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PANDATONE – HAPPY TOGETHER (CD by Music Related) *
GREGORY TAYLOR – AMALGAM: ALUMINUM/HYDROGEN (CD by Palace Of Lights) *
K. LEIMER – THE USELESS LESSON (CD by Palace Of Light Records)
BENJAMIN BONDONNEAU & FABRICE CHARLES – DORDOGNE (2CD by Le Chataignier Blue)
KIWAKO KANEDA – CAKE OF SEA (CD by Absurd) *
WEREJU – THROUGH THE DEPTHS OF UNKNOWING (2CD by Electric Requiems)
GROSSE ABFAHRT – ERSTES LUFTSCHIFF ZU KALIFORNIEN (CD by Creative Sources)
MICHEL BANABILA – TRACES (CD by Tapu)
UNTITLED (3CD compilation by Public Guilt/UndeRadar/Epicene Sound Systems)
IDIOSCAPES (CD compilation by Idiosyncratics)
FOARM 5: (AUTONOMY) (Magazine & CD)
GERRITT – PROOF OF POWERS (LP by Misanthrophic Agenda)
JEFF REHNLUND – OUR THIN MERCY OF ERROR (CDR by Hymns) *
TORSTEN WJIIK – HAVE A NOISE DAY (CDR by Ronf Records) *
TORSTEN WJIIK/SWAMPS UP NOSTRILS – ORESUS OG DUS (CDR by Krakilsk) *
ANIMAL MACHINE/SWAMPS UP NOSTRILS/AATMAA – DESTROY ALL ARTIFACTS (CDR by Krakilsk)
POCKA – UHRWERK (CDR by The Hand Work Press) *
PAPER MUSIC (CDR by CT-Collective)
METAL ROUGE – CALLING WINTER (CDR by Seymour Records) *
JIGOKU NOHARA – SEIYAKU NO NAKANI, SHI HA OTOZERERU (CDR by Thee Disciples Ov Penumbra) *
BUCKETT OV SCISSORS (CDR by Grey Produck)
ODAL – TOMATOTERRORISM (CDR by Grey Produck)
ANTOINE CHESSEX – LOST IN DESTRUCTION (CDR by Editions Zero)
CORNUCOPIA – DEATH OF THE SUN (CDR by Sonora) *
CASTRO/MARHAUG – GLORY ON THE SUMMIT (CDR by Sonora)
ASTRO/CORNUCOPIA – DROP OUT BONES/SHOCK THERAPY (CDR by Sonora)
KOFF KIRK – A PRACTICAL GUIDE TO PERSONAL SERENITY (CDR by Organic Pipeline)
CROSSBRED – DEAD IN HER DRUM’S RHYTHM (CDR by Organic Pipeline)
PULSE EMITTER – VIOLENT COSMOS (CDR by Organic Pipeline) *
JARROD FOWLER/DISTRIBUTION AS RHYTHM – KENNETH GOLDSMITH SINGS
(Cdr by JMF)
JARROD FOWLER/DISTRIBUTION AS RHYTHM – BRANDON LABELLE – MUSIC AND ITS DOUBLE (Cdr by JMF)
JARROD FOWLER/DISTRIBUTION AS RHYTHM – JAY DEE DILL PICKS (Cdr by JMF)
JARROD FOWLER/DISTRIBUTION AS RHYTHM – BEATS & DRONES A COMPILATION FEATURING SCUTOPUS & DURLIN LURT + OSCAR P. MCCLURE (Cdr by JMF)
JARROD FOWLER DISTRIBUTION AS RHYTHM SETH KIM-COHEN – OH MY FRIENDS THERE IS NO FRIEND (CDR by JMF)
MACHINEFABRIEK – STOFSTUK (businesscard CDR by Machinefabriek)
SCOTT FOUST – THE HERO RETREATS FROM THE WORLD AND FULFILLMENT (DVD-R by Pineapple Tapes)
ORIGAMI BOE – NOISE DIARY (MP3 by Ambolthue)
TORE HONORE BOE – ENDGAME (MP3 by Ambolthue)
TORE HONORE BOE – VISCUM ALBUM (MP3 by Ambolthue) *
PANDATONE – HAPPY TOGETHER (CD by Music Related)
Behind Pandatone is the man who also runs the label Music Related, but his debut album was three years ago on Neo Ouija and his main interest back then was ‘computer processing of his acoustic guitar’. I must admit I didn’t hear that record, but the guitar is still a present feature on ‘Happy Together’, but it’s expanded with the use of voices, male and female, slow trip like rhythms, samples, field recordings and a synth here and there. Maybe the ‘slow trip rhythms’ may already give a clue what this is about: slow trip hop like music, and especially when there is the voice Julianna Barwick, thoughts go out to Portishead or Antenne. But that’s only half the story. The music part is actually quite interesting. Pandatone loves sound: from real instruments, but also found sound, tape-hiss, contact microphones scratching the surface and the eight tracks may form a unity in approach towards composition, there is enough small, experimental things happening all around which make this a highly enjoyable CD. At times the influence of Tujiko Noriko can be heard – both in music and the use of voice – but in his songs Pandatone is much tighter and more concise than the sometimes somewhat free formed songs of Noriko. Melancholically music for sure, but with a nice sunlight coming in. It’s a very nice CD, subtle, emotional and just great. (FdW)
Address: http://www.musicrelated.net
GREGORY TAYLOR – AMALGAM: ALUMINUM/HYDROGEN (CD by Palace Of Lights)
K. LEIMER – THE USELESS LESSON (CD by Palace Of Light Records)
As a follow-up to Taylor’s previous release ‘Voiceband Jilt’ (see Vital Weekly 526), here is another example of his music which he makes using a piece of software developed by Cycling 74 called Radial. Like before, this new release is recorded live. Before he used the ‘Invalid Object’ series as the source, here it’s all gamelan music, which he spins around. He uses synthesis, looping, sampling and such like to process the gamelan sounds, but the original is deceivingly recognizable. I say deceivingly since it’s not always the ‘real’ thing is listen carefully. It doesn’t have the immediateness of the original gamelan music (of which I am not an expert), but Taylor brings the sounds to another level. A highly ambient level, seemingly not moving very fast at all, and he makes the gamelan sounding as wind-chimes, creating richly textured music that floats by nicely. Since the weather is great, and I am listening this with doors open, in early evening, the music mixes nicely with the bird calls, and if I close my eyes I can even think I am in Indonesia, on a trip that hallucinogenic of all sorts of substances. ‘Amalgam: Alumininum/Hydrogen’ is a great successor to the previous release. Again nothing new under the sun, but it makes more coherent ambient album.
