TALKSHOW BOY – ICE POLICE (CDsingle by Pocketclock)
BIG CITY ORCHESTRA – IN A PERSIAN MARKET (CDR by Verato)
ULTRA MILKMAIDS – V/S PART 2 (CDR by Verato)
FLITHY THURD – POWER CONTROL LUST (CDR by Verato)
THE AUDIBLE STILL-LIFE: SONIC PLANAR ANALYSIS 02 (CDR by Stasisfield)
GRIDLOCK – UNDER (3″CDR by Piehead Recordings)
CHEFKIRK – SWEDISH TOPSPIN (3″CDR by Icebox Records)
LESLIE STUCK – PAS (CD by Cycling 74)
BAUDER & AJEMIAN – OBJECT 3 (CD by Locust Mus
SLUGGO – COMPLETED UNDER DURESS (CDREP by Sijis Records)
DARUIN – WAY OF ABANDONMENT AND COMPROMISE (CDR by Alienation)
NORD – ABSTRACT MOON (CDR by Alienation)
FLUXORGY – DOG FACTORY (CDR by Alienation)
MIKROKNYTES – LIVE_SRC (CD by Crank Automotive)
PROJECT DARK – GRAMOPHONE DE LUXE (CD by Phono Erotic)
NO.9 – WHERE COME FROM? AND WHERE TO? (CD single by Locust Music)
OVRO – MALICE IN WONDERLAND (CDR by Some Place Else)
TOD DOCKSTADER – EIGHT ELECTRONIC PIECES (CD by Locust Music)
J.D. ROBB – RHYTHMANIA: ELECTRONIC MUSIC FROM RAZOR BLADES TO MOOG (CD by Locust Music)
RESINA – OPINIO OMNIUM (CD by Mousike Lab)
SINTESI OUTPUT O1 (CD compilation by Sintesi Archivio)
AVATAR 41 DEGREES (CD compilation by DSP)
ELLENDE – MATHEMATICA (CDR by Tosom)
SACHIKO M – 1:2 (miniCD by A Bruit Secret)
J. SULLIVAN – ICE SHELF (3″ CDR by Kissy Records)
JOHN HUDAK – OLD MOON (3″ CDR by Kissy Records)
TALKSHOW BOY – ICE POLICE (CDsingle by Pocketclock)
This is the first release for a new Australian label and they decided to release a CD single for their first release, which clocks in under five minutes, but pressed on a 5″ CD and in a regular jewel case. That is indeed a daring move. Why not add a couple of extra tracks or remixes? Behind Talkshow Boy is ‘bedroom-buttonpusher’ Adrian K-Sahara (aka Adrian Trajstman), who released a cassette and CD before. Besides being an one man band, he’s also a member of keyboard punk band Cattle Of The Sun. Especially the piece ‘Ice Police’ is a catchy piece, with quirky snow flakes on the keyboards and a nice snare kick and a sing along refrain. Yes, it could be a hit (it would be Vital Weekly’s single of the week, if such a thing would exist). The flip – the label refers to flips, even when it’s a CD! – is a nice, but maybe the redundant b-side? (FdW)
Address: http://www.pocketclock.org
BIG CITY ORCHESTRA – IN A PERSIAN MARKET (CDR by Verato)
ULTRA MILKMAIDS – V/S PART 2 (CDR by Verato)
FLITHY THURD – POWER CONTROL LUST (CDR by Verato)
A couple of new CDR releases on Verato, the side label of Suggestion Records and the one by Big City Orchestra is certainly a surprise. For one it’s an one-track release, which is kinda odd for Big City Orchestra. No sound effects library enclosed this time. But instead we get almoost 78 minutes of the most strangest music. Quite ethnic in approach, with tablas, sitars, people chanting, brass bands playing keyboards and other collages and cut-ups of sound. A very weird piece of music, which is also quite un-Big City Orchestra like, despite some of the industrialized raga drones that play a pretty role here.
The CDR format is of course something to clean the vaults for bands, certainly if they recorded a lot, but without the oppurtunity to release it all ‘proper’. Ultra Milkmaids for instance is one such band. The recordings on ‘V/S Part 2’ date back to 1996 to 1997, and show a particular development of the Milkies sound: heavily drawing their lines of ambientesque keyboard patterns. Although by now the sound may be worn out a bit, it’s quite a nice item of darker atmospherical music. I must say I prefer the current day sound of the Milkmaids.
