LOWERED – ARCHE (FOR GONGS) (CD by The Remains Of My Estate) *
BAS VAN HUIZEN – WAANZINTRAAN (CD by Moving Furniture Records) *
TAKU SUGIMOTO – SEPTET (CD by Meenna) *
TETUZI AKIYAMA & MAKOTO OSHIRO & SUZUERI & ROGER TURNER – LIVE AT FTARRI (CD by Meenna) *
SHIBATETSU – PLASTIC PNEUMA (CD by Hitorri) *
DANIEL BENNETT & STEPHEN CORNFORD – FELLFIELD DRAFF (CD by Hideous Replica) *
LUCIANO MAGGIORE – 18 RHYTHMIC STUDIES FOR A PEN, A CASSETTE CASE AND A KOREAN
CASSETTE DECK (CD by Hideous Replica) *
STRØM – X (CD by Mikroton) *
NORBERT MÖSLANG & ILIA BELORUKOV & KURT LIEDWART – SALE_INTERIORA (CD by Mikroton) *
KURT LIEDWART & PHIL RAYMOND – RIM (CD by Mikroton) *
CIRCLE BROS – RUST (LP by Three:four Records)
DEEPFISHK – OFFSHORE ZONE (LP by Chmafu Nocords)
MOSQUITOES (7″, private)
UNFOLLOW – ALL MY RIFLES (7″ by Lathelight)
GRETEL – LIGHTS/TEMPLE/LOOP #B (7″ by Lathelight)
GORLEN – TAPE DEATH #10 (cassette by Lathelight)
GERALD FIEBIG & EMERGE VS NYM – CONDENSED ENDEAVOUR (CDR by Attenuation Circuit) *
GERALD FIEBIG & EMERGE – COMPOUND (CDR by Attenuation Circuit) *
EMERGE & SINTARI MIMITHE – KAGOME (CDR by Attenuation Circuit) *
RE-DRUM & EMERGE – PERSECUTORY DELUSION (CDR by Attenuation Circuit) *
RE-DRUM & EMERGE (cassette by Attenuation Circuit) *
SINDRE BJERGA – DREAM INTERRUPTION (CDR by Attenuation Circuit) *
LEO DUPLEIX – TWO COMPOSITIONS FOR MIXED SOURCES (2CDR by Albertine Records) *
SOCRATES MARTINIS – UNDER THE ARCHES OF HER VOICE
(CDR by Organized Music From Thessaloniki) *
ENRIQUE R. PALMA – CONTENANCE (3″CDR by Organized Music From Thessaloniki) *
LE CABLE DE FEU – FIREWIRE (cassette by Tanuki Records)
KALI MALONE – TRAGIC CHORUS (cassette by Xkatedral)
MARIA W HORN/INSECT ARK – MAGNETA/LONG ARMS (cassette by Xkatedral)
XKATEDRAL VOLUME II (cassette compilation by Xkatedral)
ENTRE VIFS – KOHLE + STAHL (cassette by Aussaat)
ADAM ASNAN – CARRIERS, PA (cassette by Mappa)
BAKUNIN COMMANDO (cassette by Amok Tapes)
ONTAL – SIMULACRON (cassette by Amok Tapes)
THE LAST WAVE – COURCIRCUIT (cassette by cro2 Records)
LOWERED – ARCHE (FOR GONGS) (CD by The Remains Of My Estate)
This is the first in a series of works called ‘Arche’, and each will focus on a single instrument,
along with some field recordings. Behind Lowered we find Chris Gowers, who we’d met in the past
when he worked as Karina ESP and running the labels Evelyn Records and Trome Records. This
new release is on a label called The Remains Of My Estate, but the catalogue number is ‘trome006’,
so perhaps in some way there is a continuation? As said this is made with the tam-tam and field
recordings, which I think might be best described as ‘recordings of sea waves’ but according to the
cover is Psithurism (which according to the dictionary means ‘the sound of wind in the trees and
rustling of leaves’), with some singing bowls at the end (a forecast to the next instalment in fact),
but it is also important to realize that all of this was recorded acoustically, with no ‘artificial/digital
effects or treatments being used’, which is not easy to believe I would think, but so be it. It also says
that ‘all percussive sounds are absent, thereby removing the performance element of the piece to
leave an arrangement of pure, decaying tones. The aim of the piece was to minimise the human
element, both from a performance perspective as well as compositional one, and to focus on the
pure resonant response of the instrument’, which might all be mighty fine, but obviously the tam
tam has been played, one way or another, however minimal it might have been and by adding field
recordings and singing bowls towards the end, there is for sure an element of composition, I’d say.
I have no idea how this was played and recorded by I must say I quite enjoyed these thirty minutes.
Obviously it all sounded very drone like but ever since Thomas Köner and Mark Wastell that is
perhaps the defined sound of the tam tam? It will also be sounding like the unearthly rumble,
like the sound is coming from the earth core: deep and mysterious. It may be something you heard
before, but the overall consistency the music was made, the execution the piece, it all worked very
well, I thought. This is one excellent piece of drone music. Can’t wait for the next instalments and
maybe hear the complete piece by then. (FdW)
——— Address: http://tromerecords.com
BAS VAN HUIZEN – WAANZINTRAAN (CD by Moving Furniture Records)
Here is one of those Bas van Huizen releases with what seems to be a Dutch title, but it’s again a
word that doesn’t exist. ‘Madness tear’ would be one translation, but what does it mean? Van Huizen
came from Nijmegen, but since many years he lives in China and after some time of silence he
returned to releasing last year on Moving Furniture Records on the occasion of CDR day (see Vital
Weekly 1009). Now it comes on a real CD – just in time for recordstore day I guess, but I am not sure
if Moving Furniture Records cares about that (or if they have a sale for that). Van Huizen’s music is
quite powerful, if we want to avoid the word ‘noise’. Although nothing as such is mentioned on the
cover, there is I think lots and lots of sound effects, both to be found in the analogue and digital
world, which are used to process field recordings, but also it might be fed with the sound of the
guitar, vocals and singing bowls, like on his last release. And all of that with quite some considerable
force. Maybe it reflects some of the hectic, noisy life in China I was thinking. Yet Van Huizen never
seems to loose touch with something melodic, like the ringing of an organ, the wall of guitar sound
and that, like before, sounding a bit like shoegazing – less vocals and drums. But it’s this musical
aspect that sets his work apart from many other noisemakers, which use computers and stomp boxes.