‘Statistical Truth’ was the ‘come-back’ album by K. Leimer (see Vital Weekly 533) after many years of silence – at least to these ears. It was a great album, and luckily not the-album-in-a-decade release I was afraid of, since about 10 months later there is ‘The Useless Lesson’, which deals with two kind of pieces: one set of pieces is composed for a string trio and the other part are the more ‘classic’ pieces of ambient music which we know Leimer best for. One could easily think that these will bite each other, but in his string trio pieces, Leimer plays slow music, loaded with empathy and melancholy and as such there is not too much break with his original electronic ambient music. Here he introduces also rhythm, which I didn’t hear him exploring as before and sometimes he mixes the strings with the electronics. In that sense, Leimer creates a wonderful varied CD, with all sorts of atmospheric mood music from all sides of the coin. ‘Statistical truth’ was a good come-back album, but also the classic Leimir, on ‘The Useless Lesson’ he re-invites his music, creating new possibilities and makes quite a step forward. (FdW)
Address: http://www.palaceoflights.com
BENJAMIN BONDONNEAU & FABRICE CHARLES – DORDOGNE (2CD by Le Chataignier Blue)
Field recordings can be used in various ways, but the most common one is to record sounds inside/outside and put this into a new context by adding other sounds or taking the field recordings into a new direction. Less common used, for no good reason it seems to me, is to go outside and record your music as part of the nature. I believe that is what one Benjamin Bondonneau (clarinet) and one Fabrice Charles (trombone) do on their double CD ‘Dordogne’, named after that lovely country-side in France. Not all of the tracks were recorded outside, but some where, and added is a bit of water, the natural reverb of cave or some street sounds. That makes an interesting thing. The music Bondonneau and Charles play is of a highly improvised nature, sometimes perhaps a bit too regular, but they too play sometimes their instruments as objects, which is quite nice. Together this is an interesting bunch of music, however it must be said that two discs is a bit long. When all the more onkyo pieces that involve field recordings were put together than it would have made up a great single CD, now it also involves some pieces that are just a little bit lesser in quality. (FdW)
Address: http://www.metamkine.com
KIWAKO KANEDA – CAKE OF SEA (CD by Absurd)
Earlier this month a little greek boy named Orion became one year old, and this is celebrated with the release of this CD by Kiwako Kaneda, from Japan. I never heard of her (him?), but it’s music in the best Tujiko Noriko tradition. Frail, intimate, with toy like instruments, and childish vocals. The somewhat lengthy title piece is perhaps the odd ball in this collection for it’s ambient music pur sang, whereas the others hoover in the Noriko areas of music. Of course I should bring this CD to my sometimes day occupation of baby-sitter and test the waters on a two year old and see what his reactions are. I think it’s all a bit too sweet for my taste, but then I may not entirely be the target group for music like this. If Noriko or the acts on Happy are you thing, then this must be too. (FdW)
Address: http://www.void.gr/absurd
WEREJU – THROUGH THE DEPTHS OF UNKNOWING (2CD by Electric Requiems)
Sometimes I may miss a point. Why would you want to press two CDs if all that is on it can fit on one CD? The music itself might be a good reason, but that is not the case here. The seven on disc one and the four on disc two bear no real difference, and with each about twenty-seven minutes, it could have fitted on one CD. Wereju is one Cathal Rodgers from Ireland, and he plays drone/ambient soundscapes (his words). I assume these are played on guitars and a bucket full of sound effects, such as harmonizers, reverb and delay units. I thought it was a fairly o.k. music, but not something that I haven’t heard before, or in fact done better by others. The whole UK scene of Paul Bradley, Jonathan Coleclough or Colin Potter come to mind, and it’s the darker brother of some of the musicians that work inside ambient music (Hypnos label or The Foundry.). Perhaps that’s also a bit puzzling for me: why more of what we already know? And why spread out over two discs? As said, for what it is, it’s some fine dark ambient drone stuff. Nothing more, nothing less. (FdW)
Address: http://www.myspace.com/werejumusic
GROSSE ABFAHRT – ERSTES LUFTSCHIFF ZU KALIFORNIEN (CD by Creative Sources)