Filthy Thurd represents the always needed to be excursion into the unterwelt of noise. With a title like ‘Power Control Lust’ you can’t go wrong. Luckily just the title is a poor Whitehouse imitation. The music is an hour long howl in feedback, shortwave distortion and effect pedals being pushed. Nothing new under the moon. Sleep tight. (FdW)
Address: http://www.verato-project.de
THE AUDIBLE STILL-LIFE: SONIC PLANAR ANALYSIS 02 (CDR by Stasisfield)
Stasisfield is one of things that we have in which we can see the importance of internet: a webgallery, a record label and the possibility to download music. Their first year is documented through a CDR that holds no less then ten hours of music in MP3 format. There is also a new compilation, which is the audio companion to an online exhibition at Stasisfield, dealing with still-life’s. A still-life is usually not a very interesting painting, but it’s not Stasisfield’s idea to ridicule that, but ‘this project serves rather as the beginning of an exploration of still-life’s relationship to today’s artists who work in a manner beyond simple two-dimensional representation of three-dimensional objects”. The audio-works on this release (seventeen artists in total) are all made with manipulated samples of field recordings. Real, rather than still-life, but captured as it were, frozen in time and altered, reproduced, like a real still-life. Nice short pieces of manipulated sound, in fact it’s hard to detect any sort of field recording in most of these pieces. Processing has done it’s work to quite some extent. Included are well-known names – well, to some, I guess – like John Hudak, Steve Roden, Sawako, Mou Lips! but also some I never heard of like Koura, i+o, Trace Reddell, Schoenecker and Ethan Koehler. What I liked about this compilation was the relative shortness of the tracks. The longest is 4:44, so all these people keep their pieces precise and to the point. A relief, compared with some other overlong compilations… (FdW)
Address: http://www.stasisfield.com
GRIDLOCK – UNDER (3″CDR by Piehead Recordings)
Unlike Vital Weekly’s NMP last week, I am less familiar with the works of Gridlock, even when they have been around since 1994. The press blurb mentions a lot of references (from Panacea to Skinny Puppy to Funckarma, Autechre), but I can only detect some nice ambient synth lines here and rhythms borrowed from the Intelligent Dance Music scene (read, indeed: Funckarma and/or Autechre). The mood is a bit dark here, the tempi are down: actually quite pleasent music, if not a bit unsurprising and maybe not very new. Not as ambient as I expected after last week’s review of ‘Formless’, but still quite alright. (FdW)
Address: http://www.pieheadrecords.com
CHEFKIRK – SWEDISH TOPSPIN (3″CDR by Icebox Records)
A while I reviewed a CDR release by Chefkirk, aka Roger Smith (Vital Weekly 383) and I was not very positive about it. Although much of what I said about that release is valid for this one: distorted rhythm loops with noisy back-end, but given the length of this release (only twenty minutes), it’s a bit more appealling than a whole album. I guess the best thing about it is the track title ‘Laptop Folk Is A Joke’. (FdW)
Address: http://www.ibrecords.com
LESLIE STUCK – PAS (CD by Cycling 74)
Apperentely all the compositions made by Leslie Stuck are intended for dance and apperentely all these works are made in collaboration with the choreographers. Leslie Stuck, somebody whom I never heard of, works of course with Max/MSP (otherwise there would be no point in releasing it on Cycling 74, a label devoted releasing works made with this software). Stuck uses mainly a single patch which generate the notes algorithmically. The outcome, six pieces for six dances, are quite different. ‘Special X’ is almost dub in approach, using a single strike on the keyboard and interfere’s with strange sounds that sound like a saxophone until this piece changes colour and approach. Quite a nice piece. Other pieces like ‘Soothing The Enemy’ and ‘Go’ have a stronger blend of percussive sounds, and pieces like ‘Convolution’ and ‘Mondriaan’ are more classical in approach, with samples used from classical instruments or straight from classical music (the covers says Stravinsky as one, but I thought it was ‘Also Sprach Zarathustra’ at one point). Although the music is throughout a varied bunch, it’s at the same time also a bit tame – not really surprising, breathtaking, shocking or hilarious. Maybe just as with filmsoundtracks, if you don’t get the visual thing added, it may be less strong. (FdW)
