Week 3

AIDAN BAKER & HAN-EARL PARK & KATHERINA SCHMIDT – THOUGHTS OF TRIO (CD by Attenuation Circuit)
DRONAEMENT & AALFANG MIT PFERDEKOPF – CLOUD COVER (CDR by Attenuation Circuit)
SMALL THINGS ON SUNDAYS – MISGUIDED – LIVE TURNTABLISM (CDR by Attenuation Circuit)
MANUEL MOTA – 1-7 (CD by Headlights Records)
STATIC TELLER – SWAP TIDE (CD by Klang Galerie)
FLOWERS WE ARE (CD by Klang Galerie)
ANTONIO DELLA MARINA – SANJE (CD by I Dischi Di Angelica)
HASCO ENJOYMENTS – WOW! (CD by Rope Worm)
REPO / TETKOV / LORD – MIDLANDS LIFE CRISIS (CDR/cassette by Aphelion Editions)
DANIEL CRAIG – DILJIN RISING (CDR by ROHS! Records)
KLUIK – SANKUTU (CDR by Hyster Tapes)
PETROGLIFI SOLUBILI – TANTE CASE VUOTE (CDR, private)
ASHLEE MACK, PIANO – GREEN (CDR by Sawyer Editions)
KARI WATSON – ENCLOSURES (CDR by Sawyer Editions)
BEN RICHTER – DISSOLUTION SEEDLINGS (CDR by Sawyer Editions)
INSUB META ORCHESTRA – EXHAUSTION / PROLIFERATION (CDR by Sawyer Editions)
MORTON FELDMAN AND TOBIAS HUME – FELDMAN AND HUME: INTERMISSIONS (CDR by Sawyer Editions)
DE FABRIEK & QUINTEN DIERICK – HET FAILISSEMENT (cassette by De Fabriek)
TIM SIX – EQUALIZIER (cassette by Cosmic Winnetou)
PJS – SPIRALS (cassette by Cosmic Winnetou)
GÜNTER SCHLIENZ – NOVELLEN (cassette by Cosmic Winnetou)
GÜNTER SCHLIENZ – SOFTWARE (cassette by Muzan Editions)

I don’t know half the things Aidan Baker is up to these days. I hear what passes Vital Weekly, but I don’t actively follow everything he does. In February 2024, he played a live concert at the Morphine Raum in Berlin with Katharina Schmidt on drums and percussion and Han-earl Peak on guitar, with Baker switching between guitar and bass. I don’t think I know Schmidt’s work, and of Park, I know he’s an improviser, having worked with Lol Coxhill, Charles Hayward, Evan Park and so on. I see the result here as combining the best these players offer, mood music and free improvisation. For once, the guitar doesn’t rely on many sound effects to generate atmospheric music, but by taking their sounds minor and tapping on strings, without much sustain, rubbing strings and maybe a bit of delay to colour the sound. At the same time, Schmidt freely goes about with a few elements of her drum kit. In the early pieces, it seems as if they are searching for common ground, testing the waters, but as the work continues, I believe I hear Baker doing a bit more of his ambient playing, Park contrasting with his play, while Schmidt remains steady in what she does. Especially the sixth piece (all untitled) works very well in that respect. At times a bit too much free improvisation for my taste, but it worked rather well.
In recent times, I reviewed a few works, old and new, by Mirko Uhlig’s Aalfang Mit Pferdekopf, and here he comes with an all-new work, recorded with Marcus Obst, also known as Dronaement. Also a name I hadn’t heard in some time, apart from the contribution to the Taalem boxset (see Vital Weekly 1463, not my review). The information here mentions this new release is part of a trilogy with Aalfang Mit Pferdekopf, the first one from 2007. I haven’t reviewed either of these collaborations and from Dronaement, only two previous releases (Vital Weekly 697 and 752). In those reviews I reference minimal electronics and cosmic music, and to a certain extent, one could say something similar about Aalfang’s output, which I heard more in the past. There is no division of labour here, no instruments mentioned, and I guess Obst and Uhlig handle machines and field recordings. These machines might be analogue synthesisers and sequencers, but also digital ones. They deliver a delicate mix of slow, bouncy cosmic arpeggiator doodles or some more abstract sound, with the first more Obst’s interest and Uhlig the second – I am still guessing here. The field recordings are abstract; I have no idea where that’s coming from. Sometimes, there are also voices. I assume the musician’s voices for no particular reason. Interestingly, the more cosmic outings refer to composer Laurie Spiegel, and the three parts here seem like one piece but do not appear back to back. I don’t know why, as it interrupts the flow, but it also adds some variation, which is further enhanced by using an acoustic guitar (in ‘At Sea’), which appears out of the blue but works very well. It’s not something of a massive surprise, but a consistent, beautiful release.
Maybe a story I told before, but the first time I saw turntablism in action was in 1985 or 86 when Christian Marclay played the Goem Gallerie here in Nijmegen. I admit I found it fascinating, just as the concert P16.D4 off-shoot SLP did a few years later. Following that, I saw more people with turntables, heard more and found it perhaps more interesting to see than hear on CD at home. Danish duo Small Things On Sundays is not a strict turntablism group, as they also use table-top guitar, laptop and electronics, and one could see their music as being part of ‘dark ambient’ music. I am not sure, but I think Henrik Bagner and Claus Poulsen aren’t as active as they used to be, and this new release is another case of archival clean-up. The 15 pieces are from live improvisations from 2009 to 2012, emphasising using turntables and other instruments. This means we find them in a boisterous and scratchy mood in the early pieces of this CDR. Perhaps the sort of thing one expects from using old, scratchy vinyl and turntables. As the release progressed, this turned out not to be the case, and there are also some quieter, ambient industrial pieces of music to be noticed here, still sitting next to pieces with a massive amount of distortion, such as ‘Deep Sea Bombing’. The variety of the pieces saved this release for me; had it all been scratchy records, I would have been less optimistic. Combining various musical interests and placing them in a dynamic line makes this a fine release. Still, I prefer their regular work better. (FdW)
––– Address: https://emerge.bandcamp.com/