The big band improvisation is getting more and more popular. I noticed this before, with Mimeo, Plains and Freq_out, we now also have Grosse Abfahrt. Named after a catastrophe with a zeppelin about a century ago, this is a big band: Serge Baghdassarians (electronics), Boris Baltschun (electronics), Chris Brown (piano, electronics), Tom Djill (trumpet), Matt Ingalls (clarinet), Tim Perkins (electronics), Gino Robair (analogue synthesizer) and John Shiurba (guitar). They all improvise their way through the pieces, and what was noted with Plains, can also be said here: it seems that the bigger the band, the quieter the music is, or perhaps it’s just a matter of low volume mastering. They have four lengthy pieces and one short one here, and it’s quite an affair of subtleness. Feedback like sounds, scratching the surface of guitar and wind instruments, crackles and peeps, this demands a big form of concentration, that is quite rewarding in the end. Parallels can be drawn to the music to that of MEV or AMM, and less to the bands above, mainly due to somewhat more extensive use of acoustic sound sources. It’s a marriage that works well, the meeting of electronic and acoustic sounds, and it makes this not really an easy CD, but certainly a most rewarding one. (FdW)
Address: http://www.creativesourcesrec.com
MICHEL BANABILA – TRACES (CD by Tapu)
What more is there to say about Michel Banabila? He started in the beginning of the 80s, and developped himself into a very profiled musician nowadays. His output is impressive and of a constant high quality. You know what you get from Banabila. But there is a but: it is not that surprising anymore. In 2005 Tapu Records released a double cd of Banabila, called ‘Hilarious Expedition’, bringing together music that he composed for theatre and film productions. Now Tapu Records again releases a album by Banabila with music that he composed for films and documentaries. The album is compiled by Peter van Cooten. Most of the tunes on this one we already now from other releases, but we find them here in different mixes, etc. Notwithstanding, this album is a coherent whole, that is easy to be enjoyed by lovers of Banabila,s work. And it is up to the standards that we are know from Banabila. But again, we dont find any new musical surprises, as there were on ‘Hilarious Expedition’.(DM)
Address: http://www.banabila.com/
UNTITLED (3CD compilation by Public Guilt/UndeRadar/Epicene Sound Systems)
This is not an easy task. Three CDs, making up some three hours of music, with no less than fifty-five names. It’s released by three labels, and I am not sure if each label curated their own CD, or that they all collected pieces which were then put into one whole. Housed in a nice box, this might be to some a most welcome introduction to the world of noise, experimental and drone music – in that order. Although much of the fifty-five stem from the USA, we also come across swiss acts as Strotter Inst and Herpes O Deluxe and Japanese Guilty Connector. On the USA side we recognize names as Thurston Moore, John Wiese, Gerritt, Jason Zeh, ultra//vires, Destructo Swarmbots, Panicsville, The Cherry Point Donna Parker, Burning Star Core and Mike Shiflet. So we can safely say that the majority of the names are new to us. In that respect this is a gold mine for (would-be) labelowners. Get this and pick out your favorites to release on your label. As said noise is the main thing on this release, and there are some loud beasts here. But there is also some more interesting explorations of the genre of noise, with some better listenable and more imaginative results. These are the more interesting pieces on this compilation. After three hours things sort of burned in my head and it was no easy to re-collect which pieces were the nice ones and which were a bit less. But if you wonder about Door, Teeth Collection, Sick III Cell, Heirs Of Rockefeller, Back From Iraq or Perfect Teeth and all those others sound like, this is one hell of treasure box. (FdW)
Address: http://www.publicguilt.com http://www.underadar.com http://www.epicenesound.com
IDIOSCAPES (CD compilation by Idiosyncratics)
The idea behind this compilation is not a very complicated one: let’s ask our favorite artists for a track that is specific/particular/idiosyncratic, a ‘drone paradise’ (Lasse Marhaug). It combines the old folks, people that one can come across on compilations, such as Rapoon, KK Null, Troum or Daniel Menche, people who are also stylistically related to each other with some of the newer lots, the laptop posse such as Keith Fullerton Whitman, Critikal (Kiritchenko, Kotra and Jeff Surak) and Sebastian Roux. It’s not thirteen versions of drone music that goes on here. Thank god, no. Whitman has a piece of mechanical CD player error, and the skipping continues in the piece followed by Critikal. Charlemagne Palestine has his organ drones but layers on top sounds from the zoo and sexual activity – quite boring at that I must say. Marhaug’s Jazkamer however plays also a drone but one of a more louder kind, just like KK Null, who is of course a bit more rhythmic. Steffen basho-Junghans plays acoustic guitar in an almost raga-like mood and perhaps the closest thing to a traditional drone. Other pieces move in the well-known area of ‘dark and atmospheric’ music, such as the organ like piece by Janek Schaefer, Rapoon, Troum, Eve And The Sickness and Idiosyncresia (the latter two are bands ‘behind the label’), which are nice, but perhaps a bit too predictable. Throughout it’s a fine compilation, but nothing special. Good tracks throughout, not surprising and no bad tracks. (FdW)
Address: http://www.idiosyncratics.net
