AUBE – METAL DE METAL (CD by Manifold)
It probably comes as no surprise that the only source material Aube used is metal. In the first piece this is not at all clear. The sound is like a waving synth/sample piece that floats quite nicely. Then metallic sounds are to be heard in the second piece together with more softly treated samples of the sources. Deep end bass sound start to rumble as the piece evolves and makes a crescendo into feedback. The third piece is again built around samples, but they stay, volume wise at the same level. ‘Calx’ on the other hand is a short looped thing with bell-like sounds coming in and builds up again. With it’s rhythmical character, this piece has dance-music potential. The sample used in the 6th track actually sounds more like a guitar (Tortoise…?), but hey strings are metal too. The CD is great as it emphazises the sounds very much, and much care seems to be taken over the compositions itself. With this CD Aube is in ambient territory again, and I must say that I think that this is Aube at his best. His noise works fade in comparison to this. Needless to say that the CD is housed in a metal jacket, thus finishing off a great CD! (FdW)
Address: <vince@ubd1.vdospk.com>
WILLEM DE RIDDER & CRAWL UNIT – VOICE & SOUND (7″ by Povertech)
The voice of Willem de Ridder could be familiar to you. He once released two stories on CD with a musical intermission by The Hafler Trio. The famous storyteller and radio artist has an awful (but very well cultivated) accent when speaking English ( De Ridder is Dutch). He lets the words come out of his mind and Crawl Unit adds the sound in the background and borrow musical ideas from The Hafler Trio: stretched drones with repetitive sounds over them. Not bad, but I can handle 3 listenings of this at the most. (FdW)
DEEPNET (Double CD compilation by Side Effects)
LEGION – LEVIATHAN (CD by Side Effects)
Now that Brian Lustmord is the personal assistent of Graeme Revell, formerly known as Mr. SPK – now well-known supplier of Hollywood film soundtracks, the label Side Effects is in full effect again. It used to be the outlet of SPK and Lustmord mainly, but now they have many old and new artists on the roster. If you are familiar with Lustmord’s sound, then you might be not surprised to find out that Brian’s label interests go in similar directions: utterly dark ambience, the reverb unit full open on virtually all sounds. This dark ambient stuff is different from the Isolationist stuff, as most of this stems from synthesizers and samplers – no guitars or anything like that. Nevertheless, Deepnet is an interesting compilation, as it features only 12 tracks spread over two CD’s. Meaning that most tracks last for 15 minutes or more – this will give you an adequate description of what to expect. Much to my surprise I liked the two Monte Cazazza tracks featured here. His previous sound works didn’t appeal to me very much – too much cliche and not many musical ideas, but here the fine rhythmical outbursts were more than fine. Very curious to hear his forthcoming CD’s for Side Effects. Other highlights for me are the TAGC track on disc 2, CTI and Atom Heart. Deepnet is a good showcase of an important label
Legion’s Leviathan is Lagowski’s third CD as Legion. The first one, ‘False Dawn’ is still among my favourite CD’s. Music that plays itself so it seems, long stretched dark synthesized tones. The second CD was alright, but not much of a surprise I thought. Leviathan is a continuation of the typical Legion sound: again long stretched, dark industrial sound, but it somehow didn’t work for me at all. Indexed as one long track, but according to the cover there should be 6 on there. Somewhere at 53 minutes Mr. Legion starts to play a sort of gothic-thing which was not to my liking.