MANUEL MOTA – 1-7 (CD by Headlights Records)

Here’s another release of one of my favourite guitar players, Manual Mota, from Portugal. I never met the man, never saw him in concert. Sadly, I should add because he’s my favourite as mentioned, but also I would like to see him in action, to learn something about his methods. His guitar sounds far from traditional playing; many times, one doesn’t even recognise the six strings in action. Maybe he bows or plucks? Maybe objects upon strings? I doubt there are a lot of sound effects used; I think perhaps a bit of reverb and some colouring through amplification. Also, the space in which he plays his music plays a role. All these things I mentioned before and still haven’t got an answer. But that’s alright; it leaves something of a mystery in place, and that’s also great. On his new CD, Mota goes even more minimalist, with no title, just ‘1-7’, and the difference with earlier work is these pieces are a bit shorter, but otherwise, they are all vintage Manuel Mota. That highly abstract guitar sound, distortion, scratch and rub, and no drone approach create an alien atmosphere with a refined atmospheric quality. The reverb sends things upwards, adding that spacious quality the music now has, with a bit of ancient, decaying edge. It could very well everything fall apart here (in style with civilisation as we know it), like the rubble and dirt picture on the cover. Another excellent work by mister Mota; I just can’t get enough. (FdW)
––– Address: https://manuelmota.bandcamp.com/

STATIC TELLER – SWAP TIDE (CD by Klang Galerie)
FLOWERS WE ARE (CD by Klang Galerie)