One hears the digital processing going on, yet it never looses the idea of a ‘song’ or ‘piece’; none of
this is a mindless attack on the senses, there is no noise for the sake of noise. In all it’s heavy weight
I was thinking it is perhaps a little long at fifty-six minutes so my suggestion to take this in with some
care! (FdW)
——— Address: http://movingfurniturerecords.bandcamp.com/
TAKU SUGIMOTO – SEPTET (CD by Meenna)
TETUZI AKIYAMA & MAKOTO OSHIRO & SUZUERI & ROGER TURNER – LIVE AT FTARRI
(CD by Meenna)
SHIBATETSU – PLASTIC PNEUMA (CD by Hitorri)
Three new releases by the house of Ftarri, the respected house for improvised music from Japan and
we meet Taku Sugimoto again. A long time ago he was very much present with releases of music in
this rag, but moved away, maybe to compose pieces like ‘Septet’ and have these performed and focus
less on the world of releases. ‘Septet’ is for seven players (duh) and has Sugimoto on electric guitar,
while other players are Rebecca Lane (flute), Michael Thieke (clarinet), Johnny Chang (viola), Derek
Shirley (cello), Bryan Eubanks (sine-tones) and the man I recently bumped into by sheer accident in
two very different cities in a very short time, Koen Nutters (contrabass). According to the liner notes the
clarinet and flute plays no melody, just one tone and Sugimoto wanted ‘to have the other instruments
work as if they are drawing several spectrums with the sound of the clarinet or the flute, so each of these
instruments has a specific set of microtones to play’. According to Ftarri Sugimoto is now also connected
to the Wandelweiser group and hearing this it is easy to see why; the music is not entirely quiet but
moves very slowly, and changes only gradually over the course of these forty minutes. Sounds move
in and out, make a connection with another and then disappear; then there is another connection to be
made, somewhere else in time and all of these with all seven of these instruments. If one listens only
superficially – never recommended of course – then it seems that these instruments play the same thing
over and over again, but I can see it would evoke some Zen like meditative force here; if you decide to
listen closer than you would notice the gradual shifts between the various instruments. This is a work
of true majestic beauty. Slow and solemnly moving music.
Ftarri also has the possibility to do concerts and ‘Live At Ftarri’ documents the recording of a concert
held over there on February 19, 2013. Here we have a quartet of players on the shortest piece, fifteen
minutes, with Roger Turner on drums, Tetuzi Akiyama on guitar, Makoto Oshiro (self-made instruments)
and Suzueri (piano, toy piano, objects, voice) – the latter preferring to write the name in small caps.
The CD opens up with a recording of the three Japanese players playing a set together that lasts almost
forty-two minutes. Maybe a bit long for an opening act, I was thinking, but maybe there are other reasons
for such a division. In the trio recording everything happens on more or less the same dynamic level,
and best is to play this at a somewhat lower volume; not because it is very loud music, but because it
sinks in with your environment, and one sometimes hears the more abstract tones produced by Oshiro
and suzueri, while the somewhat blues like playing of Akiyama rises up from that like turning the dials
on your radio. In the piece with Turner, called ‘Yotarri’, the sounds of the drum kit make it less easy to
play this at a lower volume, I think, as it is somewhat more demanding. It’s not that Turner is banging
his kit in a loud manner, but in order for you to differentiate between the various instruments, not to let
them melt together, I turned up the volume a bit and another world opened up; the bowing of cymbals,
the drumming, the feedback like tones from Oshiro and the now abstract guitar playing by Akiyama.
Quite different pieces I think, but together they work quite well.
More of an oddball, perhaps, for Ftarri is the release by Shibatetsu, born in Tokyo in 1959. Since
1980 he is actively in music playing piano and keyboard harmonica player, both composing and
improvising on these instruments. On ‘Plastic Pneuma’ it is however just the keyboard harmonica and
on this album he offers thirteen pieces, short pieces at that, clocking in at somewhere between one
and three minutes. Almost song like structures, but it’s of course not really songs. The instrument is not
really one we hear a lot on the releases we review, but it is an instrument that is well suited to play
drone like sounds, as well as shorter sounds, and Shibatetsu alternates between both ends in these
pieces. It makes this into quite a warm record with delicate, short, well-rounded compositions. The
closest this reminded me of was music by Pascal Comelade; it shares that same naive sensibility,
while this one is not even being very close to being conventional in musical approaches. Short but
a highly refined release; you leap from song to song and Shibatetsu takes you on a well thought out
journey through his musical world. (FdW)
——— Address: http://ftarri.com/
DANIEL BENNETT & STEPHEN CORNFORD – FELLFIELD DRAFF (CD by Hideous Replica)
LUCIANO MAGGIORE – 18 RHYTHMIC STUDIES FOR A PEN, A CASSETTE CASE AND A KOREAN
CASSETTE DECK (CD by Hideous Replica)
One quite conceptual release and one from the realms of noise; let’s start with the latter. It’s a duo
recording of one Daniel Bennett on electronics and software and Stephen Cornford on electronics and
objects. I believe I only heard of the latter before. They recorded the three pieces (spanning thirty-three
minutes) in Bristol in 2013 and 2014 and it shows a love for true noise on one hand and objects abuse
on the other. Yet one cannot say this is all about pure noise, but it rather combines loud and louder bits
of noise, usually in the form of a real time sound collage. Bouncing back and forth between distorted line
hum, crackling of faulty cables and some obscure rustling of objects in the background. In ‘Draff’, the last
and longest pieces on this release, they cut back on the more extreme frequencies and it opens up a
more interesting pattern of moving and changing lines of noises, electronics, buzzing and hissing, always
on the move towards the next stage. Quite dark and very intense, this piece works rather well, and takes
up half the length of the entire release. As far as I am concerned I would have loved a bit more of this,
than of the two other pieces, which seems by comparison straightforward slabs of noise. Maybe that’s
the way this duo should go next time?
