ROBERT BEATTY – SOUNDTRACKS FOR TAKESHI MURATA (CD by Glistening Examples) *
HENRY VEGA – STREAM MACHINES (CD by ARTEksounds) *
ILO & FREIBAND – BITS AND PIECES (CD by Korm Plastics/Motok) *
CEDRIC DAMBRAIN – SUBJECTIVE SLAVE (CD by Roughledge) *
VOMIR – LES ESCALIERS DE LA CAVE (CD by Decimation Sociale/Skum Rex/Narcolepsia)
RORO PERROT – MUSIQUE VAURIENNE (CD by Decimation)
DARSHAN AMBIENT – LITTLE THINGS (CD by Spotted Peccary) *
DAVID HELPLING & JON JENKINS – FOUND (CD by Spotted Peccary) *
KK NULL & ISRAEL MARTINEZ & LUMEN LAB – INCOGNITA (CD by Aagoo Records) *
BLEVIN BLECTUM – EMBLEM ALBUM (CD by Aagoo Records) *
CONNECT_ICUT – CROWS & KITTIWAKES WHEEL & COME AGAIN (CD by Aagoo Records) *
COMMON OBJECTS – LIVE AT MORDEN TOWER (CD by Mikroton) *
MICHAEL THIEKE UNUNUNIUM – NACHTLIEDER (CD by Mikroton) *
MARGARETH KAMMERER – WHY IS THE SEA SO BLUE (CD by Mikroton) *
ILIA BELORUKOV & KURT LIEDWART – VTOROI (CD by Mikroton) *
ILIA BELORUKOV & KURT LIEDWART – OBWOD (CD by Copy For Your Records) *
GERMAN ARMY – LAST LANGUAGE (LP by A Giant Fern)
SINDRE BJERGA & MICROMELANCOLIE – ANAGLYPH #1 (cassette by A Giant Fern)
DEREK ROGERS – SIGNIFYIUNG MEMORY (cassette by A Giant Fern)
DOC WÖR MIRRAN & TESENDALO – THEMES FOR WALDEN (CDR by Mirran Threat) *
DOC WÖR MIRRAN – COLD RATS (CDR by Mirran Threat) *
DOC WÖR MIRRAN – HAPPY AS A TARGET (3″CDR by Mirran Threat) *
AUTOPUGNO – CARPA CAVERNOSA (CDR, private) *
NIKO SKORPIO – KHORA (double 3″ CDR by Some Place Else)
TASOS STAMOU – A LITANY OF ‘AISHITERU WA’ (3″CDR by Orila) *
_BLANK (cassette by Love The Chaos)
ROBERT BEATTY – SOUNDTRACKS FOR TAKESHI MURATA (CD by Glistening Examples)
On Jason Lescalleet’s Glistening Examples label the first release of Robert Beatty under his own name. You may know him as a member of Hair Police (whom I once reviewed in a not so favorable way which let to many discussions with the label boss) and solo as Three Legged Race, which I didn’t hear. He also is a visual artist which includes drawing, video and album covers such as for Oneohtrix Point Never and Peaking Lights. Here however he offers soundtracks for ‘digital video glitch pioneer’ Takeshi Murata, which Beatty recorded between 2004 and 2007. As Three Legged Race he has recently an album on Spectrum Spools (of whom we sadly no longer receive promo’s), and this work sort of forecasts that. It has nothing to do with the noise of Hair Police (thank god. *sighs*). I haven’t seen the video work of Murata, so maybe I am not the right person to judge the musical component, but then if Lescalleet feels they can stand on their own two feet, I can judge them as stand alone musical pieces, right? It seems to me there is a fair amount of analog synthesizers here, especially in the longest piece, ‘Untitled (Pink Dot)’, which has a very minimal approach, with very subtle changes. In the opening piece ‘Cone Eater’ there is a bit of the good ol’ noise worked in and probably this is all very glitchy when it comes to the film. It’s a short piece but not my favorite. The next three pieces are longer and all heavily rely on those analogue synths, but somehow seem to stay away from a pure cosmic doodle and go much deeper in their minimalist approach. It’s music that works right inside your brain and doesn’t lull you to sleep. In stead you stay focussed on whatever changes there are in the music. The last and shortest piece is a short excursion in rhythm, which is a nice closing statement, but perhaps also a bit out of place? For the biggest part I thought this was a great CD (which is actually also available on LP and download, in case you are in need of that!) (FdW)
Address: http://glisteningexamples.com/
HENRY VEGA – STREAM MACHINES (CD by ARTEksounds)
Here’s an album which I have played a couple of times in the past two weeks, and somehow I don’t seem to make up my mind about it. I never heard of composer Henry Vega, who seems to be living in The Netherlands, if I understand the list of performers right and those who commissioned pieces. All of these pieces are solo instruments or small ensembles in combination with electronics. Modern classical music that is, and it’s usually not the kind of music which I am particular fond of. For instance ‘Slow Slower’, the opening piece here (in two parts) is something that is too common for me. Careful playing, bits of electronic thrown in, baroque instruments (harpsichord, recorder, viola da gamba) meet modern electronics, but the result is not very exciting. In that respect I quite enjoyed the two pieces for percussion and electronics, ‘Izumi’ and ‘Automata Angels’, in which in the first we have a vague Eastern notion in the percussion and a forceful drumming in the second. That also seems to have Ikeda like digital glitches, which is something we also heard in ‘Scanner Quartet’, a string quartet and electronics, of which the latter are particular stuttery and had a nice microsound feel to the piece, indeed Oval/Ikeda meeting a string quartet, who produce a variety of short and sustaining sounds. The title piece, which closes this release, is then something I didn’t like much (again). See, how this limps for me on two ends? I liked some of these pieces to some extend, but overall, as a whole CD, it didn’t work for me. I know that’s probably not the function of a CD, you can choose the pieces you like, but perhaps I am kind of old fashioned, and want to play the whole damn thing! (FdW)
