Fine Arts/Tufts University’ in that city,
with Stelzer playing facing the projection, “surrounded by four inwards-facing speakers and two
large subwoofers”. Stelzer plays “cassette music”, which is what you think it is; music recorded on
cassettes and then mixed together, perhaps with a few additional sound effects. Stelzer has quite
a few players and is a gifted player of these; both in the sense of playing them live as well as using
them to tape field recordings with. You can never tell what these field recordings are with mister
Stelzer. I have little idea how and where he records his stuff and how he treats them. Via social
media, I saw once a short clip in which he showed a cassette playing something and another
machine recording them, out in the open air. I assume he does that also in big, empty places,
adding the space to the blend. This brings quite dark and ominous blocks of treated sound,
which you can call ‘drones’. In this piece, he has a bunch of them and it comes in two sections,
each about twenty minutes. Both of them work towards a mighty crescendo, of which the second
one is the more brutal one. Building and building his sounds, brick by brick as it were, going from
gentle deep drones to massive ones, working with small changes continuously. Even without the
film, this is quite a scenic picture of a wide open landscape, moving like a camera panning over it,
coming from a distance, closing in microscopic. This is great work!
I had not heard music by the two bands/projects. Cultural Fog is a trio of Claire Cirocco, Emily
Roll and Fred Thomas. No instruments are mentioned for any of them, but judging by the music, I
hear vocals, drums, bass, synth and electronic toys. They have seven tracks in thirty minutes and
someone described this “Comfort music for psychopaths”, which is perhaps a bit far fetched, but
there is a pleasant uneasiness with this music that I can’t place. It is un-pop music, with a similar
approach in treating drums with a delay device, vocals that can’t be heard properly (or perhaps
not singing loudly enough and that might be intention?) and overall lo-fi quality of the production;
more basement than a studio, but that works pretty well. I assume ‘NYE’ stands for New Year’s Eve
and I can imagine this trio drinking and having fun (how about that for psychopaths?) while
recording these unstructured songs. Sometimes it seems as one song rolls into the next, being
variations on a tune. There are no titles for these songs, so that may explain the continuous
approach here. It’s weird, vague and very pleasant.
One Máté Károlyi-Kiss is Ashpa and hails from Hungary. Ashpa has a few releases according to
Discogs, on imprints such as Sound Holes, Geräuschmanufaktur Strange Rules, and Clandestine
Compositions. The first one, ‘1’, was a self-released cassette, which is graced with a re-issue here.
Four pieces are on this CDR (all by the way in neatly designed and printed covers) are around five
minutes, so more an EP of sorts. Discogs says it is all to do with field recordings and tape-
manipulations, and following the CDR by Stelzer, it is interesting how different approaches can be.
I would think Ashpa goes around with a recorder and a contact microphone to pick up all sorts of
events, which are manipulated by hand in ‘Encircled’. It has a very tactile, direct feeling this piece.
In other pieces, he taps a cruder pattern of machines, dishwashers, ventilators or what have you
and the results are a somewhat noisier take on the world of field recordings. Not a densely
orchestrated as Stelzer’s power drones, but a more crude, direct mixing of various sound sources.