These two new Klang Galerie releases are examples of Klang Galerie’s interest in improvised music and, in the case of the first, also involving someone from the past; Blaine Reininger of Tuxedomoon provides violin on two of the ten pieces (the last one is a bonus track, not mentioned on the cover). Jørgen Teller has been around for a long time, yet I never learned more about him. He plays the guitar, keyboard, and EMS synth 100 and sings on his CD, which also sees Jimi Tenor’s flute on two pieces. Maybe improvised music isn’t the proper term for this (or the next), but I take a somewhat liberal view here. Teller’s music is, perhaps, a combination of synth-driven beats, not aimed at the dance floor, singing/speaking voices, and with melodic content absent, but also a form of pop music, with many of these pieces being too long to be a pop music piece. You see, this music swings without swinging many ways. It’s a strange affair, which sometimes takes inspiration from Tuxedomoon and much more from the musical leftfield. It’s a most daring album because it defies any logical categorisation, which makes this hard to market (if that is a consideration of this label). What I enjoyed about this album is that strangeness, that purposefully trying not to fit in. At the same time, I must also say that after six songs, I knew what it was about, and throughout, I found all the songs too lengthy. From some editing this could have a stronger album.
Flowers We Are is a trio of Marina Dzukljev (piano, electric organ), Matija Schellander (drum machine, sampler) and noid (also known as Arnold Haberl on cello), which is also the amount of information on the cover. It sounds like a concert recording, but no location or recording date exists. More than Static Teller this is improvised music, but of the variety I enjoy a lot more. There are two pieces here, and they are pretty different. ‘Celeste’ opens the album and is the longest. In this piece, the three move delicately through dynamic interaction, going from very quiet to considerably loud. There is very quiet, intense yet quiet interaction for minutes on end, reminding me of some of AMM’s work, but with more electronic means. These draw the piece into a more electro-acoustic improvisation, with touches of real instruments. Only towards the end of ‘Celeste’ do these ‘real’ instruments pop up with some delicate piano and cello interaction. The other piece, ‘Nocturnal Butterflies’, is quite different. At 14 minutes, everything is closely together. I assume this is pre-planned. “let’s play material that is knitted tightly, slowly building to a crescendo, and disappearing on the high note”. It isn’t easy to recognise any instruments in this piece, which goes from quite dark and low to dark and massive. It’s almost as if another band is playing here. This is one intense piece out of two, but two entirely different ones. Great stuff. (FdW)
––– Address: https://klanggalerie.com/

ANTONIO DELLA MARINA – SANJE (CD by I Dischi Di Angelica)

I don’t think I’ve heard of Antonio Della Marina before. He’s an alto saxophone player using sine waves. That looks good, but it could do a lot of ways. The recording is from a concert in Northern Italy and involved also lights. Maybe these are part of the booklet. “Sanje belongs to the second phase of Della Marina’s research when he began experimenting with ways of incorporating the sound of alto saxophone, modifying the traditional fingering and mouthpiece techniques of the instrument, in the three-dimensional “spaces” generated by the carefully crafted overlaying of sinusoidal signals. ‘Sanje’ therefore appears (in its original recording from 2021, remixed in February 2024 for this release) as a composition made up of a texture of chords in just intonation, which unfolds in various sequences and combinations, accompanied by hypnotic saxophone phrasing performed with the technique of circular breathing.” There is also something about harmonic intervals. Wind instruments in combination with sine waves are things I like, and I think the clarinet is the best instrument for that. The saxophone is not my favourite instrument, but Marina does an excellent job. How it all works with the sine waves and harmonic intervals I don’t know. The saxophone doesn’t play long, sustaining tones closely working with the sine waves, but he plays ‘around’ it. It has a bit of a jazz-like feeling to the music, and the use of reverb (possibly from natural surroundings rather than electronically generated) adds a strong atmospheric feeling to the music. If the bright colours in the booklet are some kind of indication, then it must have been quite a hallucinatory experience. I should add it is sometimes bordering on the fringes of new-age music, but I’d say it all stays on the right track. An excellent work of improvisation, composition and sound installation, meeting up in 36 minutes of soft sonic bliss. (FdW)
––– Address: https://idischidiangelica.bandcamp.com/album/sanje

HASCO ENJOYMENTS – WOW! (CD by Rope Worm)

The Polish Rope Worm label is now four releases in, and if they aim to confuse, they succeeded. If irony is the intention, it also works. Apparently (!), Hasco Enjoyments is a group around John-Peter Hasson, who plays on all tracks, using baritone guitar, bass, synthesiser, Wurlitzer, percussion, along with people contributing flute, clarinet, keyboards, guitar, soprano saxophone, backing vocals (though no other vocals are mentioned) and pedal steel. We met Hasson before, as I reviewed JP Inc. and his ‘Massage & Spa’ release in Vital Weekly 1402. That was a most relaxing release, even if our of place in an authentic massage and spa. Something similar is on offer here: more soundtracks for relaxing, but this time, apparently (!) for different instruments, as the previous seemed all synthesisers and digital. The irony aspect is the use of lounge-like music combined with the strangest titles, such as ‘The Seattle Mariners Are My Favorite Baseball Team’ or ‘It’s OK To Put Ketchup On A Hot Dog, If That’s What You Like To Eat’. Smooth music, a bit jazz-like, combined with rock music, surf, lounge and exotica. It’s not the kind of music often played in the VW HQ (well, maybe if VW stood for Volkswagen; perhaps they would like the song called ‘Executive Bonus’), and as such, something I don’t know too much about and wonder why they mailed a copy for review. That’s not to say I didn’t enjoy this music; I did! Excellent music to the quarterly accounts, for instance. Nothing too invasive or disturbing, as intended, I suppose. Or not? That would be the confusing aspect. (FdW)
––– Address: https://ropeworm.bandcamp.com/

