ANG MO FAUX – IMPORVISATIONS (CD by Palace Of Lights) *
RICHARD FRANCIS & JASON KAHN & BRUCE RUSSELL – DUNEDIN (CD by CMR) *
CONTEMPLATRON – PRABHASHVARA (CD by Wrotycz) *
BRYAN EUBANKS & CATHERINE LAMB – UNTITLED 12 (AFTER AGNES) (CD by Sacred Realism) *
ANDREW LAFKAS – MAKING WORDS (CD by Sacred Realism) *
MACHINIST – CONVERGENCE (CD by Narrominded) *
ALESSANDRO BOSETTI – DER ITALIENISCHE MANIERISMUS (CD by Con-V)
MERZBOW KAPOTTE MUZIEK – WORKS 1987-1993 (3CD by Korm Plastics) *
KNURR & SPELL (CD compilation by Memoirs Of An Aesthete/Smokers Gifts/Noise Below)
PHIL MINTON & DYLAN NYOUKIS (LP by Phase Records/Mafia)
GATE – DAMNED REVOLUTIONS (LP by Ultramarine Records)
SMEGMA – EVER AND ANON (LP by Ultramarine Records)
BENE GESSERIT – STILL INSANE AFTER ALL THESE YEARS (LP by Ultramarine Records)
ANDREY KIRITCHENKO – CHRYSALIS (LP by Nexsound)
JADA – (7″ by Cosmic Volume/Inner Landscapes)
P-LAB + Z + KASPER T. TOEPLITZ – LIVE CE SOIR LA 14/03/2012 (CDR by Care Not Care) *
XTEMATIC – BEAUTIFUL NEGATIVA (CDR by SP Recordings)
FRANK ROSALY – CENTERING AND DISPLACEMENT (CDR by Utech)
TOY BIZARRE – KDI DCTB 146 [S] (3″CDR by Kaon) *
SINDRE BJERGA – RADIANT FLUX (cassette by LightenUp Sounds)
SAGAS – SOJOURNER’S LAMENT (cassette by LightenUp Sounds)
FILTHY TURD/YOL SPLIT (2 x c90 by WHITENESS & PINKNESS)
AUTOMATING / TORTURING NURSE CONTEST TO KILL 100 PEOPLE (Audio cassette by
Tenzenmen)
MIKEL R. NIETO & FEDERICO SANCHO – MACHINE PATTERN #01 (cassette by Security Device)
ANG MO FAUX – IMPORVISATIONS (CD by Palace Of Lights)
A trio from Singapore here, Ang Mo Faux, although perhaps all of them ex-pats of somewhere else. We have two ‘sound’ makers, Ty Constant and Peter Ivan Edwards and Steven M. Miller on live signal processing. All of that latter thing happens in the environment of MAX/Msp, and the sound makers react to each other, to the software and the environment. Just what those ‘sounds’ are made, is not told, but my best guess is something that can be played in a bit of percussive way. Everything is linked to each other, and that makes this both an unstable thing, but also a lively environment in which people can call and respond. Two pieces, one of forty five minutes and one of twenty-five minutes, and I am not sure in post-production a lot was changed by Miller, who gets the credit for mixing these pieces. It seems, but that’s just based on what I hear, that not a lot was edited out of this music, and we get more or less all of what happened when recording this. This means that not every single bit is great, but we also must weed through some bits in which this trio searches a way. Lots of all the usual computer suspects here, pitch shifting, granular synthesis, delay and reverb, they all drop by in various configurations and combine and collide nicely with the sounds produced. Not always as strong, and I would have liked a more edited version, I guess, but as a general flow of sound events it all makes perhaps great sense the way it is presented now. (FdW)
Address: http://www.palaceoflights.com
RICHARD FRANCIS & JASON KAHN & BRUCE RUSSELL – DUNEDIN (CD by CMR)
Like I say elsewhere in this issue, I am a big fan of music from New Zealand (although missing out on Gate that is), and recently Richard Francis and Bruce Russell did a book on the music scene from that country (see Vital Weekly 856), which prompted me to play the entire catalogue of Corpus Hermeticum again. Francis and Russell also work together musically, see for instance their release ‘Garage Music’ (Vital Weekly 828). Here we have a thirty-eight minute concert they did with Swiss/American musician Jason Kahn, with whom Francis also worked before – it’s a small world. Francis brings a modular synthesizer and computer to the table, Kahn his analog synthesizer, radio and mixing board and Russell analog electronics. Of course all of this is improvised, but this sounds really tight together. Of course things sustain a lot around, like a wheel once set in motion, it will go on and