Luciano Maggiore, of whom we reviewed various works in the past (see Vital Weekly 959, 921 or
his works with Enrico Malatesta, see Vital Weekly 941 and 947), follows a more conceptual approach.
In much of his solo work he shows an interest in using speakers and analogue and digital devices, such
as Walkman, CD players, tape recordings) and you probably have guessed by looking at the title of his
latest release what it is about. Here we have a man who plays a pen, a cassette case and a Korean
cassette deck, I presume the latter to do his recordings. I am not sure if the pen is used to play steady
rhythms onto the case, but that’s what this sounds like. It could also be that the pen is held against the
case in the machine and there is some additional line noise from the player, which makes up this hissy
drone background sounds. We get this times eighteen, from one minute to five minutes, in total forty-nine
minutes. For a while I thought some of this was quite captivating, but forty-nine minutes was too much.
Especially the longer pieces I found a bit hard to get into. I get the point of this! Whatever happened to
3″CDs, I wondered. Those were perfect for such conceptual meandering. (FdW)
——— Address: http://hideousreplica.co.uk/
STRØM – X (CD by Mikroton)
NORBERT MÖSLANG & ILIA BELORUKOV & KURT LIEDWART – SALE_INTERIORA (CD by Mikroton)
KURT LIEDWART & PHIL RAYMOND – RIM (CD by Mikroton)
The word ‘Strøm’ means electricity and for Gaudenz Bradutt (electronics, analog synthesizer) and
Christian Müller (electronics, contrabass clarinet), that may cover what they do, well, save, perhaps,
the contrabass clarinet of course, which may not need electrical power. They already worked together
as Strøm for fifteen years and they have played all over Europe and two of their previous releases
where reviewed before (see Vital Weekly 682 and 836). I thought both previous release to be all right,
but I found it on the safe side of improvised music. This new work, recorded in 2014 and 2015 shows
Strøm in a less safe place, which works all the better for the end result I think. There is throughout quite
an electronic feel to the music, much more than before, and it hisses and stutters all over the place.
Maybe one could say there is a noise edge to the music, but that is over doing things. The music is
certainly forceful and vibrant, with quite some intensity in the dynamic range. Maybe this has
something to do with the origin of the material. I understand one of these pieces is the original and
the other six are ‘reworkings’ of that, using extensively live sampling; maybe that explains the
somewhat hit ‘n scratch approach some of these piece have and that works quite well. It’s a dynamic
work of improvised musique concrete approaches, and so far their best album.
The other new releases (more of this label next week) include label boss Kurt Liedwart, who plays
analog synthesizer, electronics, ppooll (a software thingy) and the first collaboration is one with Norbert
Möslang on cracked everyday-electronics and Ilia Belorkuov on alto saxophone, electronics and laptop
and it is due to his involvement at the Experimental Sound Gallery in St. Petersburg where this was
recorded. Möslang is of course the main point of focus, having a long career in playing cracked
everyday-electronics, which is to be understood as ‘modifying and recontextualising the use of home
electronics’. He had a duo for thirty years with Andy Guhl called Voice Crack and since 2002 he plays
solo and with others. His Russian partners are quite well known players from the world of improvised
music and their releases find their way to these pages a lot. ‘Sale_interiora’ is the result of some four
hours of playing together, preparing for the concert and is this trio at their best. Whereas Belorukov
and Liedwart are sometimes on the quiet side when it comes to improvisation, it is Möslang who drags
them into the world of noise, or so it seems. Of course this is not all a furious blast; in the second piece
‘Nero’ there is quite some room for a more careful exploration of everyday debris, but through these
thirty-four minutes it all appears with some brutal force and has a crude edge; it works however very
well. It bounces off in many directions and all roads go anywhere, but the fine interaction between
these three players prevents it from being messy.
On the other new release, Liedwart gets credit for playing lloopp, electronics and percussion and
he teams up with one Phil Raymond. He plays computer and percussion and together they released
‘Absence’ in 2008 as a download and ‘Rim’ is their second album. Somehow, somewhere they use a
fair bit of percussion sounds in this music, heavily processed, the information tells us, but also adding
more percussion, sine waves and quiet noises as the music progresses. While many of the releases
by Mikroton are in the realm of improvised music in one way or another, this one seems to be made
within that too but it doesn’t sound like it. Or at least not to the same extent. In each of these five pieces
there is some deep rumble to be heard, of various bass tones colliding together in all sorts of forms
and shapes and on top of that there is some highly obscure rattle of a solitary object. More dark
ambient, I would think, than strictly some kind of beep/scratch improvised music release. I thought all
of this was highly enjoyable. Not because it was so much different than other works in this particular
scene, but because it was quite a lone wolf in the Mikroton catalogue. (FdW)
——— Address: http://www.mikroton.net
CIRCLE BROS – RUST (LP by Three:four Records)
Five years it took Willem Lecluyse to finish this album and whilst most previous Circle Bros work
was released by his own label – Morc – this time it’s the people of Swiss experimental music label
Three:four Records who have decided to dedicate a spot in their catalogue to the Bros.