KAREN BORCA & PAUL MURPHY – ENTWINED (CD by Relative Pitch Records)

Entwined is the first proper release of Karen Borca (1948) as a leader. There’s a release on NoBusiness Records with the Karen Borca Trio, Quartet & Quintet. However, that was a live recording from two separate dates (1998 and 2005) at the Vision Festival in Angel Orensanz Centre, NYC. She married Jimmy Lyons, the alto sax player, until his all too early death in 1986. Karen and Paul Murphy (1947) were one half of Jimmy’s quartet, with Jay Oliver on bass duty. So here we have the unique combination of bassoon and drums. Some pieces are not new to this release. Opening tracks Good News Blues, Something, Cambiar, and New Piece can be heard on the NoBusiness Records release, albeit with an added saxophone and bass. And in the case of Good News Blues with Paul on drums. Seven pieces in just over an hour. And boy (girl), what an hour it is. The bassoon is a favourite instrument of mine. I have one on loan, and its distinctive timbre and huge range (three and a half octaves) appeal to me. And what Karen does with the bassoon is mind-blowing. Sure, timbres, it’s all a bit the same, but notewise she’s nothing short of a wizard. Effortless sheets of notes, not in the Coltraneway but in a more subdued way because of the timbre. Since there’s no other tonal instrument, only implied chord progressions exist. And Paul adds a complete orchestra by way of his playing the drums. This is a stunning release! (MDS)
––– Address: https://relativepitchrecords.bandcamp.com/

REPO / TETKOV / LORD – MIDLANDS LIFE CRISIS (CDR/cassette by Aphelion Editions)

Of course, it’s old-school to think labels, especially the independents, have a particular musical style. But more often than not, such labels are run by music enthusiasts, who don’t think twice if they have some to release they like. I never had Aphelion Editions as any sort of label, and yet their latest is still quite a surprise. It’s a collaboration between members of two bands: “three members of Repo Man (Liam McConaghy – guitar / Anthony Brown – bass / Bojak – sax, violin, vocals) and two members of Exeter’s free jazz trio Capri-Batterie (Matt Lord – sax / Kordian Tetkov – drums)”. The first is described as no-wave rock. They recorded their collaboration in January 2020 (we’re not told why it took so long to release this) as part of post-punk and free jazz improvisations. Perhaps not something of our daily digest. The title track opens here, and at first, I was thinking of some weird math rock thing, but when the vocals kicked in, the music made a meaningful connection: this reminded me of Dutch anarcho punks The Ex. For years they combine the finely honed aggression of punk with the free expression of jazz, free jazz and improvisation. I find similar aggression in the ten pieces here, even when occasional lapses in power exist. When things are instrumental, and everybody goes on to do a more reflective effort, things slow and tone down, taking some of the energy and speed away, such as in the final (and most extended) piece, ‘Throbbing Keegan’. Here, it becomes a bit too psychedelic and ‘normal’. I like it when things are spiky, loud, aggressive and a cascade of energy; more post-punky, if you will and less free-jazzy. One could also say this music is a bit far from my daily listening habit, so what do I know? (FdW)
––– Address: https://aphelioneditions.bandcamp.com/

DANIEL CRAIG – DILJIN RISING (CDR by ROHS! Records)