on. Perhaps it’s the nature of the instruments that make this maybe easier, but it’s still a matter of action and reaction. People responding to what others are doing. Each brings his own trademark sound to the table, all of which are different but also close to each other, which makes this a nice somewhat more louder drone work, with bleeps from the synth, long form drones, radio static and all of such sounds, swirling in and out the mix, with some static sounds going on and on, slowly changing color and shape. An excellent concert that night, in 2011, in Dunedin. Definitely one to release indeed. Maybe a bit more info on the cover wouldn’t hurt, I thought. Three masters of electronic improvisation at work. (FdW)
Address: http://www.cmr.net.nz
CONTEMPLATRON – PRABHASHVARA (CD by Wrotycz)
Now that I am getting older, some of my direct peers are also a bit older and some gravitate towards more spiritual life, talking zen buddhism or playing singing bowls. Not me, I haven’t reached that stage, and unrest as I posses, I may never reach that stage of levitation. But then, perhaps, I am also bound to miss out on the release by Contemplatron, which is loaded with quotes about Buddha, to whom the music is a homage ‘the glorious exterminator of death’. Various quotes on that and just the mentioning that the music is composed by Jaroslaw Wierny. No instruments are mentioned here, but it seems to me it’s a fair amount of synthesizers in combination with perhaps wind instruments, singing bowls and percussion sounds from digital means. And of course voices, which mumble and chant and one can almost smell the incense burning. Almost. While I must admit I don’t particularly care for all of this – the background of the release, the buddhism and the magickal signs on the cover – the music sounds quite alright actually, especially when it’s not too much rattling and semi-improvised. The voices is obviously something I least cared for, but when it leaps into the more finer drones, it’s actually quite good. Perhaps also because at times it sounds more industrial than ambient and it cleverly stays away from being a very new age like release. So I guess it gets the benefit of doubt. (FdW)
Address: http://www.wrotycz.com
BRYAN EUBANKS & CATHERINE LAMB – UNTITLED 12 (AFTER AGNES) (CD by Sacred Realism)
ANDREW LAFKAS – MAKING WORDS (CD by Sacred Realism)
It’s hardly a secret I should think that I like CDs over vinyl. Yes, entirely my problem. Or as someone said: but in twenty-five years you can’t play CDs anymore. To which I replied ‘that may include vinyl also and perhaps I am no longer around then to check all of this, but until then I like the crisp sound, and no crackles with some of the softer music. But then CDRs do tend to wear out, and luckily these days you can press real CDs in small quantities with a real digipack. So you have a good looking product in a small edition. Perhaps that’s the whole raison d’etre behind this new label, Sacred Realism, who just released these two ‘glass mastered CDs in digipack, edition of 150’. Labelowner Bryan Eubanks teams up with Catherine Lamb for ‘Untitled 12 (After Agnes’), named after a painting by Agnes Martin, during her ‘grey’ period in the 1980s. I never saw any of those paintings, except for this one which is reprinted on the cover (‘but you see why vinyl is superior: those CD covers are so small’) but I can imagine what it sounds like based upon this sixty minute release (well, 59’59), which actually is about ‘nothing’. A static hiss, for one hour, with a bump at exactly fifteen minutes making the sound go up a bit, and one at exactly forty-five minutes mark. But for the rest it’s just static hiss. It’s all very conceptual for sure, but perhaps a bit too conceptual for me. Or perhaps it requires a totally different attitude towards listening and/or a form of meditation which I not always posses, certainly when reviewing and writing. This is one of those things, one has to put aside and pick up again when time calls for it.