The title it seems does not refer to the result of the process of oxidation; it rather pertains to the
Dutch word ‘rust’, which translates to ‘rest’. And indeed the record starts out very quietly: there are
harmonium drones, ambient guitar riffs and soft, almost muttered vocals. Most sounds seem to have
an acoustic origin, which together with the ostensibly lo-fi recording methods makes the listening
experience a very intimate one. Halfway through the first side the music becomes slightly more
dynamic and holds a more open character. However, since many of the instruments seem to be
drenched in a thick layer of delay, the timbric changes have a mere rippling effect on the surface
and after a while the sting furtively seeps away again underneath a warm stargazing guitar drone.
All in all much of it rather befits the background of a dreary, rainy evening, dimly lit by the outside
city lights.
The second half instantly jumps into a more dynamic track of a dissonant and more experimental
nature, though the added glockenspiel takes the edge off somewhat and gives “Breadcrumbs” that
eerie-nursery atmosphere, for which bands like Múm are famous. After a while the abundant presence
of delay made me cringe a bit, especially since it renders some other rhythmic sounds slightly out of
sync. It might be an intentional wonkiness that comes with the Circle Bros sound, but the fact that at
times a lot of the mix seems to be routed through the delay unit, made it a little obtrusive to my ears.
What is wrong with delay as such, you ask? Personally I think it obscures the actual sounds by
superimposing a more dominant musical experience of rhythm. I feel slightly tricked each time, since
basically any sound that is fed through a delay unit appeals to our musical sense – moreover seems
to make ‘musical sense’. Of course it can contribute much if (poly)rhythmically used, but I can’t shake
the idea that it sometimes just sounds like an ‘easy’ way to create a sense of impetus without too
much effort.
This is not to say I believe Lecluyse to be a lazy composer – far from it. It is crystal clear that the
record was carefully composed and within his style the delay unit definitely serves a creative purpose.
Perhaps it is just the downside of having to work with devices like these on a daily basis that renders
one more testy.. or even slightly blasé.
Anyway, if I had to pin a reference on the overall sound of the album – which is quite a cumber-
some task, but perhaps necessary since there is much electro-acoustic ambient out there – I’d say
that parts of it reminded me of Drekka, whilst other bits sounded a bit like Grouper, but clearly more
embellished with regard to the instrumentation. As stated I could have done with less delay, but it’s
a fine, dreamy and understated album nonetheless. (PJN)
——— Address: http://www.three-four.net/
DEEPFISHK – OFFSHORE ZONE (LP by Chmafu Nocords)
The letter ‘K’ in DeapseafishK (as it should be spelled) stands for keys and it refers to the fact that all
three players use instruments with keys; we have Juun (pianoguts, hammered dulcimer, toy piano),
Katharina Klement (piano, clavichord, zither, synthersizer, electronics) and Manon Liu Winter (piano,
clavichord). From a video of a concert I understand these instruments are flat on their back and played
like percussion instruments, but due to the various surfaces of these instruments (metal, wood, strings)
there arises an interesting vast majority of possibilities. It’s not easy to say if we should DeepseafishK
as a group of improvisers or perhaps as performers of fixed compositions. A piece like ‘Luminous’
sounds like a fixed composition, sounding like being aboard of a sinking ship. It has repeating
fragments making this into a solid composed and rather beautiful piece of music. Other piece sound
perhaps a bit more improvised. Throughout the music sounds carefully played, which maybe the
downside of the album. One could wish for some heavy explosion of sound, something that bursts
out every now and then, but with these three players that doesn’t seem to happen, maybe save
towards the end of the record, but even then it remains highly civilized. I think this is quite a good
record, with a fine balance when it comes to improvised and composed music, but it’s also a bit too
careful at times. (FdW)
——— Address: http://nocords.net/
MOSQUITOES (7″, private)
This is a highly limited 7″ by Mosquitoes, who call themselves an ‘experimental rock trio from South-
east England’, to be played at 45 rpm, and which gives such a brief introduction not a very clear
idea of what they do, I would think. There are three pieces here, and the guitar is noisy and different
than y’r usual rock guitar, while the drums are bit jazz like. The bass is also not working coherently
towards a line that underpins the songs, which is great. It is music that I don’t hear a lot these days,
and it reminded me at best of the music of P.D., the group that later became P16.D4; they share the
same sensibility when it comes to deconstructing rock and (free-) jazz and even the mumbling voice
of ‘Keep Breathing’ is quite similar. All three songs are rounded off and don’t sound like excerpts
from something much bigger. It lasts less than nine minutes, but it sounds great. Very lo-fi with a
direct in y’r face approach when it comes to recording and production, but for me that enhances
much of the fun. I’d be curious to see where they would move next; or there is no next move and
maybe Mosquitoes sink in total obscurity and this is a pre-programmed collectors item. (FdW)
——— Address: <mosquitoesuk@gmail.com>
UNFOLLOW – ALL MY RIFLES (7″ by Lathelight)
GRETEL – LIGHTS/TEMPLE/LOOP #B (7″ by Lathelight)
GORLEN – TAPE DEATH #10 (cassette by Lathelight)
Three new releases by Lathelight, C. Jeely’s most recent foray into label land, and pressing up
mostly limited lathe cut 7″ singles and cassettes. Perhaps it is a bit of a surprise to see music from
Unfollow released. This is the musical project by Tony Boggs, who once named himself Joshua
Treble, and who was one half of Desormais and as Unfollow released a cassette by Kikimora
Tapes (see Vital Weekly 1005), which showed an interest for the more experimental version of
techno music. I wondered how that would sound on a lathe cut 7″, but the two pieces here don’t
use as much rhythm as his previous release and is more about the computer-processed sound
of decay. A warm, glitchy atmosphere is put forward on this release and in the title piece there is
a bit of rhythm to be noted, but pushed towards the background with some grainy textures running
along. With some imagination one could say this is a bit of ambient dance, but ‘Lost In It’ on the
other side is all of decay and grainy textures and heavy laptop processing, and sounds like a
release from Ritornell release circa 2001. Not entirely new, but it sounds quite good. Perfect
7″ songs!