I don’t think I had heard of the musician Daniel Craig, who might be from Australia. In 2019, he got himself a Revox reel-to-reel machine and recorded many hours of improvisations of looping sounds from a MAX/MSP patch to loops, obscuring the erase head so sounds could accumulate. During the lockdown of 2020, he collected the 11 pieces on ‘Diljin Rising’ from this material, named after a river in the Australian outback. There are references to “a well-known contemporary Korean/German philosopher”, but I don’t know who. I am quite the sucker for this kind of music, ticking all the right boxes. Intimate, small sounds, reel-to-reel manipulation, lo-fi, and somehow hi-fi (thanks to the input). Primarily small pieces, acting like sound snippets, watery paintings of highly obscured instruments. Of the 46 minutes, two pieces take up almost half the album, and here, Craig loses grip a bit unless he intended the music to be rather loosely orchestrated. This might very well have been the idea, to stretch out a short piece, let run for a while, including tape glitches and all that. I prefer his shorter pieces, tiny ripples of lo-fi ambient music, ever-changing views of grey water and misty days, much like the cover of his release, a wolf (?) in a snow-covered land. You know, all those atmospheric images one has with this kind of music, and maybe that’s not a surprise, but it works pretty well. (FdW)
––– Address: https://lontanoseries.bandcamp.com/

KLUIK – SANKUTU (CDR by Hyster Tapes)

I was pleasantly surprised by a privately released cassette from the Finnish Kluik project; see Vital Weekly 1455. Now Hyster Tapes is responsible for a CDR release which says nothing more than Kluik, the title and Hyster Tapes 2024. It’s rare for them to release something on CDR, not a recycled cassette. Hyster doesn’t have a Bandcamp page, only a poor website (I am sure part of their aesthetic) which says about this release, “crudely recorded free improvisation of microphone feedback, tape echo, guitar, piano and primitive percussion. At times it sounds like Ry Cooder having a real bad day”. That’s quite funny. Before it was a combination of noise, ambient and psychedelia, but this time, it’s all a noisier, with the banging and scratching of guitar strings, piano wires, and metallic objects, and all of this go on in the basement, packed with amplifiers and microphones. If the music owes anything to the world of psychedelia, it is probably a bad trip. Feedback freely flows around here, but it’s never an explosion of harsh noise. Kluik (a group? A single person? I don’t know) controls the music quite well. The other ‘new’ element (maybe it’s old? I don’t know any other releases than these two) is the music, which this time sounds more improvised, more than before, that is. The guitar abuse is indeed Ry Cooder out of control, trying to get a spacious sound out of his banjo but failing hopelessly. I love it! I miss the ambient aspect of their previous release, which gave the music another dimension that this piece (one track, 36 minutes) could have used, but nevertheless a damn fine release. (FdW)
––– Address: https://www.pcuf.fi/~plaa/hyster.html

PETROGLIFI SOLUBILI – TANTE CASE VUOTE (CDR, private)

In Vital Weekly 1445, I reviewed a CDR by Hama Azata, the music project of Loris Zecchin. It was a private release, just like his new one. In a note, he writes that he returned to his old name, Petroglifi Solubili. I didn’t know he used that one or what the reason is. He also mentions that he does everything except mastering (by Andrea Maruti), which includes synths, contact microphones, pedals, etc. The reason for the name change can’t be music, as the three pieces on this new release are very much in a similar raw and brutal noise field. It is perhaps less minimal and more chaotic, scratching and peeping. With that name change, I was reminded of the 1980s cassette scene, when people changed the names of projects and labels all the time, but also Zecchin’s approach to noise is pretty old-fashioned, and I mean this positively. As noted before, Zecchin undoubtedly uses better equipment (and who used mastering in the 1980s?). Still, in his production and editing, he has that old-school noise approach of smashing and breaking, culminating in a surprising musical ending of the third piece, ‘Necropoli Glossy’. And, of course, not every second of these pieces is equally strong, but being without pretensions (as far as I can judge), this is once again a lovely noise excursion with the ending of that last track casting an interesting shadow forward. (FdW)
––– Address: loriszecchin@proton.me

ASHLEE MACK, PIANO – GREEN (CDR by Sawyer Editions)
KARI WATSON – ENCLOSURES (CDR by Sawyer Editions)
BEN RICHTER – DISSOLUTION SEEDLINGS (CDR by Sawyer Editions)
INSUB META ORCHESTRA – EXHAUSTION / PROLIFERATION (CDR by Sawyer Editions)
MORTON FELDMAN AND TOBIAS HUME – FELDMAN AND HUME: INTERMISSIONS (CDR by Sawyer Editions)