In Greenpoint, Brooklyn, in 2009 and 2010, Andrew Lafkas organized concerts with numerous musicians in an open ended ensemble, playing all evening, combining “electronic and acoustic instruments, graphic and traditional notation, and composed with the abilities and input of each member of the particular ensemble in mind’. Towards the end of the series, in April 2010, they made this recording of composer/organizer Andrew Lafkas on bass, Bryan eubanks on electronics, Sean Meehan on snare drums and cymbals, Margardia Garcia on electric guitar, plus others on flute, tenor saxophone, trombone, viola and more electronics. This release, which last seventy-one minute, and which is one piece, and which has a nice flow to it. A fine combination of electronics, bursting, hissing and all of those acoustic instruments playing long sustaining sounds. Sometimes nice, viciously loud, and sometimes more quite an subdued, such as the whole middle part (from twenty-five minutes onwards, for some twenty-five minutes). A nice recording, which doesn’t sound like it has been edited in some way, but which doesn’t show any point of weakness or searching for moments, as we sometimes encounter with these unedited live recordings. A fine release on the verge of improvisation, modern classical ensemble music and microsound. Quite a fine release. (FdW)
Address: http://www.sacredrealism.org
MACHINIST – CONVERGENCE (CD by Narrominded)
Perhaps a bit surprising to see Machinist on Narrominded, but maybe it’s my narromindedness to think otherwise. Machinist, Dutch composer Zeno van den Broek, sounds like Machinefabriek, in name and sometimes a bit in music. His earlier works were dark ambient industrial musical nightmares of extended tones, but in more recent times – this particular work is a live recording from November last year – it opened up a bit more and we are able to recognize some other instruments. ‘Convergence’ opens with a piano sound, which slowly evolves into subtle, multi-layered drones and field recordings of an obscure nature. A very intense first half. Then the piano returns and moves into the second half of the piece, which is more based on field recordings, of sea gulls and sea sounds. It’s perhaps a bit of lesser part this one, which sounds too easily with just these sounds and bass thump, slowly pounding away. Only when the drones return and the piano, now in a higher range on the keyboard the piece gets some of the tension of the first half back. It ends with a solemn slow drone. Overall I thought this was a very good piece, with only one bit being lesser interesting. I don’t hear something that I may not have heard before, that much is also true here, but in the department of mood music, Machinist is certainly an act to watch out for, and though not as prolific as Machinefabriek, certainly a highly collectible one. (FdW)
Address: http://www.narrominded.com
ALESSANDRO BOSETTI – DER ITALIENISCHE MANIERISMUS (CD by Con-V)
Alessandro Bosetti makes the listener often struggle with complex music with almost mathematical structures, dissonances, counter rhythms and so on. He was born in 1973 in Milan and plays several instruments. What is striking is that it is often guided by the words and the rhythm in which it is spoken. He makes music for radio, performances and installations. His latest CD “Der Italienische Manierismus” is released on the Spanish label CON-V, which focuses on independent musicians in an unconventional way to deal with sound, like Celer, Jos Smolders, John Hudak and D’Incise. This album is less complicated than the previous albums. It seems that Alessandro Bosseti focuses more on the sound and rhythm and to increase the emphasis. The CD is composed of compositions he played live in 2011. Some tracks were tightly defined, while others were created through improvisation. What I like about this album is that field-recordings and musique concrete sounds increasingly used instead of traditional musical instruments. In the song “It is an island” is the most powerful made and he uses concrete and electronic sounds and rhythmic sound curtain. In “Our Positions” he takes as a starting point the book “Le noste posizioni” of the avant-garde poet Corrado Costa. The poem is recited in a calm and rhythmic way. In the background voices and field-recordings support the poem softly. An exciting song about the position taken and is not changed. In “Dolce Stilnox” seems Bosetti?s honored recipe to apply complex musical patterns, but by the repetition and subtlety gets this piece with his calm unrest an almost meditative character, because the listener will be surprised by the small changes. With “Der Italienische Manierismus” knows Alessandro Bosetti to bridge experiment and accessibility, without losing its own identity and that is a great merit. (JKH)
Address: http://www.con-v.org
MERZBOW KAPOTTE MUZIEK – WORKS 1987-1993 (3CD by Korm Plastics)
In history, a certain type of very conservative – reactionary even – history, key moments and people are outlined, but no longer do we learn the kings and queens, we concentrate on oral histories of last week. So whilst seemingly radical in fact everything in music is still well and truly reactionary ideology. Artists still are identified with and seek to make seminal work, as our Tracey sickly maintains. So when in the late 1970s one Masami Akita stated “I threw all my past music career in the garbage. There was no longer any need for concepts like ‘career’ and ‘skill’. I stopped playing music and went in search of an alternative.” The rest one could say really was history! Only a history that has been both ignored and wonderfully misappropriated into what is now the current noise “scene” of incompetent misfits who imagine their work to be art in the great western tradition. What this 3CD set demonstrates is the origin of this ‘scene’ or site of dissemination of the meaningless and banal of contemporality. The ipad generation were not yet born when Akita and de Waard began a series of interchanges released originally on cassette and vinyl. The ‘history’ of this process is detailed here http://kormplastics.nl/kp3050.html. The consequences of this (and other events) of the time are in a real sense more profound. As if the ideas of a previous generation failed to generate, and how the fin de siècle became an eternal return of the (same) trivial misunderstanding, and failing to understand. The process of this collaboration is obviously a deconstructive one as any current art student would argue – though by virtue of wikipedia and a downloaded paper with Harvard references. So in fact this contemporality changes, in Damian (Peter 1007-1072 not Hirst 1965 -?) fashion, the past to render the noise of Akita and de Waard as meaningful in its reaction to – from the past – of this future we now inhabit. The brilliance of such mutilation of past events not via some modified DeLorean but by the simple expediency of a logical inversion – the logic of the ipad’s NOT gates. (The garbage becomes art and so art becomes garbage….) One might therefore admire Akita and de Waard’s work as contributing to the current ‘scholasticism’ – or perhaps conversely to Damian’s condemnation of philosophy as the work of the Devil and the self flagellation of ‘noisers’ in small bars all over the mid-west. Either way – by not excluded middles they are genius’s. A logically non exclusive OR. And to end – by the by – I’ve been criticized for not describing the sound in a review – so what does this sound like – it sounds like the work that is yet to be produced by a sound ‘artist’ somewhere! (jliat)
Address: http://www.kormplastics.nl
KNURR & SPELL (CD compilation by Memoirs Of An Aesthete/Smokers Gifts/Noise Below)
PHIL MINTON & DYLAN NYOUKIS (LP by Phase Records/Mafia)
Two releases from Greece here. The compilation is a four band release of all bands from West Yorkshire and none of which I ever heard. Shembold, Oceloclot, Moral Holiday and Foldhead. I should actually say ‘psychedelic sounds from Yorkshire’. Each of these four bands/projects/persons get about twenty minutes here to fulfill their deepest desires in playing psychedelic music. Lots of organ like sounds and guitars being fed through an extensive number of sound devices. Distortion, reverb, delay, chorus, flanger, phaser and whatever it is out there to make these sounds. Moral Holiday start out nice, but drown out in a long and somewhat silly guitar solo. Foldhead is the most noisy one from this quartet, using a more synth like approach and a whole bunch of radio devices being off course. Shembold is the most guitar like, but then folded out into a tapestry of sound, with the low tick of rhythm machine. The most krautrock experience here. My favorite however is Ocelocelot which is most electronic one, with perhaps, as the title indicates a bontempi organ (‘Bontempi Bastet’ is the title) and lots of swirling electronics. Cluster on too many acid, this is the true psychedelica for me. A nice long compilation which gives you enough music to form a proper opinion.
The other release is an one sided LP recorded live in the Knot Gallery in Athens, a year ago. A country in great financial need and perhaps it was because of that, that Phil Minto and Dylan Noukis decided to use voice material. It was even the reason for inviting them. ‘Voice as the original instrument’ as Joan La Barbara would say it (actually I got this quote from the press release). The result was very much to the liking of three men owning record labels, that it is now released as an one sided LP (one label has a Greek name which I can’t read). This is a pretty radical record indeed. Improvisation music of the highest order and by two of the best, who sound at times like Jaap Blonk, who ranks easily with Nyoukis and Minton, I should think. Judging from what I hear, they move around the room in which they perform, sometimes close by the (recording) microphone and sometimes far away. And to some hilarious response from the audience, which we hear laughing at times (towards the end). A strong record of abstract sound poetry, which reminded me (again) of the best work of Jaap Blonk (circa his ‘Flux de Bouche’ and ‘Vocalor’ CDs). Totally devoid of any electronics, and yet at times sounding like electronic music. Record is a poor excuse for the real thing, as that would be the concert itself, but this one sounds great. What a pity it’s one side only. (FdW)
Address: http://memoirsofanaesthete.bandcamp.com/album/knurr-spell-being-psychedelic-sounds-from-yorkshire
Address: http://www.phasejunk.com/http://www.noise-below.org
GATE – DAMNED REVOLUTIONS (LP by Ultramarine Records)
SMEGMA – EVER AND ANON (LP by Ultramarine Records)
BENE GESSERIT – STILL INSANE AFTER ALL THESE YEARS (LP by Ultramarine Records)
Here’s a trio of LP releases which are all connected, heavily, to the past, old people (?) but all of them alive and well and recording still new material. Gate’s Michael Morley is perhaps the youngest of this lot, starting out in the 90s as a solo encounter besides his work as a guitarist in Dead C. As Gate he has released a whole bunch of material, and, curious enough, I missed out on many of them, even when in the late 90s/early 00s my interest in music from New Zealand was quite extensively. I have no idea why that is. So it’s hard to judge this new record for me, in light of his previous works. This is a come back record after two years of silence, and it’s a damn fine record. Lots of guitars, a whole wall of sound actually, but also with curious broken up sounds, which sound like ultimate computer distortion played through some crappy speakers, a beat occasionally and even a voice here and there. All along the guitar is droning, fuzzing, distorting. On ‘Turning And Towards The Light’ it’s a bit more open ended, almost in a demented blues version, but with all that distortion and feedback never really far away. It’s the piece on the other side ‘Turned And Glowing Inwardly’ which I liked best: a wall of sound, uninterrupted and in complete psychedelic mode sounds popping in and out of the mix. I should seek out the past of Gate!