Address: http://www.arteksounds.com
ILO & FREIBAND – BITS AND PIECES (CD by Korm Plastics/Motok)
The cooperation between Frans de Waard and Nico Selen goes back for over 20 years. Nico Selen released the first ever Kapotte Muziek LP at his own label called Motok in 1990. Both musicians are active in the experimental electronic music scene for more than 25 years.
Ilo, one of the projects of Nico Selen, released a highly limited CDR in January 2013 and was played many times by Frans de Waard. He gets inspired and added some sounds to the compositions of Ilo in February 2013. Three months later Ilo finalized the tracks and the album Bits and Pieces was born. The concept of re-use music and sounds of others has been done in several occasions by Frans de Waard, but in this case he succeeded very good. The CD is released by two labels of both musicians. The result is an atmospheric journey through processed sounds by computer. All titles of the tracks refer to computer language. The album starts with the track “Booting Up” and ends with “Shut Down.” Some tracks are very spacy and leads the listener to deeper worlds as well to higher atmospheres. Other tracks create more a distorted world in which the several sound layers will be in competition with each other. The variation between the several tracks makes this album to a high standard. “Error” is one of my favorite compositions of this album. A dark ongoing drone is disturbed by the sound which gives you an alarm that something is going wrong. The signal is coming not regular, which increases the sinister atmosphere. I hope Frans de Waard and Nico Selen will cooperate more in future and compose more adventurous ambient music. (JKH)
Address: http://www.kormplastics.nlhttp://www.motok.org
CEDRIC DAMBRAIN – SUBJECTIVE SLAVE (CD by Roughledge)
Despite his split 12″ on Sub Rosa I don’t think I heard of Cedric Dambrain before. Here he has a CD which comes under the banner of ‘computer music/noise/synthscape’, although Dambrain also composes for ensembles, solo works and other transdisciplinary collaborations, installations and live performances. The nine pieces span forty three minutes and are quite a heavy weight, even when it’s occasionally not the most loudest thing. This is a totally abstract computer generated sound, which can be loud, which can be noisy, but which can also be deceivingly soft, such as in ‘Another You’. Oddly enough, Dambrain chooses for some rather normal titles, such as ‘Another You’ or ‘Jail Gate Romance’ or perhaps the title of his release. I am not sure why this is, but it’s kind of funny and contradictory. The change overs from one track to another can be rude and loud, and makes up for the slightly disturbing character of the music. When it’s loud, it’s loud and the influence of say Merzbow seems never far away. These are perhaps not the pieces I necessarily care for. I heard those well enough when playing my share of Merzbow releases. I am altogether more interested in his ‘softer’ pieces, in which he shows some of the love he has for minimalist development of his pieces. Quite a fine release, with the noise pieces placed in a rather strategic position. (FdW)
Address: http://www.roughledge.com
VOMIR – LES ESCALIERS DE LA CAVE (CD by Decimation Sociale/Skum Rex/Narcolepsia)
OK its Vomir – what else is there to say – he would say – nothing? Only strangely a CD with two tracks – the first a fraction over five minutes, the second just over an hour….. but then HNW is in its changelessness, is timeless (not that you can ‘is’ without time – see below…). Now this presents a beautiful problem, well hnw itself presents the problem, I find the problem, not the HNW ‘beautiful’, because of the very instance of non instance of HNW. OK boys and girls so what’s so important about timelessness, well its (Time) the one thing absolutely essential to Kantian thinking, Kantian thinking of the possibility of thought, time (unlike space the other essential in the Transcendental Aesthetic – and if you think