When I first reviewed releases by Sawyer Editions in Vital Weekly 1442, I started with these words: “Regrettably, we receive much music from the world of improvised music, contemporary music, free jazz, and free improvisation, which, and I know I write these words every week, I feel is not why I started Vital Weekly and not where my expertise lies. Here are five further proofs from a label called Sawyer Editions, “a contemporary classical music” label. Don’t expect a well-informed review; we are not a contemporary classical music review journal.” So maybe I was ignored or not read by the label, or perhaps the label was happy with what I wrote.
I go through these in order of catalogue number and start with ‘green’ (all lowercase on the cover), an “album of quiet music for solo piano”, played by Ashlee Mack, curiously listed on the cover and Bandcamp as ‘Ashlee Mack, piano’. She performs four works by four composers: Jeff Herriott, Ian Mikyska, Eva-Maria Houben and Marti Epstein. I heard work by Houben before and know she’s part of the Wandelweiser movement, and listening to these pieces, I’d say the others are also part of that, as all of this is what is: quiet music. Sadly, this arrived straight after the new year, when everything was picking up speed again, whereas between Christmas and New Year’s Day, there was hardly any mail, and everything went into slow motion. This music is the perfect soundtrack for that period. That’s not to say I don’t enjoy this on an otherwise quiet Saturday afternoon. I know enough about classical music not to reference Erik Satie here. This quiet music consists of silence between the notes, a sparseness throughout, rather than Satie’s sparse melodies, which is a different thing. I like Satie and I like these pieces. It feels like slowing down, which in these turbulent times is something we all need. Let’s hope it’s picked up widely!
Also, Kari Watson prefers lowercase for the title of her disc. Unlike Mack, who is the performer on her disc, she is the composer of the five pieces on ‘enclosures’ and the opening piece of her CDR; the other pieces are with an initial capital letter. Two pieces are for solo instruments (just intonation vibraphone and harp), one for saxophone quartet, one for string quartet and the title piece for bass clarinet, bass flute, electric guitar and viola. We are now in some serious modern territory, especially with the pieces for more instruments. There is pretty severe bending of instruments here, going up and down, shrieking about, especially in the saxophone quartet (and, keep in mind, the saxophone not being one of the instruments I enjoy). That, too, happens in the two pieces for solo instruments, but I find these the best pieces of this release; they are also the shortest on this disc. These pieces are intimate and an expression that makes them most enjoyable. The harp gets some harsh approach one doesn’t expect, which the vibraphone also endures, but nevertheless also works beautifully with overtones.
House On Fire is a trio performing ‘Dissolution Seedlings’ by composer Ben Richter. Although they are pianists, Wells Leng, Richard An, and Andrew Anderson also ventured out to cello, percussion, toy piano and other keyboards. “Dissolution Seedlings comprises fourteen and a half obliquely connected movements exploring lateral and distributed consciousness, initially inspired by the rhizomatic plant-fungal world and its radically unlinear life systems.” These 14 pieces last somewhere in between a minute and a half to over seven minutes. Richter wrote this piece after a car accident, which gave him a concussion, and how that worked out, brain-wise, feeling “consciousness had dissolved into many dispersed pockets”. Out of that followed these pieces, which House On Fire performs. The piano is the primary instrument in these pieces, and the music has a fragmented feeling, which I can relate to the accident. Sometimes, there is an almost sketch-like approach to these pieces, maybe deliberate, maybe not, and yet there’s also a density in the music. Sometimes, it comes via tonal clusters on one piano and sparse notes on another or the cello. There is darkness in these pieces, perhaps due to the cello’s low end or the keyboard’s lower region. As with much modern classical music, I don’t know to what extent this is composed music or if the players can interpret the score, but I wouldn’t be surprised to learn there was quite some freedom here.
The only name I recognised this time is the Insub Meta Orchestra, which is indeed an orchestra, and it goes too far to list all members. About 30 people play flute, shakuhachi clarinet, saxophone, oboe, bassoon, shruti box, spinet, guitar, double bass, cello, viola da gamba, violin, percussion and electronics. As with any orchestra, some instruments are double or triple. They perform two compositions, and I believe they are composed by two persons, Cyril Bondi and D’incise, “with the help of Ed Williams for the chord choices”. “While ‘Exhaustion’ offers musicians multiple paths and interactions, ‘Proliferation’ plays with the echo, fragments of the piece being recorded and played back via smartphones.” This is what I mean by players having freedom of choice in a musical piece, something this orchestra is known for. As always, I’d love to see a score for these pieces. Both pieces are pretty similar with minor differences. Both contain quiet music, of which ‘Proliferation’ is the quietest one, with a few notes per player, it seems, and the echo part of the piece is not easy to detect. There is something slow and majestic about this piece. ‘Exhaustion’ contains more notes, with several instruments playing simultaneously, and here, too, there is a slow, unfolding majestic playing happening, even becoming ‘orchestral’ at one point – I am unsure if ‘symphonic’ is a word I could use here.
The final release is a somewhat puzzling one. I am not well-versed (not at all) in the works of Morton Feldman (1926 – 1987), whose pieces are played here, along with the works of Tobias Hume (1569 – 1645). I don’t know the connection, should any exist. “Based on the absence of a proper form of dialogue, the architecture of the work will be one of complete fluidity, where the referential structure (by the absence of dialect storytelling) will be replaced by the superposition of co-existence of different layers” as it says on Bandcamp. I do know Feldman’s music to be very quiet; “extremely soft; very slow; with a minimum attack; soft; very soft; slowly and quietly; as soft as possible” read the musical indications in the work of Morton Feldman. The pieces (there are 24, of which five contain silence) are performed by Luciana Elizondo (viola da gamba) and Guy Vandromme (piano). I guess the link is within the music performance, which is all quiet and sparse. There’s no clear indication of which composer composed which piece, blurring this further, but it works well. I couldn’t say if these are great interpretations of each composer’s work, but I end on a similar quiet note, much like where this Sawyer Editions trip started, with peaceful music. It may not necessarily win me over to explore more of Feldman’s work, but at least I may have a better idea. (FdW)
––– Address: https://sawyereditions.bandcamp.com/