Address: http://www.cycling74.com
BAUDER & AJEMIAN – OBJECT 3 (CD by Locust Music)
In Locust’s series of improvised musics, called ‘object’, we are served a nice dish of a saxophone player (Matt Bauder) and an upright bass (Jason Ajemian). It seems that the first half of this work, fifteen minutes, is a straight forward duet between the two. Long sustained tones which nicely interfere with eachother and form an austere piece of music. Apperentely both instruments were recorded seperatly onto minidisks and marked by friends and after fifteen or so minutes, the recordings are played in shuffle mode and played back along with the two improvisers. This knowledge makes this an even more intense and beautiful work, because the austerity remains intact throughout this recording. Very sparsely orchestrated, this is a live piece of acoustic drone music, that works on an intense level, maybe even more intense than those dronings that come from playing around with organs and ebows. Played with great care and concentration. Very subtle indeed. (FdW)
Address: http://www.locustmusic.com
SLUGGO – COMPLETED UNDER DURESS (CDREP by Sijis Records)
Sluggo is apperentely a guitarist in ‘far too many real bands for our liking’ – although none are mentioned, but I never heard of the bloke before. The duress mentioned in the title refers to the state the label owners were in when searching Sluggo’s hard drive for these tracks – maybe too packed with other stuff? ‘Gosh’ is a strong, dense opening piece with subtle tonal differences. ‘Holy Moly/Eye Down’ is more rhythmic but somehow fails to capture any attention here, too simple in plug (in) and play approach. Something similar can be said about ‘NyP’ – clicks and cut rhythm with lesser subtle noise added below. The final two tracks are more interesting, even when they employ similar ideas, but here is at least been thought structure and composition. This release is too short to say something about what Sluggo really wants or to give a fair judgement of what he does, but so far half of it is ok and the other half needs some extra attention. (FdW)
Address: http://www.sijis.com
DARUIN – WAY OF ABANDONMENT AND COMPROMISE (CDR by Alienation)
NORD – ABSTRACT MOON (CDR by Alienation)
FLUXORGY – DOG FACTORY (CDR by Alienation)
Alienation is a label mostly known for releasing noise works that seem to be generated with computers. Their artists are young and do not always many releases. Daruin, aka Kazuya Ishigami had a few tracks on a compilation reviewed in Vital Weekly 393. In the meantime I learned that Ishigami is also a member of Nagoya’s group Billy?. His five piece solo CDR dwells heavily on loud distorted sounds, which sound, probably intentionally, ugly. Ugliness might be a negative qualification, but I’m sure it’s an appropiate term for Daruin’s work. It’s not that his work is in the category of ‘pointless noise’, a piece like ‘No Income’ gradually breaks down and sounds well thought out. Of course things happen at an intense level of noise, but there is more idea behind this than with most others in the noise scene – regardless if they use a computer or not.
I’m not sure if the release by Nord is the same band that released a LP in the mid-eigthies and then a couple of years a CD. If so, not a very big discography either. Nord is Satoshi Katayama and Hiroshi Hasegawa, the latter being of Astro. Their release was recorded live at Space P in Yokohama in March this year. In Nord the two Japanese guys have found a fine mixture of psychedelic electronica and more noisy outings. In their studio work the balans goes more towards the psychedelic sounds, but here in this more rougher edged live recording, things are more in the noise vein. At times one hears them searching for a particular sound to work with but once they found it, things develop rather nicely. And while playing this live recording, I was thinking of Throbbing Gristle’s live work, who were along similar lines also quite psychedelic.