The other 7″ is by GreteL (as spelling is required), the musical project of Katerina And from St.
Petersburg. I have no idea what she uses sound wise, but no doubt there is a laptop stage central
and a microphone; I believe to hear some humming in ‘Light’s, the piece that fills up the first side
of this record. She creates a minimal sound pattern, built around some out of phase loops, but it
remains a bit on the static side for my liking. The other side has two pieces, of which ‘Temple’ also
uses a bit of vocal humming, but there is also some more rhythm to this piece, as well as the buzz
of a synthesizer. Not really dance music, but over the course of two and half minute there is also
a bit more variation than on the other side. ‘Loop #B’ is the other song and is basically a bunch
of loops at the same time, but due to the variation of the sounds there is actually a bit more
happening. I am not entirely convinced by this yet, I must say. I would need to hear from her.
On cassette we find Gorlen; actually the website says ‘tape and 7″, and lists fourteen pieces
for both formats in total, but the cassette I have here apparently also contains fourteen pieces,
and there is no sign of the 7″. Never mind, it’s good to have them all in one place perhaps. There
is no information as to who Gorlen is exactly or what he or she does. The pieces were rather
short here, usually somewhere between one and two minutes with some longer exceptions.
Here we have the microsound version of the laptop music. It seems that the primary instrument
of Gorlen is an old cassette player, with some very dusty mechanisms and dirt covered recording
heads on which a bunch of piano music is recorded. It all sounds mildly distorted which of
course is fine, but it could have used a bit more variation music wise in the end, I think. Now
many of the pieces sound quite similar, which is a pity, unless that’s the conceptual notion
behind this. Even for the thirty plus minutes this lasts it is all a bit much. (FdW)
——— Address: http://lathelight.org/releases/
GERALD FIEBIG & EMERGE VS NYM – CONDENSED ENDEAVOUR
(CDR by Attenuation Circuit)
GERALD FIEBIG & EMERGE – COMPOUND (CDR by Attenuation Circuit)
EMERGE & SINTARI MIMITHE – KAGOME (CDR by Attenuation Circuit)
RE-DRUM & EMERGE – PERSECUTORY DELUSION (CDR by Attenuation Circuit)
RE-DRUM & EMERGE (cassette by Attenuation Circuit)
SINDRE BJERGA – DREAM INTERRUPTION (CDR by Attenuation Circuit)
Here’s a whole bunch of releases, all but one dealing with the music of Sascha Stadlmeier, also
known as mister Attenuation Circuit (sharing duties with Gerald Fiebig) and working as Emerge.
I am not sure what prompted this sudden flood of releases. I dived in starting with the release by
Emerge, Fiebig and the mysterious named Nym. At the genesis of this lies a live recording by
Fiebig and Emerge made in a club named Cairo, in Würzburg (Germany), which was then further
treated by Nym (or NYM as the cover and information spells this), and it’s of course not easy to
say what Nym does to what kind of original. Make more drones out of drones is perhaps the
best thing I could think of. Adding sound effects or some kind of computer treatment, filtering
out most of the mid to high ranges out of the original (I assume at least) and the dark rumble
of plate tectonics is what remains here. I thought it was quite good, but maybe a bit too heavy
for me in all its darkness.
The other recording by Fiebig and Emerge is also live and there is no treatment, so we have
a clearer picture of what it sounds like. Opening up for Nocturnal Emissions, the duo decided to
add some metallic sounds via loops in their work and have something a bit more industrial. I
must admit I don’t hear this industrial angle in the music that much. It seems to be fitting whatever
it is that Fiebig and Emerge normally do, which is creating drone like material using electro-
acoustic sounds in a more improvised manner. There is the rustling of objects onto the surfaces,
which are in turn being looped and fed through sound effects to create even longer curves and
that constitutes as drone music. Within these thirty minutes the two men move through various
textures, loud and dark, quiet and subdued and it works better, at least for me then the one
with Nym.
Also a live recording by Emerge, this time with female vocalist of whom I never heard before,
Sintari Mimithe, which sounds Japanese, but the information says ‘improvised lyrics in imaginary
Japanese’, so maybe she’s not Japanese? Emerge this time samples the voice and creates vast
expanding sounds from that, moving away from some of his more Asmus Tietchens inspired
material and moves into the world of glacial drones, while Mimithe adds whispering vocal material
to the mix; one could expect something very quiet and eerie, but it is actually not really the case
here. The music is quite most of the times, sometimes even at the fringe of distortion but the vocal
interjections keeps it from leaping into noise land too much. This I thought was quite a closed
recording nevertheless, which didn’t allow for much light.
Re-Drum from Russia is one of Emerge’s steady touring buddies and sometimes (or maybe
most of the times) they also end up playing together, such as on this recording from two years
ago. It was recorded in a concert series called ‘Noise Angriff’, which translates best as ‘noise attack’,
so the result is also a bit louder than one would expect. Using lots of electronics, loop devices,
sound effects (delay, reverb), and the two create a rich palette of sounds and it stays never
anywhere long, giving the music quite some vibrancy. There isn’t much noise to be found on this
work, but I found it all rather spacious and slowly meandering about, with occasional small sounds
popping up in the mix. Head trip music!