FOARM 5: (AUTONOMY) (Magazine & CD)
Unfortunately Vital Weekly doesn’t review that many magazines, unlike the old days. I am a bit clueless as to why this is, but it is. FOARM is a magazine with CD and issue five was just released. The theme this time is autonomy, and FOARM is not strictly speaking a music magazine in the traditional sense of the word: a bunch of interviews, a survey on some historical artifact and reviews. In stead there are texts by artists on their own work, such as Francisco Lopez, Giancarlo Toniutti, John Duncan and Achim Wollscheid, but also a lengthy interview with Arsenije Jovanovic and a whole special on Jose Maceda from the Philippines and pieces on Berwick Research Institute and the Diapason Gallery, an interesting reading about field recording by Lionel Marchetti, scores and more. A highly varied reading thing that goes beyond the mundane approach of say Vital Weekly. The CD has pieces by Arsenije Jovanovic, based on street riots in Yugoslavia, the ethnic sounding piece by Maceda and solid electronic pieces by Barbara Held and Micheal Schumacher. If you like to read something different than some interviews, but something from the inside out, then FOARM might be the magazine you always wanted. (FdW)
Address: http://www.foarm.artdocuments.org
GERRITT – PROOF OF POWERS (LP by Misanthrophic Agenda)
The full name is Gerritt Wittmer, but as Gerritt he is around for some time now, and has worked with the best from his area: Sunn 0))), John Wiese, Yellow Swans, Bastard Noise and Merzbow, either in direct collaboration, remixing, doing split releases or releases on Wittmer’s own Misanthrophic Agenda label. A busy bee, in which his own music plays the smallest part. On ‘Proof Of Powers’ he however shows his best capacities in producing noise. As always we don’t know what it is that he does, but I must admit I quite enjoy Gerritt’s music. It made me think of a bunch of reel-to-reel machines playing loops at high speed, slowed down voices on the same reels, some sound effects, a cassette being fast forward and such like more lo-fi qualities in producing noise (unlike say: bash a plate metal and feed it on end through two distortion pedals), which is something that brings out various good memories here. The opening piece on the b-side reminded me of The Haters, whereas the following track of Henry Chopin. Gerritt’s noise is not one that is a straightforward blast of feedback, but one that can be described as intelligent, thoughtful and above all, nice. I wish there were more people like this, working with similar techniques and thoughts. (FdW)
Address: http://www.misanthropicagenda.com
JEFF REHNLUND – OUR THIN MERCY OF ERROR (CDR by Hymns)
Not much information is given on the artist Jeff Rehnlund, who just released ‘Our Thin Mercy Of error’ on the Hymns label, who brought us some fine noise before. Rehnlund is only slightly connected ton the world of noise. His music is loud at times, that we can be sure of, but that’s only one side of the coin. He mixes up a whole bunch of field recordings and collated them together with ‘tapes acquired in and between New York and North Carolina, anonymous North Atlantic locations, and places invariably left off the maps: deathbeds, sinking ships, angles of wind, childhood hallucinations, rooftops, media signals, and your bedroom’, which probably is depicting already what this sounds like. Rehnlund doesn’t apply computers or high quality tape decks, but the lowest means possible. Splicing hissy tapes together, taping sounds on microcassettes and re-assembling into quite a vivid sound assemblage/collage. It worked best for me when it stays away from the noise outbursts such as in ‘Schmid’, but when it’s more introspective and personal collage. Almost like a dairy been cut up and put together in way that leaves a lot open for suggestion. Quite nice this one, moving away from the certainties of noise and into something else. (FdW)
Address: http://www.myspace.com/hymnslabel
TORSTEN WJIIK – HAVE A NOISE DAY (CDR by Ronf Records)
TORSTEN WJIIK/SWAMPS UP NOSTRILS – ORESUS OG DUS (CDR by Krakilsk)
ANIMAL MACHINE/SWAMPS UP NOSTRILS/AATMAA – DESTROY ALL ARTIFACTS (CDR by Krakilsk)
All noise by Kjetil Hanssen, the man behind Torsten Wjiik. He’s from Norway (if that is of any help). His ‘Have A Noise Day’ (how funny) contains noise, and the title piece opens the release in a true noise fashion. Mucho distortion. Mucho feedback. ‘One of those’ I think, but I continue into the other tracks and it’s not downright ambient music going on here, as Torsten Wjiik stays firmly in noise, but he does a few things that are actually quite nice. The digital means applied in generating this noise does in these subsequent tracks not always lead the distortion/feedback orgy, but Torsten Wjiik creates pieces which are collage like, with rough cuts and edits in this digital mayhem, which actually proofs a noise musician doesn’t always equal the headbanging dumbo who gets his kicks out of the slow turning of one knob on his distortion pedals. Of course what Torsten Wjiik does is not entirely new, and at times he takes too much time in telling his story, but at least he gave it all a thought. That is something at least.