Address: <soleilmoon@aol.com>
TOM RECCHION – CHAOTICA (CD by Birdman)
Tom’s name might not be very known, but he was one of founders of the LAFMS (whose 10 CD box I still haven’t got through completely) and worked with a lot of experimental musicians on the US west coast. As far as I know this is his first CD under his own name. Packed with a Moebius loop (hey we’ve seen that before…) on the cover, this CD is all about tapeloops. These loops were cut randomly and collaged over each other. If that sounds like a noisy affair to you, then you are wrong. The 21 tunes on this CD are relatively short and all seem to be generate from ‘easy tune’ music, from the likes of Martin Denny and Esquivel. There is however a more experimental edge to the music, than most of the other easy tuners around, but it will defintely go down with those people. The most striking thing is this: this album was recorded in 1985-86, long before any hype of the lovers of bad taste. Some people are always ahead of their time, and we… we will always find out too late. (FdW)
Address: Birdman – 1409 W. Margolia – Burbank, CA 91506 – USA
VANCE ORCHESTRA – MELLOW MOODS/IMMORTAL MOMENTS (CD by Noise Musuem)
Eight tracks recorded live-in-studio form the debut of this Dutch group (from Arnhem). I really don’t know anything about these boys (girls?), so let’s stick to what is offered on the silver disc. It seems to me that sampling is their most beloved trick to make music. They loop all sounds they can get and create a nice flowing atmopshere. At times I was reminded of the legendary zoviet*france, but the Vance Orchestra also delves into the area of ‘easy tune’, by making loops from records locked into a single groove or scratched. This is not a spectucular CD, but it is entertaining throughout.
Part of this edition comes between two painted terra-cotta plates – so get those if you care about something special and they probably won’t be around for very long.
Address: Noise Musuem – 19 Rue Colson – 21000 Dijon – France
A SMALL GOOD THING – COOL COOL WATER (CD by Soleilmoon)
The first CD ‘Slim Westerns’ by A Small Good Thing sounded too much like David Sylvian and Ry Cooder trapped inside a reverb unit for the weekend to my ears. Their second CD, which sadly clocks in at a diminutive 34 minutes fills more of the available space with sounds and less with their decay. The first track could be considered a remix of the track ‘Someplace South Of Here’ offa ‘Slim Westerns’; clever arrangements with drum loops scattered like prairie dust. Track 2 starts with the unmistakable sound of a Zippo lighter opening (amazing how evocative such a simple soundbite can be!) and features a great monologue by a certain ‘Bert (Butt ?) Nekkid’ (Could this be the same ‘Reverend’ Butt Nekkid who sang the wonderful song ‘Wire In My Head’ some years back as an hommage to Bob Dobbs?)
Track 3 has more voice – this time Brother Randall strutrantz his religimous stuff over an exceptionally groovy piece of music making it clear, close to the end of the piece, to ‘you people in Ingland’, that they’d be speaking German now if A-Merry-Cow hadn’t joined in and saved their skins sometime in ’41. ‘Temperance’ is the longest and most buoyant track which includes (what sounds like) a cleverly placed yedaki whipbark and some beautifully interwoven guitar lines, analogue waves and synthtinkles. Track 5 sounds like the end of something (and it almost is for Track 6 is only 49 seconds long – if epitaphs could be written with a steel guitar, this brief statement comes close.)
Real instruments played by domesticated critters with some ability and a dose of humour besides. Production by Andy Hulme Of OY! Conjugate. A refreshing, gentle and all too brief moment of musical joy. (MP)
RICHARD H KIRK – AGENTS WITH FALSE MEMORIES (CD on Ash International)
‘Agents With False Memories’ (sounds like a phrase Marshall McLuhan might have coined) is an engaging and threatening hallucinogenic trip through broadcasting media. It’s a bit like Dicky, armed with (sometimes grossly overloaded) delay, an artillery of analogue sounds, breakbeats, some fat Kirkian drum programmes and some (possibly) prepared tapes of radio/tv quotes went into his studio and jammed for a while finally arriving at 55 minutes of suitable material. Mongers of arms rub shoulders with the operatics of soap in an exercise in recontextualisation which makes even Blue Peter sound like part of an international conspiracy. Voices of angels, both dark and light, dispense (mis)information… their forked tongues flicker in and out of shiny, moonlit pools of tv-induced alpha-awareness.
Richard’s preoccupation with digital media and surveillance crops up repeatedly and there is much to discover in this multi-layered exploration of our media environment. Probably extremely disturbing if you’ve had several mikes too many of lie-surge icky-acid… and I would recommend checking out Stefan Tischler’s CD ‘Excess Of Free Speech’ released on Extreme some years back…beatless but full of similar information.
Best LOUD ! (MP)