There is the odd shimmering melodic touch in ‘Akovita’, which I think comes out a synthesizer on
the side. Although none of this was something you haven’t heard before, certainly if you have been
a follower of anything that has to with lo-fi electronics, cassettes, drones and such a like, but Ashpa
does a great job regardless. It would have been nice if the re-issue had some unreleased bonus
tracks, as it is sadly now way too short. (FdW)
––– Address: https://hologramlabel.bandcamp.com/
MINIM – CONSTRUCT (SD card by Kasuga Records)
“In the philosophy of science, the construct is an ideal object, where the existence of a thing
depends upon a subject’s mind. A construct is not directly perceivable, it implies concepts that
are used to explain phenomena that aren’t directly observable.” Minim hails from Bucharest and
goes by no other name. So far I learned that many of the releases by Kasuga Records are from
the field once known as clicks ‘n cuts; computerized glitches being reworked into small segments
creating overkill bass beats and high-end ticks. Ryoji Ikeda went to world fame with it. Pan Sonic,
though much more analogue also. It is music that is, perhaps, not as popular as at the turn of the
century, but there are still people working within that genre Minim (oh, sorry minim) is one of them
and he doesn’t succeed very well. The eight untitled pieces on ‘Construct’ sound very much all the
same. It is very difficult to tell them apart. Each of them has this vaguely bass beat that is just not
cut for the dance floor, but surely makes your head nod (‘Head Nod Music’ was a category in
London record store, I once visited, and it had all those Ikeda copy cats), along with sequenced
mid-high peeps and ticks, but none of these constructions has the same clarity or melodic touch
that we find in the work of Alva Noto, Ikeda or Pan Sonic, but it copies the brutality, without making
the point. (FdW)
––– Address: https://kasuga-records.com/
POSSET & ULYATT – A JAR FULL (cassette by Crow Versus Crow)
There you go: elsewhere I write that I haven’t heard much from the extensive catalogue of Posset,
also known as Joe Posset, and now there are two of his current releases. Here we see him team
up with Charlie Ulyatt, a cello player from Nottingham. They heard of each other and when Posset
was in town, a one-off concert was set up. Following that, they started sending each other
recordings of playing over each other’s music. This is what is now on the first side of the tape,
while the concert is on the second side. Posset is mainly working with Dictaphone on these
recordings, while Ulyatt plays the cello. I had not heard of him yet, but he has “self-released a
number of solo recordings that have grown from folk-tinged post-Gahey expansive guitar to more
open, free improvisation”. That is certainly the case on this release here as both players play in
an improvised manner here. There are lots and lots of small sounds, sparkling about, from both
players, and all of this is recorded in a very direct way. Especially the three studio pieces have a
rather noisy approach, of which the last one, ‘High Head’, is the more controlled and introspective
one, the other two pointy affairs. In concert there seems to be a question of control also; perhaps
because of this meeting a first meeting? It’s hard to say I guess. It is an unusual meeting of
improvisers and within this limited set-up they sure know how to create plenty of variation, smaller
and bigger moves, teasing each other and anticipating and contradicting each other. It is
something that perhaps would be best seen in concert, I thought, seeing, hearing and feeling
the power between the two. (FdW)
––– Address: https://crowversuscrow.bandcamp.com/
CENTIWEEK (2 cassettes by Default Label Wroclaw)
“Imagine that 99% of the week you go to work, sleep and do other activities and you have only 1%
of your week time to listen to music. Here is a collection of tracks literally tailored for this occasion.
We have reduced your week to one hundredth and you will see that math is not so hard. The
Centiweek is equal to one hundred minutes and forty-eight seconds.” Of course, that is the length
of this double cassette compilation. A week has 168 hours and one could do a label that releases
only sixty-minute tapes, times 168 and have a tape for every minute of the week. A week concept?
I really don’t see the bigger idea behind ‘Centiweek’, other than ‘another’ compilation. There is
music here from Mahler Haze, Globius, Andy Nyxta, Silvio Cerutti, Neron Darkiuss, 2.13 PM,
Mathias Bredholy, Did & Brainhack Musicbox, Akira Fukishima, Jørgen Jørgensen, Alexander
Rishaug, Zenial, Hidden Channel, Theme, Sion Orgon, Babansky, Innovative Landscapes
Laboratory and Aries Mond. I recognized a few names and maybe you did as well? It is by and
large a fine compilation; lots of moody electronic pieces, doodles on a bunch of modular
synthesizers, effective use of reverb throughout, ambient meets drone, few voices (Sion Orgon for
instance), and sometimes it is a bit noisier. I was reading a book, left the covers on my desk and
not a single time I got up to check which artist I was hearing; nothing did stand out, nothing was
bad. That is surely a good thing in terms of continuous listening, but less good news for the artists;
I can imagine you would like to stand out from the flock? Maybe I am wrong. (FdW)
––– Address: https://defaultlabel.bandcamp.com/
POSSET – THE GOLDEN HANDSHAKE THAT ALMOST BROKE MY WRIST (cassette by Regional
Bears)
MELKINGS – MOVEMENT MUSIK (cassette by Regional Bears)
Joe Murray, the man behind Posset, is not often to be found in these pages, but somehow I imagine
him to be an active force in the world of underground/noise/experimental music. When I looked on
Discogs I found some 64 different releases and I would think I only reviewed a handful. However, it
is a name I immediately associate with the main instrument he uses and that is the Dictaphone.