aesthetic means beautiful theories – not here sunshine- just “aesthesis” – or sensation – better – perception – which is the other side of the cognition which is his great achievement in bringing these two into a necessary relationship for understanding- “Thoughts without content are empty, intuitions without concepts are blind.” – oh – intuitions are not intuitions – as in ideas – but to intuit something is to perceive it…without concept or ideas- they used these words different then to now – OMG I’m probably wrong – but that’s how I see it…LOL) (use of hipster jargon to impress…) is crucial, now from Kant onwards things go on swimmingly, so its no surprise that TIME is a constant thing… Hegel has it in his workings of the Dialectic of Historical progress towards the Absolute through time, and of course Heidegger is famous for his book on it, as I’m rubbishing Kant, for H, Being is just Time, but the time of ones life, not clock ticks. So I guess inanimate objects for H cant “be”, or even stupid non angst things like Bees and members of the EDL. So here is HNW beautifully deconstructing much of philosophy, crazy eh? Gets even better, as Mao, yes you know he of the little red book, famously in his 1937 essay delivered at the Anti-Japanese’s Military and Political College in Yenen “On contradiction” refused to accept the synthesis as part of the dialectical struggle (Thesis Vs Antithesis – so beloved of Hegel and Marx) and so proclaimed the total un-resolution of contradiction, it’s placed above and “contra” that of the Aristotelean ban on the contradiction (Law of noncontradiction) – and of course such Aristotelean logic is the hallmark of philosophical thinking through Kant et al and even the OOO and OOP guys of today. Yes good ole Mao (with a tip of the hat to Lenin) rubbishes the whole lot of those lovers of that law…. but better, it is pure negative dialectics IMO, and Adornoable. Maoist dialects and Vomir! are then destructive of everything – Kantian, philosophical, even time, and of course THAT explains the Cultural Revolution!, and segues (love the word) nicely to HNW – which is precisely endless timeless contradiction. So who would have thought that HNW and theCultural Revolution are one and the same! Yea! What a theory! I did say HNWIS a BIG DEAL… (jliat)
Address: http://www.decimationsociale.com
RORO PERROT – MUSIQUE VAURIENNE (CD by Decimation)
Improvised electric guitar – no effects with vocal growl… ‘there there’…. Feeble pseudo musical ramblings worthy of myself, though I bought the Telecaster copy as part of my planned “Cant play wont play” tour in 2014…. I really quite liked this 9.09 minutes of incompetence, not noise or HNW… but neither any chance of this being taken seriously, which is of course just what I’m doing. One wonders if such ‘monkey’ business might stumble on Hendrix via Bert Weedon, I hope not. So we break the laws of probability – probably…. Oh – but then I realised that there was more than one track – (my player didn’t show these at first) oh joy another 13! Many much the same, some thinner, like track 6 almost empty, some without the moaning some withreverb (track 5)… or track 10 with some strange other musical backing – 12 & 13 some atmospherics? of noisy field recording…. The whole thing is like aconceptless concept album. And @ 14 tracks – proof that probablity theory is probably rubbish.(jliat)
Address: http://www.decimationsociale.com
DARSHAN AMBIENT – LITTLE THINGS (CD by Spotted Peccary)
DAVID HELPLING & JON JENKINS – FOUND (CD by Spotted Peccary)
It seemed only very recent, but it was in fact little over a year ago I reviewed ‘Falling Light’ by Darshan Ambient, the musical project of Michael Allison. He’s a gifted musician who has played with some well-known musicians (Nona Hendryx & Zero Cool, China Shop, Richard Hell & The Voidoids) and also recorded music for commercials and television. His music has a spacious feel to it – like we would not expect something else from this label – but it’s also very musical and even jazzy at times. Smooth music. Because winter is coming and I turned up the heat a bit more, I was all sleepy on this sunday afternoon and reading, doozing off, drinking coffee and actions that go on a sunday, and meanwhile Darshan Ambient with his piano, guitar, synths, string instruments and lots of sound effects. He plays ambient music for sure, modern day ambient music, which may or may not be on the side of new age. I am not sure. I would give this certainly the benefit of doubt, as maybe it’s sometimes a tad too dark for new age folk, but Darshan Ambient should be careful and not slip into more easy sound production than he does. Darshan Ambient could use a bit more spice I’d say.