The other two bands are considerable older. Smegma started out in 1973 and have been connected to the Los Angeles Free Music Society. Since then they always play concerts, mainly around the current hometown Portland, Oregon. Smegma play free music; free as in how they play their instruments, how they construct their ‘songs’, but also free of any kind of stylistic approach. A while ago, several people thought Smegma belonged to the school of noise, and to some extend that is perhaps true, but actually if you play together in a free mode since 1973 you may pick up a few tricks from the big book of musical history. That’s what makes this record quite a weird one. Smegma move all over the place. From surf like opening to free jazz, free rock, noise, sound collage and even something that reminded me of computer manipulated sound, along with skipping records, and analogue tape loops of found sound, this sounds almost like a compilation but it’s not. Smegma’s rock line up, which includes various wind instruments, guarantees that things never get off the rails too much, even when they go all weird on us. This is a damn fine record. If you want to have something weird or need a proper introduction to this band, then I’d say: here’s a way to step in.
Something entirely different is the music by Bene Gesserit, who started out somewhere in the early 80s. Here we find Alain Neffe, firstly known as one of the Pseudo Code trio and the Insane Music label, and a little bit later also as Cortex, Human Flesh and with his wife Nadine Bal as Bene Gesserit. From all of these bands, which I rate highly, Bene Gesserit wasn’t the one I got into easily. It’s perhaps because it’s quite heavily based on vocals by Bal, or perhaps the somewhat cabartesque, dada like approach. But as I was recently listening to the CD re-issue of their first LP from 1985 (see Vital Weekly 822) I actually seemed to enjoy it more than I did in 1985. Maybe it’s for more mature people. That’s the same here on this new LP with a title that I don’t like that much, with material that is recorded between 2009 and 2011. At the core of the Bene Gesserit sound is still the elastic voice of Nadine Bal, who calls herself Benedict G when being a member of Bene Gesserit. She sings, moans, howls, scream, laughs and cries around which B. Ghola (which is, obviously Alain Neffe) plays his loops, Yamaha portable mini synth, digital sax, 1970s organ, rhythm box, garageband loops and sounds. That is indeed an indication that things have changed and instruments and recording gear have been updated. It sounds like it indeed. But this update didn’t make the music sound any less, in fact it sounds better, when the rhythm is pounding away in good ol’ fashioned boxed style or from the loops from the computer. More worked out, clearer in the use of various layers, but never ‘drowning’ in the new techniques. Here we have eleven pieces of some of the finest electronic pop music – totally out of line with the other two recent releases on Ultramarine (or indeed much of their catalogue), but which work wonderfully well. Modern, mature, intelligent pop music. Excellent! (FdW)
Address: http://www.ultramarinerecords.com
ANDREY KIRITCHENKO – CHRYSALIS (LP by Nexsound)
This is certainly one of the stranger records I encountered lately. I know Andrey Kiritchenko as someone who likes his computer, a surprise and his Ukranian background. “Chrysalis is a state in which one creature naturally transformed in an almost completely different being, while remaining within the cocoon. The idea of this transformation in time, when living creatures are left virtually nothing from the previous condition, is very inspiring. In this album sound of acoustic instruments and electronics flow into one another, dissolve in devolution, decay in a space of interactions. Rebirth”. That’s what he writes about his latest LP, which lists Kiritchenko as the composer, producer and mixer of this record, and where he receives help on clarinet, double bass and violin. But what the hell is what here? I hear orchestral sounding music, which indicates that Kiritchenko sampled those instruments and perhaps some he played himself and creates this odd music. It’s sounds very jazz like (I almost left it with Dolf Mulder for this reason), sometimes a bit minimal (“A Sack Of Winds”) and also actually quite acoustic. That’s perhaps the oddest thing about this record. Here we hardly have an ‘evidence’ of Kiritchenko’s laptop in play, so perhaps he’s just editing the recordings made by the musicians and add a bit of piano and drum sounds of his own. I was thinking that this might all be a too jazz like for me, but overall I also thought this was a strangely captivating record. One hell of hard to classify record, Rafael Toral fans for more spacious ‘fake’ jazz should take notice! Less electronic, more warm, I guess. (FdW)