Four more tracks by Torsten Wjiik can be found on a split CDR with Swamps Up Nostrils. More along the lines of his ‘Have A Noise Day’, except that ‘Hyperactive’ is held together by some forceful beats. Nice but a bit superfluous after the previous release. Swamps Up Nostrils is a name we came across before, and it’s the project of Arnfinn Killingtveit, the owner of Krakilsk and many other musical enterprises. I though Swamps Up Nostrils played some more wicked version of rhythmic – read: techno inspired – industrial music but here the spirit is more towards rhythm ‘n noise. Heavy pieces of broken up music and sound. Still not always top stuff, as much of it is just a bit too crude for my taste. So I feared for the worst of the release with Swamps which is made together with Animal Machine and Aatmaa, both of them are new to me. They all play together here (I assume) and the result is another blast of noise, but the pieces were a bit more tight and concentrated. Much Merzbow at times, some rhythm and just very occasionally a somewhat quieter moment. It’s ok, again, but not great and certainly not genre bending.
Address: http://www.ronfrecords.com
Address: http://www.krakilsk.org
POCKA – UHRWERK (CDR by The Hand Work Press)
The Hand Work Press is being handled by Matt Borgi and is in fact a real hand press machine. It made the nice cover for the release by Pocka, ‘Uhrwerk’. Or perhaps ‘Pocka’ by Uhrwerk. I am not entirely sure but I think Borghi is also responsible for the music. Before I though Borghi was part of the synth scene such as Matthias Grassow, but the previous release, ‘Images’ (Vital Weekly 471) showed a deepened interest in rhythm in his music. Here on ‘Uhrwerk’ he returns to the old ambient styled works of ‘Washout’ (see Vital Weekly 417), but perhaps in an even more minimalist vein. Per track he touches upon a few sounds, a chord or two, and keeps that going for some time. Maybe the ‘Uhrwerk’ (clockwork) stopped, or perhaps it’s a metaphor for standing still and contemplate? The music as such is a perfect tool for such meditations. Nothing much happens here, but that is absolutely not the idea of this music. Relax, empty your mind and float gently down the stream, and enjoy this nice Eno-esque trip. Nothing new, but bright as a star. (FdW)
Address: http://www.thehandworkpress.com
PAPER MUSIC (CDR by CT-Collective)
If I’m not mistaken this is the third release I come across of the Chain Tape Collective, where somebody coins an idea (‘let’s record children’) and then people set themselves to work to record children and do a piece of music. Here one Nick Robinson asked his mates to make music with paper. Paper has different shapes and make different sounds. You tear, cut, fold, rustle them, softly, loud and all of in various degradations. Making music with paper is not new. A long line can be drawn from Keith Rowe, Asmus Tietchens and G.X. Jupitter-Larsen (who once had a whole cassette of dedicated fellow artists tearing up newspapers). The musicians here do much a similar job as those on the G.X. tribute cassette. Tearing up is a favorite means and they all like to use sound effects to alter or emphasize the sounds. Some of these employ sampling to create loops, or (too) much reverb, such as the curator himself. It’s all quite nice, not great but pretty much alright. Included are also David Cooper Orton, Micheal Peters, Paul Jackson, Rinus van Alebeek, Anders Ostberg, Sonoprint, Subscape Annex, Norelpref and AJ Wimbush. However nothing beats the sensation of putting your ear to a piece of paper – any paper – and try to some music yourself. (FdW)
Address: http://www.ct-collective.com
METAL ROUGE – CALLING WINTER (CDR by Seymour Records)
Following their self-titled 3″CDR for CLaudia here is now their first full-length release of this duo of Helga Fassonaki and Andrew Scott, formerly of New Zealand. Whereas on the 3″ their instrumentation was limited to persian santur and guitar, their move to Los Angeles means access to more and different instruments, although none of these are mentioned on the cover. The guitar is surely present. The music is again highly improvised but during various sessions and in a small space. The environment in which they record something is of importance for them, making use of natural reverb. The eight pieces on this release are great example of improvised drone music of a rather low recording quality, but with a high level of emotional playing. Scraping the barrel, using natural reverb, slow moving textures, it’s all there and it makes a great CDR and very much along the lines of the music that only people from New Zealand can produce. Improvised, rock, experiments and lo-fi quality. Very nice work indeed. (FdW)
Address: <slowchimes@gmail.com>
JIGOKU NOHARA – SEIYAKU NO NAKANI, SHI HA OTOZERERU (CDR by Thee Disciples Ov Penumbra)