Listening to the seven pieces on this new cassette I realized the music of Posset is not unlike that
of Sindre Bjerga. It is all very personal sound poetry. Posset uses his Dictaphones in combination
with loop devices (be these of the digital variety, or perhaps analogue ones from reel-to-reel tapes
or loop cassettes) and in it, he shoots his unstable sounds and starts layering them. The cover also
mentions the use of tapes, mouth sounds, text to speech machines, bells and wine glasses, as well
as the help of Otto Willberg, Id M Theft Able and OD Gee on a track each. Speeding up tapes,
looping them and the additional of mouth in almost all of these pieces makes this one excellent
personal release. ‘Got My Yah Yah’s Out’ is almost like a drinking/drunk song and recorded badly
by accident; I am sure that is not how it was made. I think. I haven’t heard enough of Posset to say
something that makes sense about his development as a musician; I very much enjoyed this one.
That I do know.
I had not yet heard of Melkings, a duo of Jim Strong and Thomas DeAngelo, who use” tapes,
telephone, voice, electronics, homemade instruments, power tools, car, etc.”, which is, obviously,
an interesting list, It also mentions contributions from Jim Strong Sr., Robert “Baseball” Aitken and
Esther Scanlon. Recorded in two days in July 2018 and mixed in two days in February of this year.
This is not easy to describe music and partly that is due to the strange collage like sounds thrown
together. First I thought they were a kind of free noise band, recording down in the basement with
crude guitar and electronics, but it turns out it is all a bit more complex than that. Those elements
are in here for sure, but also there seem to be tape-manipulations of crushed acoustic objects, but
then amplified on some shitty speakers to enhance the effect of lo-fi approaches. There are bits
with synthesizers or organ, such as towards the end of the first side. Maybe they are interrupted by
father (not in the way Controlled Bleeding once, when his sister stormed in and ended up in the
music screaming her complaints about the noise) or some such and it is all quite obscure. Having
said that, I also found it quite compelling. It is music that leaves much to wonder and ponder about,
just because one has no clue what is going on here. Think of a very crude version of Nurse With
Wound, recording everything on a bunch of old cassettes and then using an old mixing desk with
hardly any more options than fading sound in and out to create the master tape. Some of the voice
material on the second side reminded me of Eric Lunde, along with some of the manipulation of
sounds. Just like Posset, there is something quite personal and poetic going on here, like having
a listen to somebody audio diaries and rehearsal tapes. Maybe it is something else. I have no
idea, but I enjoyed it. (FdW)
––– Address: https://regionalbears.bandcamp.com/
GAMMA FUNCTION – DO:XA (cassette by Important Drone Records)
SUSANA LÓPEZ – FOUR SINUSOIDS TO ELIANE (cassette by Important Drone Records)
Following the initial batch of releases by Important Drone Records here are two more releases
and both of these last some 90 minutes each, which, I think, is quite a rarity in the world of cassette
releases. Both of these are by people I never heard of, and both, but I’d say with the name of the
label that should be no surprise, deal with drone music. Each tape has one piece per side.