The cover of ‘Found’ shows us Ayers Rock at night and a falling star. That looks like new age to me. Here we have the musical talents of Jon Jenkins and David Helpling, both of whom I may not gave heard before. The music they play together, on perhaps a similar set of instruments as Darshan Ambient, uses more guitars wailing about and a bit more rhythm, creating more pathos to the music. This could be movie music to say the next series of Game Of Thrones. It’s full of cliche’s and I must say not very much something I really like. While Darshan Ambient helped me through a grey sunday afternoon of laziness, the packed cliche’s of Helpling and Jenkins did absolutely nothing for me. Maybe here I was put off by the lots of guitars/’heavy’ rhythm cliche’s, as when that’s all gone, there are some nice pieces here too of atmospheric ambient music, but for me a little too much over the border, into that country whose name we dare not mention: new age. Not my world. (FdW)
Address: http://www.spottedpeccary.com
KK NULL & ISRAEL MARTINEZ & LUMEN LAB – INCOGNITA (CD by Aagoo Records)
BLEVIN BLECTUM – EMBLEM ALBUM (CD by Aagoo Records)
CONNECT_ICUT – CROWS & KITTIWAKES WHEEL & COME AGAIN (CD by Aagoo Records)
Three releases on Aagoo Records and on the first one we welcome KK Null, again, following his collaboration with The Noiser (see Vital Weekly 904), with another collaboration. Here with Israel Martinez, of whom we heard some interesting computer treated field recordings before (see Vital Weekly 819 and 869) and one Lumen Lab, which is actually his brother, Diego Martinez. In fact Israel was until 2002 a member of Lumen Lab. The three of them collaborated by trading sound files and playing with these on the spot in a more or less improvised way, and exchanging these recordings for further processing and editing. The result is four pieces, spanning fifty-one minutes, which combines their various interests in music. There is Null’s love for repeated short sounds, forming loud, heavy blocks of rhythm and the heavily processed field recordings from the Mexican brothers. Some of the improvised playing is retained in these recordings, which I guess is what makes them long(er), but I am not entirely convinced that was a good idea. Some of these pieces could have easily been trimmed down a bit, kept to a stronger point and not meander about as they seem to be doing now. It has the feeling of four lengthy cuts from a live recording, in strong need of some editing. It has absolutely great, intense moments, but it doesn’t seem to convince as a whole album, unfortunately. I heard much better from both Null and Israel.
Much to my shame (?) I must admit I don’t know Blevin Blectum’s very well. She didn’t release that much, but somehow it never reached me. Nor actually work she did with Bevin From Blechdom – which shows we are hardly journalists. Perhaps ‘Emblem Album’ is then my first proper introduction to her work. The press release says that her music is heard many different places, but is Ideally is to be listened to by emotionally-inconsistent artificially-intelligent spaceships sliding into other dimensions, played at high volume’, but that the sort of lingo that puts me off. Blectum uses a lot of rhythm in her work, but it’s not always music to dance to. There is a driving force in this music, which makes you drive, move, bounce, but occasionally it’s also a bit tiresome. Rather than using analog apparatus which seems always be deemed holy in the world of rhythm, Blectum uses her laptop to create a more digital version of dance music, with low bit rates as separate instruments. Sometimes the hyper-action she brings to the table is just too much, such as in ‘Harpsifloored’, but a Basic Channel rip off as is ‘Basically Chunnelled’ is quite nice. I am not sure if I now have a better idea of her music; somehow I doubt that. It’s partly because I didn’t like all of these pieces I guess. I see what she wants, I see what she does, she does well, but it’s perhaps not entirely my cup of joe.