Address: http://www.nexsound.org/
JADA – (7″ by Cosmic Volume/Inner Landscapes)
Behind JaDa we find Jan van den Dobbelsteen and Danielle Lemaire, who operate solo on all sorts of projects and sometimes together. Here it’s together alone, each filling up one side of the record, and both of them now having an exhibition in Eindhoven about their recent trip to Bandung, Indonesia. Both Lemaire and Van den Dobbelsteen are visual artists and musicians – in no particular order and both worked extensively with Indonesian musicians such Iman Zimbot and Gustaff Hariman Iskandar. On this 7″ Ja and Da each have a side of their own. Van den Dobbelsteen has an odd minimalist piece of static radio sounds from Radio Bandung and and ‘kitchentools’ although it’s not easy to figure how these tools sound. A static sound, far away and remote, not unlike the CD by Bryan Eubanks and Catherine Lamb, reviewed elsewhere, but then much shorter and perhaps a bit more musical. He also plays on the other side, together with Lemaire and Zimbot in an improvised session – or rather snippets thereof, which too sounds recorded far away and has a rather intimate quality to it. Like listening in to what the neighbors are doing through an open window. Together with the shadowplay that covers much of this exhibition – which I actually saw – this fits well. Rather well, indeed. (FdW)
Address: http://www.iae.nl/users/jada
P-LAB + Z + KASPER T. TOEPLITZ – LIVE CE SOIR LA 14/03/2012 (CDR by Care Not Care)
This is quite cute: ‘You mean recall having kindly written about my cd-r, ‘Wipe Out’ way back in Vital Weekly number 486′, the letter says, but no, I don’t remember what I wrote about last week, let alone August 3 2005. Even after re-reading that review, I have no real clue as to how it sounded, but apparently indeed I liked it. Paul Collins, who wrote that, played on and on with a band called Ultradig and Caandides, and in the last two years with Lukas, Adrian, and Bladine, making up the group P_Lab, who played on March 14 of this year with Kasper T. Toeplitz a concert, which also included texts by Emmanuel Zwenger, the Z in the listing. There is no mentioning of instruments on the cover of this release, but hearing this music, which they describe as ‘minimal drone noise’, I assume it’s an all laptop affair, plus perhaps some out board electronics to further color the detail of the affair. Most of the times it’s quite a loud affair of heavy drones which come close to the world of noise, but luckily it’s never really loud. For me the first piece, at forty five minutes already quite a beast, would have been enough to get the drift, so the next one, another twenty-five minutes may seem superfluous. The writer only appears, it seems, in the final piece, which curiously then only takes one and half minute. Quite a decent release, nothing new under the sun, but executed with quite an amount of style and care, which works out long and well. (FdW)
Address: http://p-lab.bandcamp.com
XTEMATIC – BEAUTIFUL NEGATIVA (CDR by SP Recordings)
Tracks which otherwise might be found in the first Alien film, a double problematic, that its been done, but further in the original it raised a dystopian future and a cowboys and Indian plot with music and effects which ‘aped’ 2001 but were not ‘transcendental’ in anyway. Goldsmith is no Ligeti. Some tracks are clearly more ‘noisy’ than others but hold on to the “spacey” theme. Track titles should help – Nightmares From Future, Truth Does Not Exist, Dead Field Transmission, Para Hermosa Negativa, Tempest, Pain Of My Soul, 0 and Tehom… we have mostly very spacey echoy themes – and yet some more harsh noise. Not withstanding that the truth does not exist – oh
really – good to know! – in Tom Wolfe’s painted word – an excellent critique of art btw, the truth of painting was in its flatness, and so we marvelled at Jackson Pollock’s flatability. That is until some critic remarked that it was not flat at all- it was deep, very deep, Greenbergian deep, so deep you could metaphorically fly a spaceship into it…! There was a cultural gasp and onto the stage came Lichtenstein & co with images of cheap printed material, comic books whose flatness was doubly insured by their being flat paintings of flat comics, which had no physical or intellectual depth whatsoever! Hence the genius of Andy Warhol.. So too with noise there is a great danger of being swallowed in the depths – not of philosophy – whose depths have been totally mudded by the French, but by pseudo mysticism, magic crystals and freeze dried forms of Buddhism. Or by pained souls… which is why incompetence and nonsense is so important to noise remaining – noise. (jliat)