Behind Gamma Function there is Marcin Żółtowski from Gdańsk, Poland, who was a physicist
and is now a sociologist. Apparently, he plays a lot of concerts in Poland and Germany with “his
rather aggressive pedals+laptop noise/extratone/breakcore shows or appearances on Croatian
Xernex netlabel”. I didn’t know that and couldn’t tell, based on the two-piece on ‘do:xa’, which he
programmed in Supercollider. On the first side the development is as to be expected from the
world of drone music very minimal, even when at twenty-nine minutes there is a sudden shift
towards a somewhat more active field of sound; throughout it stays on the atmospheric sides of
things. Which can be also be said about the other side, had it not that this side is sifting through
many different layers of sound. It is not per se drone music as we know it, and more a complex of
sounds of a somewhat industrial nature, especially in the second half. I am not complaining here,
just noting the interesting differences between both pieces and how, perhaps, this is not the most
common pieces of drone music; especially the second.
On the other cassette, we find a tribute to Eliane Radigue, the undisputed queen of slow music.
Lopez is also a teacher and one half of the noise duo Listas Futuristas. She too worked with
Supercollider, perhaps funnily enough. I would think her two pieces fit the idea of what is
commonly thought of to be drone music much better, especially on the first side of the cassette;
the first half of that is very quiet and at one point it all goes slowly up a bit more, but it stays in
similar slow development, using the same sound material, four sine waves I gather from the title.
The B-side works along similar lines but has certain unrest in these tones, going slowly up and
down whatever forces are used to create them and when played loud they become quite
disturbing. Best is to keep your volume at some level of control. Play medium to soft for full
pleasure; the sound remains full immersive but it works out better that way. Quite a blast these
two releases; perhaps it is also best not to play these in one go. (FdW)
––– Address: https://importantdronerecords.bandcamp.com
EAR/WAVE/EVENT (magazine by Ear/Wave/Event)
No doubt I said this before, but probably some time ago; when vital wasn’t a weekly concern, but
a fanzine on paper, it seemed that we were reviewing much more fanzines and books than we do
these days. I could speculate about the reasons for that, but let’s just say that they don’t reach us
as much as they did before. That’s a pity, as I love reading. Recently I read some children books
from the ’50s, Eric Idle sort of autobiography, Stephen Morris personal insight on Joy Division, a
book on the printing place connected to Extrapool and a magazine, whose issue this month is
dedicated to Factory Records. Then the fourth issue of Ear/Wave/Event arrives. The first three are
available for free online at the link below, though not, as far as I could see, as some kind of fancy
PDF, which is how I love my online magazines best. The fourth issue comes on paper, and is LP
sized, coming inside a record cover. Bill Dietz and Woody Sullender are the editors and in the
editorial they discuss the whole magazine thing, being nothing more than cogs in the wheels of
the music industry (manufacturing, distribution, promotion and selling this month’s record), which
of course is the whole raison d’etre of Vital Weekly, how much we like to think we are not part of
the industry at all. Ear/Wave/Event is however not your typical magazine at all. It harks back to the
older magazines, publishing scores of music pieces, which can be performed, even when these
scores in this magazine are far more open-ended and often also food for thought. This ‘music’ is
not performed, released and reviewed here, but merely exists as images, poetry or instructions;
sometimes perhaps even all three of that. Mattin’s contribution is a fake (I believe so) Wikipedia
about ‘Thinking-Out-Loud’, a music genre, if that is, “where people share together thoughts around
the dissatisfaction with this world”. Also, others show a political edge to their work, such as Chloë
Bass, Title TK (with some interview; I assume. Not even sure there!) and Bethany Ides. Other
contributors include Ben Vida, Kamau Patton, David Grubbs, Dawn Kasper, Anna Vitale, Christine
Sun Kim, Anne Callahan, Robin Watkins, Hairbone, Micah Silver, Chris Mann, Hong-Kai Wang
and Helen Mirra. In total, front and back included 34 pages, and perhaps not always with many
words, but with an overwhelming amount of ideas to ponder on for a while. You would not need
another book for a while, I would think. (FdW)
––– Address: http://earwaveevent.org/