Part of the REV. Lab series of Aagoo Records (meaning they are curated by graphic designer Bas Mantel, who adds a book to the vinyl version of this) is the CD (and LP, as all of these are available on vinyl) by Connect_icut, the musical project from Vancouver, Canada. He has had a bunch of releases before, receiving praise from (oho) Thurston Moore, Byron Coley and The Wire and he has a support slots for Oneohtrix Point Never and Loscil. That should give you pointers as to where to place this music. In the world where we have ambient, glitch and computer manipulation; microsound it was called at one point, but that might not be the commonly used phrase anymore. Music that is released by Kranky, but now on Aagoo Records. It’s quite good for what it is. It carries on where we left this off ten years ago – but we never receive any promo’s from Kranky anyway – and as such it’s hard to see any development in this music. Think Oval, think Loscil, think early Stephan Mathieu, or Fennesz and you are there. The forty-one minutes are well spend, actually twice, as I had it on repeat while reading the whining words of rock star’s autobiography and was too caught up in that nagging to switch the tunes. It’s fine music, but god, what’s new, pussycat? (FdW)
Address: http://aagoo.com
COMMON OBJECTS – LIVE AT MORDEN TOWER (CD by Mikroton)
MICHAEL THIEKE UNUNUNIUM – NACHTLIEDER (CD by Mikroton)
MARGARETH KAMMERER – WHY IS THE SEA SO BLUE (CD by Mikroton)
ILIA BELORUKOV & KURT LIEDWART – VTOROI (CD by Mikroton)
ILIA BELORUKOV & KURT LIEDWART – OBWOD (CD by Copy For Your Records)
One of the reasons why we at Vital Weekly have this ‘send three releases only’ at a time is that at one point a certain label, whose releases where financed by the artists, started sending ten new releases at a time, all of which was from the world of improvisation. Now Mikroton made it to five, including one that is not on their own label – more later – and I am not suggesting that artists actually pay along, but apparently, some of the labels for improvised music just seem to release a lot (at the same time?). Maybe Miktroton missed out on our glorious rules? Sending a lot of music means it has to be lumped in with the rest of whatever else we get, and it usually means the reviews are a bit more condensed. Let’s kick off with the released by John Butcher (saxophones, amplifier), Rhodri Davies (electric harp) and Lee Patterson (amplified devices and processes), who apparently work as Common Objects these days. They played earlier this year at Morden Tower in Newcastle (and no, I will not link this to something else recorded there so many moans ago) and now released cut to three shortish pieces and one long. If these names mean anything to you, you know their deal. Anything makes sound, including the instrument I am using and it might not be the sound you expect this to make. The short pieces are solo pieces and I am particularly fond of Paterson’s ‘Thoracic Pattern’ this being an excellent drone like piece. In the other pieces we may recognize the instruments as such more but here, in the long concert piece of the trio, we too have an excellent interaction between the players and all of their approaches to the instruments. It’s music with a lot of silence cut in, to build up tension and let it all happen in those fringes of silence. At times perhaps conventional improvising, and at other times something entirely different. Nice one.
Thieke we had a few ago around here with his release with Biliana Voutchkova (improv musicians and their mad schedules, eh?) now he’s here with a release of his ‘compositions’ – as noted on the cover – with an ensemble he calls Unununium, in which we find Martin Siewert on guitar among others. Or perhaps they only play on three of the nine pieces? The cover isn’t all to clear to that end. The music was already recorded in 2009 and Thieke plays clarinet, zither and field recordings. It’s hard to say to which extend this is composed and to which extend this is improvised, hence my reservation. It might very well be that Thieke provides the outlines of what is played and the players have a certain freedom of playing. I don’t know. The music seems to be all held back, minimal in development and heavily on the exploration of instruments and sounds. It only bursts out on a few occasions and turns into a post rock jazz tune then. I quite enjoyed the more silent aspects of this release, but wasn’t blown away by those parts.