How they sound separately can be found on a cassette, maybe because that format is well
suited for a split release. It was recorded in concert in 2015 when they toured Europe and Re-
Drum has a forty-three minute recording from Augsburg that is quite strange. It doesn’t have the
usual playfulness of sounds, but slowly develops into one point and then seems to stay there
for quite some time. It seems, but I readily admit I am no expert on all of the music by Re-Drum,
that this is a bit noisier than his usual approach. The recording quality left also room for
improvement. On the other side a recording from Warsaw by Emerge who this time around is
also a bit noisier than he usually is, I think (and from him I heard quite a bit by now). He plays
around with some versatile sound material and does that in a way that is very much like musique
concrete. A bit of reverb to add some more body to the material, lots of reversed sounds popping
in and out of the mix and Emerge keeps consistently working with that for the entire thirty-three
minutes, which I admit is perhaps ten minutes too long, but it belongs easily to his better works.
The only release not to include Emerge is by Norway’s Sindre Bjerga, of whom I recently witnessed
8 concerts in a row, each with slight variations; it was almost as if he performs a fixed composition
every night. This recording was made last year when he toured the Baltic States and upon playing
‘Dream Interruption’ I am thinking this is another execution of the same piece. Bjerga uses a
microphone, some cassette recordings, Dictaphones, small cymbals and a metal object with spring
to come up with something that sounds like an outsider piece; something that is covered in the
world dreams (as suggested by the title) but could easily be having a place in mental illness or
some kind of disturbed life. Things can go wrong here, objects are trashed around, but carefully
placed acoustic sounds play an important role. Towards the end Bjerga cooks up a drone, a rather
violent one actually, of disturbed transmissions from the other side. Very consistent in it’s execution,
every time with another variation. (FdW)
——— Address: http://www.attenuationcircuit.de
LEO DUPLEIX – TWO COMPOSITIONS FOR MIXED SOURCES (2CDR by Albertine Records)
Two compositions by one Leo Dupleix, born in 1988, graduated in Brussels, now living in Paris.
He is an electronic music, but also plays the piano, and working in the field of improvised music. To
that end he uses computer, contact microphones, speakers, electronic devices, pianet, synthesizers,
field recordings and such like. These two compositions could have easily fitted on a single disc,
but they are two different compositions, so Dupleix decided to copy them on separate discs on his
own, recently founded imprint Albertine Records. In ‘Bruit(s)’ (meaning ‘noises’) he uses field
recordings, white noises and sine waves – some of the latter in a very high frequency range, which
was better noticed by the 16 year old in the household than the actual reviewer. If you are born in
1988 you might also still hear these frequencies. In this thirty-two minute piece he sets all the
sounds after one another, using the collage form; it cuts quite radically back and forth between
some highly crude sine waves sounds, distorted sine waves but also more gentler field recordings.
It doesn’t always have the same tension but it worked throughout quite all right.
‘Process #1: Changes’ he uses an ‘open hard drive and fan and digital processing’ and it lasts
thirty minutes but is spread out over five separate pieces (unlike the other composition) and each is
his own thing. What could be some crude form of noise actually works out quite well, in various
stages of decay, as that’s what it sounds like. Minimal in approach, away from the collage approach,
this is the kind of intelligent noise that reminds me of someone like Francisco Meirino; powerful yet
not without some clear thought and not aiming for the sheer mind numbing noise. (FdW)
——— Address: <leodupleix@gmail.com>
SOCRATES MARTINIS – UNDER THE ARCHES OF HER VOICE
(CDR by Organized Music From Thessaloniki)
ENRIQUE R. PALMA – CONTENANCE (3″CDR by Organized Music From Thessaloniki)
Music by Socrates Martinis from Athens, Greece has been reviewed before, by various reviewers,
meaning some of his work can be regarded as noise (see Vital Weekly 850, 921 and 949) and
maybe it says something about the ever shifting perception of noise that I now review this, perhaps
because of some rekindled interest in noise. Maybe there is an electro-acoustic edge to the music
that made me listen and listen again here. ‘Under The Arches Of Her Voice’ is not a very long
release, twenty-six minutes, and has six pieces, which were constructed using found sounds,
objects and field recordings. Some of these sounds like it have been recorded on a street, using
a handheld recording device and sounds coming from small speakers, while someone is shuffling
about. These outside positions are well chosen as it seems that he sometimes finds himself below
some buzzing sound, like a security camera; of course this might not at all be true, I am merely
guessing at all of this. It seems possible, that’s all I am saying. It makes these pieces very good;
very vibrant and full of action, even when not necessarily something is happening, or there is a lot
of things going on. It is a pity that this is all a bit short, length wise, but it is a great release!
The other new release by the same label is by a Mexican musician called Enrique R. Palma,
all the way from Yucatan and over there he is part of the ‘noise, metal and improvised music
communities’. Palma plays his music solo and in a duo called Xtul. He also has his own label
called Lengua de Lava. Here he has a solo piece for ‘computer, bowed cymbal and concertina’,
but there is also help from Javier Beci on melodica. I found the whole thing to be sounding quite
improvised, with a lot of sounds coming from the bowed cymbal, so it’s a bit unclear what the
computer and concertina do. There is, very occasionally, something of an electronic nature to
be detected in this, and maybe that counts for the computer involvement? I am not sure. In the
beginning of the piece there is clearly quite some computer originated sounds to be detected,
but everything is cross faded into each other, forming one twenty-minute piece of overtones,
acoustic room recordings of the cymbal and while it didn’t sound too bad, I was thinking that I also
didn’t entirely understand the idea behind these separate pieces creating one long piece together.