Address: http://www.sprecordings.com/
FRANK ROSALY – CENTERING AND DISPLACEMENT (CDR by Utech)
Four years ago composed Frank Rosaly “Centering and Displacement.” The two pieces, in which electronics and percussion are combined is released by the American label Utech Records. At present he lives and works in Chicago and has been active since 2001 in the improvised and experimental music scene of that city. Numerous releases he has to his name, as a solo musician, a member of a project or as leader of a group aka band. This musical centipede, which has its roots lie in drums and percussion, has entered for this album is a musical experiment. Various shots of improvisation he has collected and divided into parts. The pieces are in a sound program orchestrated and arranged. The pieces were further processed and divided into six separate channels. The six channels were transferred to three CDs and these were played back on a six channel installation. Fortunately the piece was reduced to a two-channel version, which now can be heard in two parts. The album is a wonderful synergy between electronic sound, drums and percussion. Despite the technical approach of the composition, it is not been heart in the end result. The compositions sound as spontaneous and well considered pieces in which also the necessary freedom to experiment has been taken. The first part begins with noisy and heavy drums and turns into a subtle piece of metal through soft tones and wooden percussion. The second part is wonderful in terms of tension. It starts with abstract electronic sounds and a beautiful discrepancy between the sound of scraping metal and melodic call. Then comes a rhythmic electronic sound in the pace of increased heart rate, which is the base for percussive improvisation. Frank Rosaly knows how to fit acoustic and electronic sounds wonderful together into a very attractive album. Highly recommended! (JKH)
Address: http://utechrecords.com/
TOY BIZARRE – KDI DCTB 146 [S] (3″CDR by Kaon)
For reasons I am not sure about, Cedric Peyronnet, the man who recorded a bunch of river sounds and handed them out to befriended composers for quite some time now, never did one himself, it seems. He himself he works as Toy Bizarre when it comes to composing with electro-acoustic sound matter (and unlike many of his peers he still holds on to his old band name). His sixteen minute piece here is quite loud with mildly distorted passages of sound, and only to a lesser extent something that is a bit softer. It’s not easy to say what Peyronnet has done with his own material, but it doesn’t always seem to be computer processed – or in fact processed at all. Many of the times it seems that he’s applying merely some equalization to the original sound material and some edits to get the ‘right flow’ in this material – pun intended. Overall I quite enjoyed this piece of music, perhaps because it was all a bit louder, a tad nastier perhaps, than what we usually hear from Toy Bizarre. An interesting addition to his own, fine series. (FdW)
Address: http://www.kaon.org
SINDRE BJERGA – RADIANT FLUX (cassette by LightenUp Sounds)
SAGAS – SOJOURNER’S LAMENT (cassette by LightenUp Sounds)
More and more Sindre Bjerga, the man who keeps on performing and performing. And all of these performances are obviously recorded and many of them are released. Here we have two recent performances from August of this year in Norway, which show us a slightly different Bjerga this time. I have no idea what he uses here, but his music is a bit more open here, using a variety of obscured voices, many of which seem to be taped to dictaphones and such like, feedback like sounds, and lesser on the manipulation of electro-acoustic sound sources. But perhaps I am entirely wrong here and it’s just for these occasions he sounds a bit different. But both pieces, recorded on two different nights in close succession, are also what you expect from Bjerga. Lo-fi, electronic, electro-acoustic, a bit chaotic at times and slightly disorganized. It’s how we know him best and what I like about his music. Very consistently building his own sound world. Perhaps not always with the biggest jumps in development, but surely this one is especially nice.