I must say I am a bit confused about the last release, I am not even sure if ‘Fluxorgy’ is the band and ‘Dog Factory’ the title, or maybe the other way round. The music, twenty songs in thirty minutes, is almost everything Alienation stands for: computerized noise. Sounds run through plug ins, run amok even, loud and distorted. Highly distorted and fragmented and seemingly with a lack of composition – or if present, only at a rudimentary level. I had the idea many sounds where used a couple of times, like a constant recycling of the same material. Of the three new ones, the weakest brother. (FdW)
Address: http://www.ops.dti.ne.jp/~thirdorg/
MIKROKNYTES – LIVE_SRC (CD by Crank Automotive)
This is my first encounter with Mikroknytes, a duo from Washington, DC, the duo being Derek Morton (electronics, effects, computer) and John Coursey (violin, electronics, ‘skull massage’). They released two CDs in the past which I didn’t hear (I think). Here they present a live album of some kind. I say of some kind, because I understand this is a collection of various concert recordings, which are edited with great care, including new overdubs and further processings. Although their press blurb mentions several influences (from Can, Cluster, via Pole, Microstoria to Labradford and Stars Of The Lid), I found the whole much more inspired by late eighties, early nineties drone and industrial music. There are more traces from bands like Zoviet France or Illusion Of Safety then a click by Pole or a rock wave by Cluster. As you can imagine, the music on this release is not something surprisingely new or earth shaking. But it’s not a bad release either. The eight pieces are well crafted, heavily layered of psychedelic but noisy waves of guitars and synths and drenched in sound effects. It’s hard to think that I am maybe listening to a couple of live concert at the same time, because they all sound like they fit together very well. It proofs that indeed much time went into editing this CD and it should definetely appeal to lovers of the aforementioned bands. (FdW)
Address: http://www.crankautomotive.com
PROJECT DARK – GRAMOPHONE DE LUXE (CD by Phono Erotic)
Project Dark was once Project D.A.R.K. and I believe a trio of turntable manipulators. Their releases were mainly weird shaped and mattered grammophone records (out of glass, chocolate and what have you). It has been quiet for the last couple of years around Project Dark, but they have been working on a new direction in both music and vision. The music has become much more rockier and is played on a classic rock set: drums, guitar, bass and vocals. Kinda hard to think this is the same Project Dark as before. However, I’m told that these instruments trigger audio and video samples, which show, in a live concert situation, their previous 7″s and gramaphones. It’s kinda hard to imagine upon hearing this new CD that this has anything to do with gramophone music. It’s a rocky sound, with heavy guitars and likewise drums. Forceful indeed. The use of various singers (from Tim Whelan, Lucinda Singer, Bongo Debbie and Sexton Ming) makes the whole thing quite nice. I can imagine if there would have been only one singer, it would be a bit overlong, this CD. Now it’s a pretty varied bunch. I can imagine some of the older Project Dark fans have trouble with this and for me, I’d like to see the visual part of it! (FdW)
Address: http://www.phoneerotic.com
NO.9 – WHERE COME FROM? AND WHERE TO? (CD single by Locust Music)
The man behind No.9 is one Joe Takayuki, who is an ‘unsung electropop mastermind’ from Tokyo and he will have his debut full length soon, also on Locust Music. While waiting for that, Locust releases this CD single, with one original No.9 track and a remix by Hrvatski and Ken Brown. No.9 is a stuttery, quirky uptempo tune with hints of cocktail jazz aswell as being a bit poppy. Nice one indeed and for sure an appetizer for his debut CD. The Hrvastki mix let the drums roll in a bed of echo and space and is quite dubby of sorts and has a creepy undercurrent. Ken (aka Bundy K.) Brown has a much lighter tune. Only keyboard like with a Microstoria touch. (FdW)
Address: http://www.locustmusic.com
OVRO – MALICE IN WONDERLAND (CDR by Some Place Else)
There are not many women who are interested in producing microsound, microwave or lowercase. Ovro is the exception (one of ‘m). She comes from Finland, uses computers and microphones to create small, austere yet nice soundscapes. The microphones are not to capture field recordings, but rather the voice of Ovro. Although Some Place Else cleverly say ‘file under vocal microsound’, it’s not really vocal in a very traditional sense at all. Ovro humms into the microphone and makes samples of this, something short and almost rhythmical, but sometimes longer and more stretched out. It’s hard not to see any similarities between Ovro and AGF, but Ovro has an even more minimal approach, and lyrics only sip through rudimentary, like ‘I wish To Die Inside Of You’ (file under vocal goth microsound?), adding a strange, dark and surreal atmosphere to the proceedings. A captivating work. (FdW)