It seemed to lack a bit of coherency; it was more a calling card: see what I do. What Palma does
he does pretty well, but now its time to do a composition with it. (FdW)
——— Address: http://thesorg.noise-below.org
LE CABLE DE FEU – FIREWIRE (cassette by Tanuki Records)
The name of the band translates as ‘Firewire’, which is also the name of the release. Lots of the
text in the booklet is in the French language, which doesn’t help. Google translate makes this
into the usual garbage, so I understand that this is a trio of Olivier Meyer, Laurent Berger and
Aymeric De Tapol, who recorded somewhere in the Elzas, in a cabin. A piece of land, which
was very quiet, but the music is not necessarily as quiet. There are no instruments mentioned
here, but I could easily believe there is a whole bunch of synthesizers available, modular
systems perhaps, electronics, an organ of some kind, but also field recordings and maybe
a guitar, but I must admit I am not sure. Le Cable De Feu plays what we could call drone music,
especially in the longer pieces on this release, the opening and closing piece and ‘Mantra
Express’. Their drones are quite gentle and have a refined, rich sound, full of light and variation;
in some of the shorter pieces they are experimenting with some more field recordings and the
use of sound collage, which due to the brief character of these pieces form an interesting
counterpoint to the longer pieces. The one piece that I felt was out of place, was ‘Post Scriptum’
with it’s heavy drumming, which none of the other pieces had. Maybe here too was the idea to
provide with something different but it just didn’t work for me. Otherwise I thought this was a
really great release with some excellent subdued music. (FdW)
——— Address: http://tanukirecords.bandcamp.com
KALI MALONE – TRAGIC CHORUS (cassette by Xkatedral)
MARIA W HORN/INSECT ARK – MAGNETA/LONG ARMS (cassette by Xkatedral)
XKATEDRAL VOLUME (cassette compilation by Xkatedral)
Three releases by Swedish Xkatedral label all filled up with names I never heard of. The
aesthetics of the label is rather 80s like, with hand printed/Xeroxed artwork. The first release
I heard was by Kali Malone, who plays electric guitar and ‘generative organ’, whatever that
may mean, and it sounds great. The slow swelling of tones, locked in an environment of
drones, with intervals overlaying each other at what seems to be irregular paces. Sometimes
it sounds like bagpipes, but then slightly processed. While I was doing other stuff for quite
some time this afternoon, and this on repeat play for quite some time, these twenty minutes
(which actually never sounded like two pieces of ten minutes each. It seems longer. But maybe
that’s a mistake on the information) really stuck in my brain and the more I played the more
I liked it. Some excellent rougher edges of the world of drone music here.
The next release is a split one by Maria W Horn and Insect Ark, whose piece originally
released in 2013 by Geweih Ritual Documents. Horn may have three pieces, judging by the
cover, but it’s not easy to say what is what, which is odd since Kali Malone plays songs in
some way or another. These are moody pieces, or even doomy to some extent, with some
hollow sounding drums and lots of the lower end of the keyboards and you would expect
some dark voice intoning something about death and decay or other such pleasantries,
but that’s not present here. I am not sure if just some dark drum sound and ditto keyboards
are enough to hold my interest.
On the other side we find Insect Ark, with just one long fifteen-minute piece of music.
Here everything is also doom and gloom, drums in place but instead of keyboards there is
an extensive use of guitar sounds. They drone heavily about with long sustaining sounds
in the first half, and in the second half of the piece it’s all about more conventional dark rock
music. Not bad, but not entirely my thing.
The final release is a compilation with five artists, including Kali Malone, which is
described as ‘a compilation of spectral monoliths for baroque organ, disklavier, string trio
and hand crafted gamelan instruments by Ellen Arkbro, Isak Edberg, Marta Forsberg, Kali
Malone and Kristoffer Svensson’. Each has piece on this tape and I am not sure how to
understand that whole list of instruments, other than each of these musicians use something
from that. Listening to the music clarifies that; it is indeed a description per piece. The drone
piece that opens up the cassette is by Edberg and is simply great. It puts the mark high for
the rest, but it all lives up to it. There is some excellent music on this, all of which sounds
perhaps way more modern classical than one would expect on a low budget cassette
release. Much of this is from the world of electronics, drone and ambient, but none of this
sound hastily made or with rather low means. I think it would be a great idea to re-issue
this on a CD(R) and use the much better sound quality to make the music shine even
more. An excellent release! (FdW)
——— Address: http://www.xkatedral.se
ENTRE VIFS – KOHLE + STAHL (cassette by Aussaat)
In the week where the Dutch people vote on some treaty with the Ukraine (or as some put
it about the whole nature of European collaboration between nations), I am listening to
‘Kohle & Stahl’ by Entre Vifs. The European Coal and Steel Community was a forerunner
of the European Union, the starting point for this whole EU thing, to work together with six
nations, Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg, France, Italy and Germany, so that a future
war between countries would not happen. I understand this release is about the Lorraine,
a part of France that was “heavily affected and effectively rendered powerless by the crisis
of the steel-industry of the 1980s and 90s”. I also understand that Zorin, the main man from
Entre Vifs (also of Le Syndicat), is from this area and his industrial music fits very much the idea of standing
right in the middle of an ironworks. As a student I once paid a visit to such a factory, albeit
in Liege, with a friend who was also interested in ‘industrial’ music and we both agreed that
sticking up a microphone right there would result in a much better industrial music than
we’d usually hear. We didn’t do. The music of old-timers Entre Vifs was in the old days
a bit of mystery to me, and for some time I assumed they just used synthesizers and short
wave radio, but apparently also in the old days they built their own ‘muckrackers’, apparatus
with plugs and metal, wires and such like which are amplified to a volume tres fort, but also as a
tribute to the band of the same name, who come from this area and to whom this release is dedicated.
These are played in an improvised way and it doesn’t sound like a full blast of distortion but rather
like a fine mixture of loud noise, improvised plucking and scratching and in ‘Le Coeur
Machine’ it goes straight into the heart of the machine, but the two pieces on the other side
show more dynamics, ranging from loud to well, a little less loud than this. It all makes up
a good ol’ fashioned noise cassette, and the only major difference is that the printed cover
looks much better than in the old days – with probably one of the exceptions being Entre Vifs first
casette, but maybe that’s because Aussaat is the successor to the label Cthulhu Records, who already
had a great reputation in that department and who happened to release that first cassette? (FdW)
——— Address: <ernten@aol.com>
ADAM ASNAN – CARRIERS, PA (cassette by Mappa)
Besides being one-third of the trio VA AA LR (with Vasco Alves and Louis Rice), Adam
Asnan is active composing music on his own, dividing his time between London and Berlin.