Perhaps I should leave such tapes as by Sagas to Jliat. Matt McDowell (of Dire Wolves and Waterfinder) plays guitar on two tracks and lapsteel on one, and does this too close to the amplifier and plays around with the notion of feedback, like we haven’t heard that before. The best bits here are when he’s considerable far away from the amplifier and lo and behold this guy can play some desolate free blues music. Especially the lapsteel piece is quite nice. Loosely improvised, this is without too much distortion enjoyed best, I think. When all of those gates are opened, I am indeed less interested. The majority is however thumbs up. (FdW)
Address: http://lightenupsounds.blogspot.com
FILTHY TURD/YOL SPLIT (2 x c90 by WHITENESS & PINKNESS)
FTs “tape is made up of two lengthy audio collages. Fish god invocations. Stories of when he was lost at sea. Recorded over some old Hawaiian tape. Yol’s tape is made up of one track of him dragging a mic in an old metal mop bucket through an industrial estate and yelling as he goes along and banging bits of metal; and another track of some yelling and banging about in an attic, some field recordings, words from the Donor audiobook + bits of noise.” Small snippets (10 or so seconds) of found sound, 60s radio, toy guitar, ambient sounds, speech, radio static noise, moaning demented singing all recorded seemingly on a cheap cassette in which the cuts between these snips are often heard, the tape starts nowhere and wanders in some delirium nowhere, which is the hallmark of Filthy Turds work. The quoted text from the website asserts that the tape is made over an audio book – in this case Captain Correlli’s Mandolin, much of which remains on the B side. The other tape is the bucket piece, accompanied again by moaning… this time recorded over an Audio book of John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men again of which on the B side part of the recording is extant. The nature of these releases is such that there barren inessentiality no way provocative of any thought, as does it matter if descriptions are accurate. For me they are then not metaphors or commentaries more like operas though empty of any worthwhile content – yet strangely alluring. (jliat)
Address: http://whitenessaandpinkness.tumblr.com/
AUTOMATING / TORTURING NURSE CONTEST TO KILL 100 PEOPLE (Audio cassette by
Tenzenmen)
The title relates to one of many atrocities inflicted by the Japanese in the Nanking Massacre in 1937… Automating is Sasha from Melbourne, Australia, Torturing Nurse should be more well known, a prolific noise ‘act’ from Shanghai… This is a very odd release indeed, Automating’s contribution consists of a recoding of some analyst? – a talking therapy – overdubbed with echoy drones hums and rhythmic glitches – no doubt all very meaningful, symbolic or whatever. OK – harsh from me – but why wrap such ‘weak’ art student messing about in the context of an actual historical holocaust. It’s a poor show, only allowable by the charity that should be shown to children, this kind of art belongs on fridge doors. Again in case anyone thinks this harsh – the atrocities which occurred in WW2 were harsh- and so if we use these to wrap some kind of naïve avant gardism – shouldn’t we raise the questionable nature of using such material. OK – so the Chapman Bros do this all the time. The whole saga of the SS and concentration camps reduced to ironic toy town vignettes, well this can be defended- but for lack of space not here- but simply because the deliberate crassness rather than employing the atrocities historically turn back on the artworks in an obviously Dadaistic way, nothing of this is found in the seriousness of Automating’s work, other than the pseudo seriousness of the naïve and inexperienced.
Torturing nurse I’ve found never fail to achieve a vitality of noise across its various forms in a creative and animated way, from HNW through to HN, and they do once again perform well on this tape. Can they avoid similar condemnation, well yes, and not because they come from near to where these events took place, but because of their shear lack of ideology that typifies all noise- as in the case of Merzbow- noise as art is not art because in Nietzschean terms it is beyond good and evil and so beyond morality, ethics and aesthetics, it must be in its arbitrariness – meaninglessness. The debate of the morality of the second world war or any war simply does not arrive, or rather its been established that all structures are essentially self justifying and hypocritical, in culture, history and art. Noise does not critique, it ignores, effaces, overwrites, obfuscates everything including itself, as the work of Torturing Nurse does here. (jliat)
Address: http://www.tenzenmen.com/
MIKEL R. NIETO & FEDERICO SANCHO – MACHINE PATTERN #01 (cassette by Security Device)
One of the big differences between the 80s cassette movement and the current revivalists, is that these days there is hardly a weird package around, unlike the 80s with its pyramids, cans, pill boxes and bathing sponges. So in that respect this nice oversized styrofoam box needs a big applause – sufficiently different from the majority of tapes reviewed here. Inside the box we find a yellow tape with no print and a piece of paper with some sort of coded message, but puzzling is not my middle name, so I didn’t bother. I tried the website for more clues, and having films and pictures in stead of words is a nice idea, but they aren’t hardly informative. So, the nice graphic by one Federico Sancho and the sound by one Mikel R. Nieto, whose website is equally uninformative. Which is a pity since the music is actually quite nice. Here too I am reminded of the 80s with its drone like sounds, humming like a machine, and perhaps taking its source from a machine. When the drones end, there is, lo and behold, even a machine like sound, one of a primitive kind. Maybe a print place of some kind? With some letter press, hand operated device? I am not sure, but it adds to the conceptual nature of the whole package. What it is all about is a mystery, but it looks and sounds great. And that’s perhaps also a nice 80s touch, where you had zero information most of the times. (FdW)
Address: http://www.security-device.org