Something else, completely and utterly something else, is the music by Margaret Kammerer, of whom I never heard. Maybe Mikroton wants to run a little side business, or perhaps these musicians want to do a bit of jazz anyway. We recognize in her ‘backing band’ Christof Kurzmann (voice, saxophone), Axel Dörner (trumpet), Burkhard Stangl (vibraphone) and Werner Dafeldecker (double bass), while Kammerer plays guitar and sings; with a bit of percussion by Big Daddy Mugglestone and and Marcello Silvio Busato. These nine pieces were already recorded in 2006 and the lyrics are by by Ned Washington, E.E. Cummings, Cole Porter, and such like and, well, alright, it might not be entirely jazz like, there is a jazz like feel to these pieces, especially in the way Kammerer sings these songs. The music is sparse at most of the times, but melancholic and moody, like we have been invited down to a smokey night club; except that the music is perhaps not entirely jazz standards. It’s interesting to hear these musicians playing this kind of music and it’s great to find such a release on Mikroton, even when, on the other hand, none of this is really my cup of tea.
The final two releases are by the same people although credits differ. Ilia Belorukov plays prepared alto saxophone on both releases, but on the Mikroton release, he also plays ipod with mini speaker, contact with mini amplifier, motors and objects, and Kurt Liedwart plays ppooll on both and adds objects and field recordings to the other. Ppooll is of course lloopp spelled backwards, the software thing that is used by Fennesz (among others) a lot. The Copy Of Your Records release was recorded in a studio on 27 May 2011, while the Mikroton release is has a live piece and three studio recordings from 2012. These are the facts about these two releases. There are, perhaps, also differences. Both had some mighty careful playing of sounds and instruments, but perhaps the Mirkoton release seemed a bit more silent, or perhaps I’m deceived by the near silence of ‘Teine’? All of this is careful stuff, as said, and 90 minutes is a lot to take in at once. Of course one doesn’t have to do this and take a CD at a time. But that’s perhaps not the harsh reality of a reviewer, alas. If I had to choose a favorite, I’d take the Copy For Your Records. That one had more sustaining sounds, more drone based and perhaps the more noisy one; perhaps that was what I need after so many carefully constructed beauty? (FdW)
Address: http://mikroton.net
Address: http://cfyre.co/rds/
GERMAN ARMY – LAST LANGUAGE (LP by A Giant Fern)
SINDRE BJERGA & MICROMELANCOLIE – ANAGLYPH #1 (cassette by A Giant Fern)
DEREK ROGERS – SIGNIFYIUNG MEMORY (cassette by A Giant Fern)
My introduction into the world of Portuguese label A Giant fern through a LP and two cassettes. The LP is by the for me unknown Los Angeles band German Army, who are all anonymous. There is one guy, X, who is always there and the band has had a bunch of releases since 2011. This is the third LP. This is a dark wave/pot industrial band with synthesizers, vocals and rhythms. The musical pieces are recorded at night, and you can tell from the slightly claustrophobic sound. The vocals have no doubt lyrics, but it’s hard to figure out what these lyrics are supposed to be about, and titles provide not much more: ‘Smoked Voice”, “Lost In A Canyon”, “Gloomed” “Fortified Ground” etc. The musical part is rhythm heavy, feeding through echo machines and usually slowly pounding away, like a big machine in the field. The synthesizers are set a minor chord and everything sounds depressed, with the voice being processed all the time. I was reminded of the local band Distel with the angst laden songs, but who are bit more stricter in their rhythmic approach. German Army seens a bit more open, a big more free in their approach, but nevertheless from the same dark waves on a black sea. Hardly uplifting music I’d say, but it sounds all quite nice. œ
The big difference between the old world of cassettes and the new one is the quite regular presentation of the current ones. These are usually in the normal boxes, but occasionally we have something that is out of the ordinary. A Giant Fern is from Portugal and these two releases come in a small cassette sized, wooden box. The first one is by Sindre Bjerga, who we follow already for a long time and Polish Micromelancolie, the project of Robert Skrynski, of whom we reviewed a first solorelease in Vital Weekly 902, but together they already did a CDR for Twice Removed. I assume the two pieces here were recorded face to face and not through, but I have no evidence to substantiate that – for the previous release I thought the opposite. The b-side (no title) finds them in a rather loud mood, with loud and powerful, near feedback like drones, slowly falling apart in smaller particles which are still a bit noisy, but sound quite nice. It has a fine thickly layered density this piece, something which we also find on the other side of this tape, but here it’s worked in a more spacious way, reminding us more of their previous outing together. Slightly different this one, but nevertheless a fine release.