DE FABRIEK & QUINTEN DIERICK – HET FAILISSEMENT (cassette by De Fabriek)

I believe I have known De Fabriek for more than 40 years now, and there is always an element of surprise there, so I recently realised much of what De Fabriek does is about networking. Maybe I realised this before, but even more when I got this one. For no particular reason, it occurred to me that this is a rare instance in which De Fabriek isn’t at the end controls but someone else. Quinten Dierick, a reel-to-reel enthusiast (and much more) from Arnhem, sometimes known as E.M.I.R.S., is a musician also known as one of the many co-workers of De Fabriek (as the name reads from anyone who sends in a cassette of work to be used. But on ‘Het Faillissement’, he uses some of those co-workers and creates his version of De Fabriek. No other workers are mentioned by name, but the package, song titles, and music are all very much Dierick’s work. It’s noisy, rough, and has that reel-to-reel loop manipulation, murky, loud and dark, yet there is also a musical component. Off and on, rhythms pop up or a melodic touch, and even when the insert says eight tracks for side A and six for side B, it’s not possible to identify single pieces; the Bandcamp version is a single, one-hour-long piece, which makes identifying pieces not easier (harder perhaps). De Fabriek isn’t a group with a single idea or one specific sound; it can be many things, and it’s been a while since we last heard De Fabriek on a noisy trajectory, but it’s good to have it again. This is an excellent cassette and a great surprise. (FdW)
––– Address: https://defabriek.bandcamp.com/

TIM SIX – EQUALIZIER (cassette by Cosmic Winnetou)
PJS – SPIRALS (cassette by Cosmic Winnetou)
GÜNTER SCHLIENZ – NOVELLEN (cassette by Cosmic Winnetou)
GÜNTER SCHLIENZ – SOFTWARE (cassette by Muzan Editions)