Probably in love with some Japanese subsculture, one Bert Janssens from Belgium calls himself Jigoku Nohara, who releases his first CDR called ‘Seiyaki No Nakani, Shi Ha Otozureru’ – clueless what that means. His release is nicely packed and is a long affair: fifteen tracks, some sixty-seven minutes of music. That is a bit long. Jigoku Nohara plays a combination of ambient music, this time mixed with a bit of noise and a lot of ritualistic influences. These undercurrents are not well spend on me. The slowed down vocals, quasi ethnic mumblings, perhaps I am just allergic to that. The rhythm bangs a slow, electronic imitation of ethnic percussion and sounds are time stretched around. Some of the tracks are a bit too long, and as a whole things could have been better if Janssens was a bit more selective and kept his tracks a bit more concise. If dark and spooky music is your thing and you regular look at labels such as Cold Spring or Old Europa Cafe, and you are adventurous in exploring new kids on the block, then Jigoku Nohara might be worth exploring too. It has some nice pieces. (FdW)
Address: http://www.myspace.com/jigokunohara
BUCKETT OV SCISSORS (CDR by Grey Produk)
ODAL – TOMATOTERRORISM (CDR by Grey Produck)
Two releases from… well, a label. None given. It might be Grey Produck. They look nice though: LP sized covers, with hand stamps, and each comes with a circular piece of plastic which no doubt you can play on your turntable and will no doubt destroy your stylus. The music (made of these plastic sheets?) comes separate on a CDR. One is by Odal and one by, after some detection of the handcarved name, Buckett Ov Scissors. They sound like a bunch of dust under a stylus to me, fed around through a bunch of delay pedals, thus creating a noise related mass of psychedelic electronics. Perhaps a mass of psychotic electronics. Three tracks are to be found here and three variations in intensity and noise-ness. The second is the loudest, and the third seems to be the best one of the lot.
Odal is perhaps one of the oldest and longest running voices of noise music, since 1985. A true unique example of his own version of noise, which never goes out to the real loud harsh noise, but it’s the ultimate lo-fi noise, with low resolution samples and leaving much room for vocalizations. Odal is poetry in action, and even when we have no idea what it is about, indeed if it’s about something at all, there is something most curious about his music. When hearing ‘Tomatoterrorism’ I thought of his cassette release ‘Potent’ from 1986: in twenty-one years there hasn’t been a single change in approach towards sound, composition and techniques used. Normally I would murmer something about old-fashioned, outdated or the lack of innovation, but knowing Odal for all these years, there is no interest on his side to change anything at all. This is what he does, and this is what he will do for the next twenty years. Don’t expect him to think about for him alien concepts such as ‘composing’ or ‘instruments’. He is excused to do so. The only exception we make. (FdW)
Address: none given
ANTOINE CHESSEX – LOST IN DESTRUCTION (CDR by Editions Zero)
The Editions Zero label always finds me artists which I never heard like Antoine Chessex, who turns out to be a player of the tenor saxophone, some effect pedals and a guitar amplifier. Welcome, once again, to the land of improvised noise. In 1993 I saw Borbetomagus play: two saxophone players and a guitarist, who blew me literally away. Unbelievable loud music. Everything I tried to play some of their music on record or CD I was disappointed since it never captured the same intensity on a record. Maybe something similar happens here. Chessex is a capable producer of improvised noise music, and I never seen him play live, but no doubt it’s unbelievable loud music. Yet these five pieces may not have captured the true intensity of the music. It’s surely great, as were Borbetomagus recordings, but I sure like to check this guy out in a live concert. Perhaps soon somewhere. (FdW)
Address: http://www.void.gr/absurd
CORNUCOPIA – DEATH OF THE SUN (CDR by Sonora)
CASTRO/MARHAUG – GLORY ON THE SUMMIT (CDR by Sonora)
ASTRO/CORNUCOPIA – DROP OUT BONES/SHOCK THERAPY (CDR by Sonora)
The active force from an unlikely corner of the world, Jorge Castro from Puerto Rico, went through his archive of Cornucopia music. Cornucopia is his ongoing collaboration with Claudio Chea, and on ‘Death Of The Sun’ we find a whole bunch of tracks from the period 1999 to 2005. The oldest pieces from 1999 are a blast of noise, which are alright but not top Cornucopia material. The band swiftly developed themselves in what they are now better know for and which they can do much better than downright noise: the total and complete transformation of field recordings into densely layered ambient industrial tapestries that invoke dark atmospheric music. The noise bits may shed a light on how things sounded at the embryonic stages, but it’s the growing up material that is quite strong. Mysterious, alien and desolate sounding. Drone like but due to the bits of more forceful present material, quite original.