Derek Rogers seems a new name to me. His three pieces were recorded in Los Angeles, late 2012, early 2013. The two pieces on the b-side contain field recordings. They are not easy to spot, unless the bird twitter in the second one. The music is mostly electronic here, of gliding tones, computer processed sounds, and most of the time not very loud, although at one point in the title piece things become a bit louder. The music is quite moody and relaxing, and could easily last an hour when played at low volume in the background. It doesn’t force itself upon the listener, but provides something that fills up your space, and probably would classify as ambient in the way Eno intended. I quite enjoyed this, immersed by other activities I guess, while this one was repeat for some time, depending less than the Bjerga/Micromelancolie. (FdW)
Address: http://www.agiantfern.tumblr.com
DOC WÖR MIRRAN & TESENDALO – THEMES FOR WALDEN (CDR by Mirran Threat)
DOC WÖR MIRRAN – COLD RATS (CDR by Mirran Threat)
DOC WÖR MIRRAN – HAPPY AS A TARGET (3″CDR by Mirran Threat)
For some reason I am pretty sure Doc Wör Mirran will never reach a big audience and for the wrong reason. I like them because they are so unpredictable: you never know which incarnation you get. The ambient band, the rock band, the free improv band, noise rock or just noise. If your taste is very wide you don’t care, but where on earth will you find someone who likes it all? Not even me, I am sure, but usually people are more narrominded: “if Doc Wör Mirran would so something more like that ambient 10 CDR set thing, I’d be surely their biggest fan, but I can’t stand that rock thing”. Hence, sadly, no world fame for them. But I do like their various approaches as one band (they could opt for different names, but they don’t), and am always keen to hear whatever they are to next. Or up to beyond, as of these three, two are older recordings. I started with the release that has main man Joseph B. Raimond solo with Peter Schuster, also known as Tesendalo with a recording from 1997. This recording sees Schuster on synth and Raimond on guitar and synth and it’s dedicated to Conrad Schnitzler, the master of non-keyboard synth music who passed away last year. It’s easy to see why: these three long/one short pieces are an obvious tribute to the man who played atmospheric tunes on synth – short and long ones – for forty or so years. ‘Wal’, the longest piece close to forty minutes, starts out in a Tangerine Dream fashion, but slowly evolve into a lot of things – loud, soft, rhythmic, drone based – and can easily match up with the best of the master, who at times had a similar sketch like approach. ‘Den’, the final piece is something of a coda like outro pieces. I only had a hard time with ‘For’ which was a bit of noisy and a bit of out place, but otherwise: top release.
From the nineties is also ‘Happy As A Target’, which has seven tracks spread out over a 3″CDR and has Doc Wör Mirran in a big band line up, eight people in total. Now here the varied movements of Doc Wör Mirran are cut into one release. It opens up with ‘Florence Revisited’ with a saxophone and noise rock backing, but we also find atmospheric tunes here, a bit of cosmic doodle, jolly rock in ‘Jazz My Fuckin’ Azz!’ and synth doodle in the long ‘Southern Pacific’ ending in driving western styled rock piece ‘WWZS’ – it’s like listening to a most engaging radio station.