Address: http://www.someplaceelse.net
TOD DOCKSTADER – EIGHT ELECTRONIC PIECES (CD by Locust Music)
J.D. ROBB – RHYTHMANIA: ELECTRONIC MUSIC FROM RAZOR BLADES TO MOOG (CD by Locust Music)
About a decade ago, the name Tod Dockstader was a small hype. His name was mentioned by people like Arcane Device and two CDs of two older LPs were released (even the old LPs were still available back then, although they were from the sixties) but then his name sort of vanished again. Dockstader (1932) is an American composer who worked in a studio (for cartoon soundtracks aswell as commercials), which he used in his spare time to create his own music. But since he had no formal training as a composer he stopped in the late sixties with producing music, leaving three LPs of electronic music. The oldest one, ‘Eight Electronic Pieces’ was first released in a private edition of 50 copies and later (1961) re-issued by Folkways. This LP is neither a work of pure electro-acoustic music nor a pure electronic record, it combines both (and which some, according to Dockstader, inapptly call ‘tape music’). Dockstader recorded what would now be called ‘field recordings’ (water, wind, a slam on a saucepan) and through wonders of tape-splicing he creates some very rich electro-acoustic (for the lack of a better word) music with this. He speeds up tapes, or slows them down, changes the pitch, reverses them etc. The end-result is a very vibrant piece of musics. I think it’s much more lively and far more interesting than some of those composers who got a degree of some kind. These ‘Eight Electronic Pieces’ can easily meet the best works from the same area and still remain to sound fresh by today’s standards. Essential listening for anyone interested in electronic music – and that accounts for all electronic music.
Another goldie oldie is one J.D. Robb, of whom I never heard of. In 1941, at the age of 49, he left his job of lawyer and started a shop in Albuquerque and later he founded the Rio Grande Electronic Music Laboratory. There he produced in the late sixties and seventies some crazy electronic music which were released on two different LPs by Flokways. This CD is a selection of these two LPs. Very rudimtary sounding pieces of electronica, like in the almost detuned ‘Green Mansions – Abel And Rima’ but also rhythmical in ‘Spatial Serenade’ or ‘Canon No.1 Percussive Sound’ (which predates Unit Moebius by twenty or so years). Robb playes almost childlike tunes and despite the seriousness of some of the titles (‘Tarantella’, ‘Spatial Serenade’ or ‘Canon No.1 Percussive Sound’) one doesn’t have the idea that this is all so seriously intended. I can imagine that this new old name goes down well with those who love people like Kid Baltan or Raymond Scott. Fresh vintage stuff. (FdW)
Address: http://www.locustmusic.com
RESINA – OPINIO OMNIUM (CD by Mousike Lab)
Maybe the name Resina doesn’t ring a bell, but then maybe also the names Retina.it and Marco Messina doesn’t either. Retina.it are an electronic duo from Pompeii and have produced a couple of pieces of vinyl, most notably for Hefty Records and Messina worked for more than ten years with 99 Posse and a band called Nous. The three boys worked together on their album as Resina, safely within the areas of Intelligent Dance Music, but not created with a bunch of laptops, but rather with vintage electronica. This adds a nice dirty feel to the music. The eight tracks on this CD are lenghty (in general) and the rhythms pretty straight forward. This results in a somewhat psychedelic and minimal trip music, despite the knob twiddling going in the pieces. Styllistically they move from ambient textures to downtempo music and minimalist techno (in ‘Aitan’). Maybe the surprises are not present here and I can imagine true DJs would like this on vinyl instead of vinyl. But for the almost fifty minutes this is quite an enjoyable late afternoon working music. (FdW)
Address: http://www.mousikelab.com
SINTESI OUTPUT O1 (CD compilation by Sintesi Archivio)
AVATAR 41 DEGREES (CD compilation by DSP)
Sintesi is an electronic arts festival held in Naples, Italy and this CD documents three concerts from last year’s edition, which was held in a sixteen century church. The recordings are a combination of spatial microphones and a console recording. Afterwards the artists edited the recordings a bit. Only three pieces here, but they all have a considerable length of 17 or more minutes.
Leafcutter John is probably the best known guy here. His piece opens with quite a wild collage of sounds which goes on for some time. After the middle part he comes into more a more dubby territory. Dub is also the word for the work by Retina.it (see also the review of Resina elsewhere): the two boys improvise over a minimal set of rhythms in quite a dubby way.