Castro, armed with a guitar, met Lasse Marhaug, also armed with a guitar. It’s not from the very first second a full on noise blowing party of howling feedback, but it takes them some time (well, perhaps a lot of them) to get there, but once arrived they are full on. One plays no chords and bangs the strings through a lot of effect boxes and whilst the other holds the string let’s the feedback zip in through the amplifier, thus playing something like a solo. Quite an intense release, but the recording quality could have been better.
How exactly the collaboration between Cornucopia and Astro, also known as Hiroshi Hasegawa, was made is not told. The cover credits two tracks, one by each band, but I believe it was made using each others sound material. Over the years we learned to know Astro as a man who plays highly charged cosmic music. Not in the sense of Schulze, but a psychedelic cosmic pattern that is also related to noise music. Continuous, dirty but also spacey. Cornucopia in return are much ‘softer’ in their approach to making a similar cosmic tapestry, even when they too don’t get close to the origins from the seventies. They too have a spacious sound, but operating on a different level. Two sides of the same coin. Quite nice.
Address: http://www.sonoradisc.com
KOFF KIRK – A PRACTICAL GUIDE TO PERSONAL SERENITY (CDR by Organic Pipeline)
CROSSBRED – DEAD IN HER DRUM’S RHYTHM (CDR by Organic Pipeline)
PULSE EMITTER – VIOLENT COSMOS (CDR by Organic Pipeline)
Two years after my first encounter with Koff Kirk, in the format of a triple 3″ CDR release, there is now a full length release. Koff Kirk is a duo of Chefkirk, a.k.a. Roger Smith of Chefkirk and Insects With Tits and Jan M. Iversen of Koff Koff, Bjerga/Iversen and his own Tib Prod label. ‘Extreme .wav file degradation’ it says on the cover of the four untitled tracks. How exactly this was made we don’t know. It has the noise ‘n rhythm of Chefkirk to quite some extent, and it’s hard to tell what Iversen brings to the game. More noise and more rhythm? Well, perhaps. The first release didn’t please me too much, as something similar can be said of this. Music of a rather masturbatory sense. Nice for those who made it, but too uncontrolled to be fully entertaining.
Of more interest is the release by Crossbred, two female electronic artists from Japan, with a live recording they made in November 2005. They play synthesizers, sampler, feedback, voice and effects. It’s a pretty wild affair that however doesn’t always explode into noise but also has it’s more quieter moments. I think the live recording comes to us un-edited as sometimes things drop in volume and in some instances they search too much for the next point. Merzbow like noise, analogue electronics and low resolution samples, it’s nothing new under the noise sun, but it’s all together quite nice.
More live recordings can be found on the Pulse Emitter release. Behind that moniker is Daryl Groetsch, who as such has released more than thirty CDRs – and even at that he’s been reviewed only a couple of times in Vital Weekly. One recording is made in a club and one for a radio station. Groetsch plays modular synthesizer, it says on the cover, but I am not sure which one and wether or not he uses any sound effects. I believe he does. Pulse Emitter also plays noise, but in a more concentrated vein that say Koff Kirk and without some of the flaws that happen with Crossbred. He knows how to take the sound down, move into another territory, put on dynamics and thus creates an intense but interesting listening experience. Here talent and experience pays off, it seems. Two powerful pieces of fine noise. (FdW)
Address: http://www.organicpipeline.com
JARROD FOWLER/DISTRIBUTION AS RHYTHM – KENNETH GOLDSMITH SINGS
(Cdr by JMF)
JARROD FOWLER/DISTRIBUTION AS RHYTHM – BRANDON LABELLE – MUSIC AND ITS DOUBLE (Cdr by JMF)
JARROD FOWLER/DISTRIBUTION AS RHYTHM – JAY DEE DILL PICKS (Cdr by JMF)
JARROD FOWLER/DISTRIBUTION AS RHYTHM – BEATS & DRONES A COMPILATION FEATURING SCUTOPUS & DURLIN LURT + OSCAR P. MCCLURE (Cdr by JMF)
JARROD FOWLER DISTRIBUTION AS RHYTHM SETH KIM-COHEN – OH MY FRIENDS THERE IS NO FRIEND (CDR by JMF)
I should say to start I think the titles above hint at this review being effaced from the obvious titles to a more subtle signification implicit in the “meta” work that’s going on here. And so the review itself steps into the very dangerous stream of the metaphysic. Lamenting the passing away of Sol LeWitt who famously explored in statements the nature of conceptual art – and his definitions- though his work was more minimal – “Jarrod Fowler is a Conceptual Artist.” This statement opens up the review – its subject – (once removed – perhaps then not obvious). Having said that, he is not working within a particularly well defined sub-genre, but perhaps one of his own creation- so whilst we might refer to the “idea” as dissemination there is more a link to Marxist/Smithian dialecticism than any overt reflections on “continental” philosophy. The releases are as distribution as rhythm, so I’m not talking about these as such, as anything internal or externally signified, interesting as they are, but the ideas of distribution which relates not only specifically, and more and more ironically to the “recording industry” but to our post-fordist consumerist society in general – which aesthetically I have argued is both rejected and critiqued by “noise”. It is here parodied in the Duchampian sense of ‘presenting’ a readymade at base, but extends this into a meta-analysis – as rhythm – of the holistic process in which we find ourselves. The range of questions are both generalised, and also can be radically focused in the current i-(fill in the blank) zeitgeist. If the medium is no longer the message then perhaps it’s the product and its distribution. But the product itself is void – branding has become everything – (“Jarrod Fowler is a Conceptual Artist.”) – the content in this new meta-society of individual receptors has therefore to be on one level completely opaque – witnessed by the impossibility of rendering a playing within ones lifetime of the mp3 catalogue – this is the Tristram Shandy of post-modernity.