Here, we have a quartet of new releases by Cosmic Winnetou, the Günter Schlienz label, and one extra from the master himself. Let’s start with Tim Six, of whom, I think, I had not heard before. He’s from the Crimea but is now based in Paris. He runs the ΠΑΝΘΕΟΝ (which means Pantheon) and the Global Pattern labels (the latter”dedicated to vaporwave and other post-internet music”) and is involved in a bunch of groups. I understand his primary interest is in drone and ambient music. The label describes this as ‘traumhafte’ music; to dream by. Six uses “sine waves, effects and korg wavestate”. I am sure I mentioned before but here it is again; I don’t have any music in the bedroom. I read a book (on paper) before I go to sleep, and that’s it. The idea of having music around when I am sleeping is still alien (and yes, I know about all that music that’s out there, high on the platforms to help me through the night, and no, I am not going bold and try that). Also, reviewing is something I do during the day, which on this lovely Friday is the first day of sunshine in weeks, so the music by Six isn’t the kind of soundtrack for such a day, one would imagine. Well, that depends, I’d say. I, for one, am a sucker for all things drone and ambient, and I can see many different circumstances to play this kind of drone/ambient music. It depends on one’s state of mind and the mood you’re in, and that decides if you want to have a relaxing soundtrack or something to boost your energy levels. Again, you could wonder what mood the reviewer has to have. I believe my mood is irrelevant to the job of reviewing. I can be tired and listen to energetic music, alive and kicking and still listen to Tim Six. It’s a more or less objective thing to describe the album. Lots of words, and what I thought of the album was already somewhere in this review; I am a sucker for this kind of music. I like what I hear, and what I hear is nothing out of the ordinary in the more considerable scope of all things drone and ambient, but who cares (when you’re sleeping)? Sixty minutes of sonic bliss.
‘Spirals’ is the fourth release by PJS, the duo of Patrick Dique and Jordan Christoff I reviewed (see also Vital Weekly 1230, 1326, and 1448). Their music has been dreamy and cosmic, and the new album does not break with the past. The field recordings aspect I may have heard on the earliest releases was gone last time (even when it’s still mentioned on Bandcamp, so maybe it’s there, but I am unaware). There are only synthesisers, pads, and small percussive loops (with lots of space, as nothing makes a fully functioning rhythm on this release). The latter brings a different dynamic to the space table, sometimes even a bit more like a kling-klang of industrial music, without even stepping a millimetre closer to the world of noise music. Unlike Six, who plays two side-long pieces, PJS have shorter pieces, adding more variation to their dish, and is entirely unsuited for any bedside table Walkman playback. Of course, and spoiler alert for the next two, these are all different sides of the same ambient coin, and this, too, is a much-appreciated album of more cosmic doodling.
But, hold on, Schlienz has two long pieces on his ‘Novellen’, and the start of ‘Kind Der Sonne’ on the first side is nothing but noise. That’s not another coin; it’s another currency. But it doesn’t last very long and we land in Schlienz-land, mellow modular synthesiser music, which uses electric organ, tape machines, finger cymbals, field recordings and found sounds. ‘Novellen’ means ‘novellas’, and Schlienz uses the wiki explanation: “A novella is a short to medium-length story. It often describes a conflict between chaos and order. It usually tells of a single event, hence the expression that the novella is committed to singularity”. Schlienz found inspiration in the writing of Anton Tschechov & Nikolai Gogol, who I haven’t read because I am not the most fanatic fiction reader. Nevertheless, there is something to enjoy here, even if you haven’t read much. On the first side is a piece consisting of distinctly different parts, starting with that noise intro but going through a slowed-down reel section and spoken word (not intended for understanding), a Cluster-like tune for springtime and a short outro. ‘Das Meer’ (the sea), on the other side, is a side-long piece of mellow electronics, not aiming at anything or going anywhere. There is an eerie undercurrent, and in the second half, a slowed-down voice adds a creepy touch to the music. Novella-like? I couldn’t tell. But lovely it is.
Is it wise to launch straight into another Günter Schlienz release? From an objective point of view, perhaps not; there is a risk of the reviewer describing it as similar. And maybe it is. ‘Craving’, the opening piece, has at least a steady ticking beat behind the music, something I didn’t hear on the other cassette, but in the vast catalogue of Schlienz is no fremdkörper (I was looking for an opportunity to throw that word in), plus whatever else happens is stock and trade for him. With musicians such as Schlienz, who produce a lot of work, it’s not about the amount of newness they stick into their work. One has to look for minor differences, going deeper and deeper in their trade, making minimalist changes, and slowly expanding their work field. As such, is ‘Software’ not different from many others, and maybe it receives fewer words from me than ‘Novellen’, but it’s no lesser quality. It’s another lovely work of dreamy electronics, some bird twitter, a bit of arpeggio and some nice spacious doodling. It is the Schlienz I love! (FdW)
––– Address: https://cosmicwinnetou.bandcamp.com/
––– Address: https://muzaneditions.bandcamp.com/