The last one is the most recent release, recorded this summer and ‘all tracks represent live rehearsals, and are intended for completists only’ as it says on the cover. Doc Wör Mirran play and record a lot of music, but they hardly go out and play live. But they, very occasionally. Here the band is a quartet with Raimond on bass, Ralf Lexis on guitar and vocals, Stephen Schweiger on drums and Adrian Gormley on saxophone. This recording is ‘dedicated to Robin Gibb’, but I must admit I have no idea why; perhaps my knowledge of mister Gibb’s career is not sufficient enough. We find Doc Wör Mirran is the most normal rock mode here, which is perhaps a pity. It’s not my most favorable side of Doc Wör Mirran, but in some of these rehearsals they do something different also, like the very obscure ‘Adriana Paintress’, which seems a rumble of sounds on the knobs of instruments; but there is also the more straight forward rock song ‘Song Of The Steel Death’. The saxophone when played like this is never a particular favorite instrument here, and unfortunately gets into most of these pieces. It’s best when Doc Wör Mirran reaches for a more spacious, psychedelic tune, such as in the title piece, but it’s too short. Damn. I enjoyed hearing this particular incarnation too, even when it did least for me. Maybe this was completists only, indeed, but who are they? There should be more! (FdW)
Address: http://www.dwmirran.de
AUTOPUGNO – CARPA CAVERNOSA (CDR, private)
Not a lot of information to go by. Behind Autopugno we find one Ezio Piermattei, who plays (and I am trying to translate from the Italian cover), voice, noise, contact microphones, field recordings and sound effects. Recorded in October 2013. Two pieces, fifteen and sixteen minutes, of a lo-fi collage of voice abuse, which perhaps in some circles count as sound poetry, and bits of lo-fi electronics, which in some circles may be called circuit bending. I applaud all forms of self-expression, but is it necessary to release this on a CDR and send it out? There is no website, so how will you try and get of hold this (in such case you want to)? I don’t know. Maybe with the small effort put into this, I should not care either. (FdW)
Address: <strungaphone@gmail.com>
NIKO SKORPIO – KHORA (double 3″ CDR by Some Place Else)
Some Place Else started a new project called DR\FT. The meaning of this project is to release series of hand-made artifacts which are available for a limited period of time. The first release of DR\FT is the new album of the founder of the Some Place Else label Niko Skorpio. He hasn’t released a album for four years and the album will be available for 23 September 2013 until 20 December 2013. Niko Skorpio is active in arts and experimental music for more than 20 years. The album contains seven compositions. Most of the tracks have a length of about 4 – 5 minutes, except Sentient Debris. During 15 minutes he discovers in an ambient electronic mood the possibilities of sound, abstract rhythms and floating melody lines and the music becomes more and more one wave of sound. Hapti.ISS is a light track with a nice musical digital joke which is the start of high pitched sounds which refer to birds and childish played music. The album starts with a strong beat and Arabic orientated melodies and singing which are combined with sinister tones. The second track is a beautiful composition about communication. Bleeps from a fax and chatting bells are parts of the off the soundscore and moves to a dark atmosphere. Niko Skorpio doesn’t make easy music. Elements of popular music are part of his music and the practice of these elements suggest that the music is easy to listen. But the experimental sounds and approach to music and the aim to cross musical boundaries makes this album more than interesting to listen. The CD comes with a hand-printed cover and booklet. And do not forget… it is only available till 20 December. (JKH)
Address: http://www.someplaceelse.net
TASOS STAMOU – A LITANY OF ‘AISHITERU WA’ (3″CDR by Orila)
More recent music by Tasos Stamou (see for instance Vital Weekly 837 and 875) and it sees a further exploration of sound ideas used on ‘The Return Of The Long Lost One’ (see Vital Weekly 875). He uses a sampling keyboard, looper, voice, violin, kitchen stuff and snake charmer in an even more fragmented setting than the previous release. The longest piece lasts three minutes, but just over one minute is the preferred length of choice here. The direct approach of his music from before is what we get here too. Still we see him create his music with his two hands – anything more is too much. He picks a few sounds, samples, loops these and then adds a melody on top – the physical act of playing this. Short and sweet still, and highly home spun. There is hardly anything else to be said about this. It is, perhaps, more of the same, and that might be a pity indeed, but when it comes in such a small dose it’s perhaps not bad at all. (FdW)
Address: http://orila.net
_BLANK (cassette by Love The Chaos)
The way this looks, I should probably not go near it. All of the information on the cover has been crossed out, and why bother then? But there is extensive information along with this, explaining this is a release by _Blank abd that there are, apparently, 186 pieces on this release, all of them photographs of cassettes opened as sound. “It’s not data visualization or random connection between image and sound, but a series of JPG files exported as AIFF” – well, first as RAW and then open it with a sound editor. Following a whole bunch of text about light and sound, including the ANS synthesizer and Xenakis UPIC software. All nice of course, but in the meantime I am listening to the cassette. I understand the conceptual nature of this, but why 186, if all it does is sound the same. It seems like a loop of a certain length on repeat of some distorted sound, but not static. It has a nice movement to it, but I am not sure if 60 minutes were necessary to get this point across. 15 minutes would have done the same trick perfectly well, I should think. Nice, but a bit long. (FdW)
Address: http://www.lovethechaos.net