DILL PICKS isn’t necessarily part of the Distribution as rhythm series (It
wasn’t explicitly labeled), although it uses this (allegory) as a technique
– additionally, i see this work as also using Appropriation as rhythm. (jliat)
Address: http://www.jarrodfowler.com
MACHINEFABRIEK – STOFSTUK (businesscard CDR by Machinefabriek)
If you release a CDR here and there and wonder why fame hasn’t met you yet, you should start to study to methods of Machinefabriek. Still throwing out CDRs he produces himself, but a little check of his website will learn you he’s by now gaining quite a reputation and forthcoming releases are due on many different labels around the world. Plus he plays his socks off live. Classical example of self-promotion paying off. For the graduation project of Yvette Geelen, he recorded ‘Stofstuk’ (‘dust piece’), using a singing bowl, a contact mic, a vinyl record and a laptop. It’s the refined Machinefabriek sound. Slowly building drones, fading out, a few crackles – dust under the needle – and slowly building up again but taking a different shape. A short but delightful piece, Machinefabriek at his best. And perhaps I am not at liberty to tell, but ‘Stofstuk’ is also the basic material for a forthcoming remix project. No doubt interested parties should start the bidding. (FdW)
Address: http://www.machinefabriek.nu
SCOTT FOUST – THE HERO RETREATS FROM THE WORLD AND FULFILLMENT (DVD-R by Pineapple Tapes)
This is already the second DVD-R release by Scott Foust, main hero of XX Comitee, Idea Fire Company, Swill Radio and solo artist – universal genius. In the first ‘The Four Accomplishments’ he had his solo theatre piece, here it’s a new solo show, the premiere of it at The Gladtree Festival in March 2007. It starts out with bird twitter and Foust reading a text (best line is about why he doesn’t like improvised music: “would want to cross a bridge that was improvised this afternoon?”), which is barely audible, but it has subtitles. Followed by a piece of motion action, or what some other people would refer to as ‘dancing’. The final act is a piece for voice and radio, the instrument that Foust so masterfully controls. Filmed from one camera position with the sound not always being that great, this is however a great film. But alright, I am biased towards Foust (who says about ‘The Hero’: “I wanted ‘The Hero’ to rely less on theatrical devices and more on my outstanding personality and performance skills”), as I think he’s a genius – although I may have said so. He looks great in his red suit. The DVD-R format to document such important events, even when not of the highest standard is well spend on the work of Foust. The hero of our time. (FdW)
Address: http://www.anti-naturals.org/swill
ORIGAMI BOE – NOISE DIARY (MP3 by Ambolthue)
TORE HONORE BOE – ENDGAME (MP3 by Ambolthue)
TORE HONORE BOE – VISCUM ALBUM (MP3 by Ambolthue)
Three MP3 only release by the true Norwegian underground artist: Tore Honore Boe, who has been playing with Lasse Marhaug well before he was launched into fame. These three releases are quite wide apart. ‘Noise Diary’ is two pieces of four minutes of noise music. The title suggests that Boe recorded a piece of noise of four minutes a day, but perhaps not, and was it only an idea that never got beyond this point. Built around loops of noise this is quite a nice work, but not great.
On the other end of the spectrum is ‘Endgame – Blisters In The Sun’, which is a concert recording based on a remix that one Jan Bang did of the ‘Serum’ 10″ (see Vital Weekly 265 and 389) and this may start out quite noise related, including the sound of drills, over the course of the next four pieces things get unmistakably softer and quieter and Boe enters the world of microsound, through very quiet sounds. Quite nice.
Which can also be said of the ‘Viscum Album’, which seems to me a round-up of unreleased pieces. In good Boe style, the tracks have remarks, like ‘opus for summer rain storm + harmonika + elston gunnn’ or ‘opus for multiple sound clips + mieuuws + transportation’, which leaves enough to guess, but also some to be sure about. All of these odd sources are mingled in the computer and served as a nice dish of microsound and drone music. There isn’t much noise here, but a way more interesting mixture of field recordings, real instruments and computer generated processed sounds. Perhaps not always the most innovative musical thing, but Boe performs his stuff with great skill. If your download time is limited I suggest to download the ‘Viscum Album’, since it best captures what he does these days. (FdW)
Address: http://www.ambolthue.com