Terrae is the most unknown one to me, but their piece is quite a nice mix of minimalist techno bleeps and click ‘n cuts rhythms. Probably rougher than when recorded in a studio, which makes it even nicer. Towards the end the train gets off the rails and collapses.
Only in the track by Leafcutter John we hear the natural reverb of the church, which is good. It would have been maybe a too easy trick to emphasize that too much.
Another compilation from Italy is by an organisation called Avatar 41 Degrees, which is ‘a transverse multiexpressive network, formed by artists and professionists linked to music realm, communication and visual arts’. The expression comes via multimedia supports, public events, visual and sound art. This CD is kinda like a showcase of their work, and involves ten different Italian sound artists, mostly unknown ones, at least to me. The emphasizes lies here on the exploration of rhythms, but each seems to be having his own field of interest. There are various glitch workers (such as Martux _M, Mass), ambient lovers (Frame) and techno minimalists (Desincro, Abstract Toolkit, Animae). A pretty varied and entertaining bunch, but nothing really new. (FdW)
Address: http://www.sintesi.na.it
Address: http://www.avatar41.net
ELLENDE – MATHEMATICA (CDR by Tosom)
Slowly the name Ellende becomes more and more known, through a steady stream of releases, all of them, so far, on the CDR format. The Dutch guy in Japan has a strong interest in drone like music, but as opposed to so many others, Ellende is interested in putting on smaller tracks, as opposed to longer ones and also he combines his drones with the addition of strange, otherworldly sounds. Samples of percussive sounds are to be noted here and there, but in some cases it’s just not very clear what these sources are. Added to the embedded sounds of drone like material, the whole thing gets a strange, alienated atmosphere. Like being captured in a space ship that has been on crusade for many lightyears and that is slowly falling part with yourself trapped in it. Quite nice, once again. (FdW)
Address: http://www.tosom.de
SACHIKO M – 1:2 (miniCD by A Bruit Secret)
The name Sachiko M may not be new to you. Her work has been reviewed in these pages before, but mainly her collaborative improvisations with people like Otomo Yoshihide, Toshimaru Nakamura, Taku Sugimoto, Andrea Neumann or with groups such as Iso, Filament and Cosmos. Sachiko M always uses a sampler with no sounds and plays no sampled sound, but rather use sine waves to create her own rich world of sound. On ‘1:2’ she adds three oscillators. In some twenty minutes there is a high peeping sound and just very very occassionally there is a very short scratch like sound, if some knob is being twisted. But for the better part of the work nothing seems to be happening and that is exactely what Sachiko M wants: no memory of what you just heard, a total disappearance of any that can be related to anything we know or think to know. Works like this really draw the listener to himself and is free of any experience. I don’t know how Sachiko M thinks about this, but this seems to be true Zen in music. Music of an utmost minimalism and contemplation. (FdW)
Address: http://www.abruitsecret.com
J. SULLIVAN – ICE SHELF (3″ CDR by Kissy Records)
JOHN HUDAK – OLD MOON (3″ CDR by Kissy Records)
Two new releases in Kissy Records’ lovely 3″CDR series. Jay Sullivan is a guy who loves to break things. His own label is called ‘We Break More Records’, but for his own release ‘Ice Shelf’ he leaves his home and records and goes out to break ice. That’s exactely what you get during the twenty minutes that this release lasts: the sound of breaking ice. A close by microphone recording which is very intimate. Improvisational by nature and intimate upon hearing. A strange and conceptual record that will certainly appeal to the lovers of The Haters and Kapotte Muziek (as a live trio that is).
The other one is Kissy’s first double CDR by John Hudak. He too is more a conceptual artist for on both CDRs he uses the same material: the melting of snow on a contact microphone. Usually with the work of John Hudak, the material is on the borders of audibility, but on the first CD it’s actually a very loud sound for Hudaks standards. Unlike Sullivan, Hudak processes the sounds through various computerized filters and it sounds like a whole bunch of electrified insects. The second CD is a more intimate recording. Quieter, more peaceful and maybe even more drenched in a whole bunch of sound effects. Of the two the one that most Hudak, I’d say. (FdW)
Address: http://www.kissyrecords.com