Much of his solo work is quite minimal and noise-based, but it never goes over the top.
Trained as a composer of electro-acoustic work, he is more interested in the recording
situation than in the result of that. On his new cassette we find a collection of pieces using
two different techniques. There are three pieces called ‘Carrier’, in which two ring modulators
are connected through their ‘carrier’ outputs, controlled by the potentiometer (and since
everyone, but me, plays a modular synth these days, everybody has an idea what I just
wrote), while the three parts of ‘PA’ (meaning ‘phantom artefacts) uses “a technique of
sending phantom power to a device that also offered phantom power (which was powering
a stereo pair of mics) and the subsequent ‘electro-static’ sounds that it would produced,
and various recordings of amplified hum and detritus.” Each piece is about seven to nine
minutes and contains quite radical sound and it’s usually quite minimal. We hear what
seems to be static electrical currents, line hum and what sounds like sine waves beating
and bashing into each other; it is music that is quite loud but the goal is not to play a
heavy noise tune. The pieces are ‘Carrier I’, ‘PA I’, ‘Carrier II’ etc, and they have a distinct
quality to them, so it doesn’t sound like six variations on a theme. There is the more static
approach of the three ‘Carrier’ pieces, loudly humming, and the varied crackles from the
‘PA’ pieces. There is somehow, somewhere a ‘live’ feel to the material, I think, making
this all a little less composed. This is noise too, but one with some fine thought to it.
Great silkscreened cassette box to make it a great release. (FdW)
——— Address: http://mappa.bandcamp.com/
BAKUNIN COMMANDO (cassette by Amok Tapes)
ONTAL – SIMULACRON (cassette by Amok Tapes)
From the house that primarily brings electronic hardware, Koma Elektronik, for all
your lovely voltage controlled boxes, sequencers and whatever else there is now also
a cassette label, which they cleverly called Amok Tapes. Amok, Koma, you get the drift.
There are now four releases, all housed in a plastic bag, sealed and such, and so far
these releases show a love for some of the more heavy rhythm-oriented music. I
started with Bakunin Commando mainly because when I was fifteen I called myself
an anarchist, so I have an idea who Bakunin was. Anarchy might not be the guiding
principle of Francesco Baudazzi, who also works as Violet Poison, but under his new
moniker plays what he calls “1984-alike weird minimal/EBM tapes” and “those squatter-
alike 1980’s obscure home-tapes’s filth”, so hence a bit of anarchism I thought. There
are some vocals but I don’t think it is supposed to mean a lot. The music is not exactly
aiming straight to the disco floor, as it seems somewhat rudimentary and crude, or
perhaps one could say some of the beats and/or beats are too loosely organised, but I
agree, this would as easily sound like something from 1985. Most enjoyable if you are
in for a retro adventure.
Ontal is a duo of Boris Brenecki and Darko Kolar from Serbia and their beats are
also quite dark. They started out in November 2011 and unlike Bakunin Commando
their beats are straight forward and without compromise. This is the kind of music that
is both influenced by techno and industrial music in equal portions. Now here I can
easily imagine that this blasts at full volume in a dark basement, entirely concrete
surrounding; the garage below an apartment building, a huge sound system and then
these two playing their unrelentness beat music.
Both cassettes aren’t very long, but I would think that twenty to thirty minutes this
is also long enough. I was however pondering over the question: which DJ has these
days a cassette player on his technical rider? (FdW)
——— Address: http://amoktapes.bandcamp.com
THE LAST WAVE – COURCIRCUIT (cassette by cro2 Records)
Oh yeah, and we also received this. All the information is in French, and someone wrote
on it, ‘In French’, thinking maybe I wouldn’t recognize this language. I am never bored to
repeat myself, so here we go again: if you aim to promote something outside your own
country, it is wise to add information that is most likely to be understood by the recipient,
and if you are not sure what the recipient’s language, best use English, even when at
one point in history quite a few people mastered your own language (and of course I
receive sturdy spanking for writing all of this). But no doubt that is all spoiled words, as
who knows, this review may never reach the sender (and not because of a language
barrier), because this is another case of mistaken identity. The sender, crO2 Records
from Switzerland, may have no clue as to what Vital Weekly reviews, as these eight
mediocre rock/blues pieces are way outside what we write about (well, maybe they are
the works of a genius, but we wouldn’t know, we honestly admit this music is not on
our turf). We simply are clueless about this. We mention this so you know it’s out there
and there is a link for you to check. One purpose of sending out a review, getting
acknowledgement of your existence worked. Let’s move on. (FdW)
——— Address: http://www.cro2.ch
•••
1. incite@gmx.de
incite/ live @ FIAV Casablanca
Sat, April 23rd
Audiovisual Live Performance
Festival International de l´Art Video
Le Studio des Arts Vivant
http://www.lestudio.ma/
Casablanca, Morocco
Other artists tba.
incite/
http://incite.hamburg
http://www.facebook.com/incite.audiovisual
http://vimeo.com/incitefm
•••
Sindre Bjerga <sindrebjerga@hotmail.com>
SATURDAY APRIL 16th – 4PM – 7PM
Nonfigurativ Musikk presents:
FAMLENDE BJERGA (SINDRE BJERGA + 3/4 of FAMLENDE FORSØK)
HELLO FRIEND
CAFE M
ST. OLAVS GT 22
TØNSBERG
ENTRY – 100 NOK
•••
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