AGF – BEATNADEL (CD by AGF Producktion) *
SPLASHGIRL – PRESSURE (CD by Hubro) *
AIDAN BAKER – NOISE OF SILENCE (CD by Essence Music) *
YOSHIMI! – SOWIESO (CD by Kikvors)
COUPLING: DEDICATED TO THE MAN AND BASED ON THE WORK OF STAN BRAKHAGE (CD plus book by Silent Media)
BARRIKAD – WE MAKE NIHILISTS SMILE AGAIN (CD by Phage Tapes)
The KALI ENSEMBLE – THE KALI ENSEMBLE (CD by Phage Tapes/Turgid Animal)
ERIC LUNDE – A WORLD OF HURT IN THE KINGDOM OF GOD (CD by Heart & Crossbone)
BALATA – WE ARE ALL TERRORISTS (CDR by Heart & Crossbone) *
DIEGO CHAMY – THE INTELLIGENT DANCER (DVD by Absinth) *
THREE YEARS IN NODAR (book plus 2CDs by Edicoes Nodar)
EDEN CARRASCO & LEONEL KAPLAN & CHRISTOF KURZMANN – UNA CASA/OBSERVATORIO (CDR by Three Chairs Recordings) *
MARTIENSGOHOME & AYMERIE DE TAPOL – MARTIENSGOHOME & AYMERIE DE TAPOL PLAYS LOST FOXES (CDR by FFHHH) *
CUMULATIVE TRAUMA DISORDER (CDR by FFHHH) *
LOOPOOL – ALIVE.LIVING.LIVE (CDR by Ilse) *
BILLY GOMBERG & ANNE GUTHRIE & RICHARD KAMERMAN – BLUE & GOLD, DELICATE SEN (CD by Ilse) *
HALF AN ABORTION – NAKED MATH MACHINERY (CDR by Ilse) *
ALEXANDRE ST-ONGE/PIER-EMMANUEL TREMBLAY (3″ CDR by [Walnut + Locust])
PBK – WARFARE STATE/APPEAL (2 cassettes by Impulsy Stetoskopu)
JEFF REHNLUND – GANGNAM ATTIC (cassette by Oms-b)
AUTO BADAU TAPE SAMPLER CATALOGUE NO.01 (cassette by Auto Badau Kassettenmanufaktur)
POTIER – EINSICHT IN DIE NOTWENDIGKEIT (cassette by Potier)
JASON KAHN – WALCHETURM (cassette by Banned Production)
AGF – BEATNADEL (CD by AGF Producktion)
With the (slow) ticking of the clock, a new CD by AGF arrives, one in ever two years, or a little quicker (see Vital Weekly 700 and 611 and count the months), or perhaps I sometimes miss out some? AGF, you may know, stands for Antye Greie, once half of Laub but already since many years active as a solo act fusing poetry, voice, language and electronic music. Its not easy to see much different between ‘Beatnadel’ and ‘Einzelkampfer’, the release I reviewed in Vital Weekly 700. Still its not easy to hear what this poetry is about, still she uses clicks, cuts, a lost beat, whispering words and sometimes some understandable phrases occur. Like I wrote before I am not always particular fond of music that is used to set poetry to, perhaps preferring a ‘real’ song instead, or just instrumental music, I however must say I like AGF’s work quite a bit. Its a fine balance between instrumental, vocal and poetry and especially in her use of that with microsound, ambient, glitch and clicks ‘n cuts, she carved out a niche for her own with is largely unprecedented. That makes her work quite unique. AGF’s claim that this work is a bit louder and more aggressive is solely hers, its not something I can vouch for, although perhaps the beats at times sound indeed a bit louder.. Its another fine work for sure. (FdW)
Address: http://www.poemproducer.com
SPLASHGIRL – PRESSURE (CD by Hubro)
With a band like Splashgirl you may expect something entirely than what they actually produce. Its a trio from Norway of Andreas Stensland Lowe (piano, synths, electronics), Jo Berger Myhre (double bass, Drone Commander) and Andreas Lonmo Knudsrod (drums, percussion etc.). Their first release, ‘Arbor’ was also the first release for Hubro. Now its time for their second release, which is again largely acoustic, but there are also guests appearing here, playing, adding, guitar, trombone, tuba, tape feedback and field recordings and vocals. Seeing all the previous reviews quoted on the press release, it seems that Splashgirl might be regarded as a jazz band, but I don’t think they are, at least not entirely. But then what exactly it is, I don’t know either. It isn’t post rock (entirely) or improvised, or jazz, but it has a strange attraction around it: melancholic music, with bits of slide guitar here and there, evoking a western, desolated soundtrack style. Mostly introvert, Splashgirl never leaps out, but can rise high with ‘The Other Side’, with its fine soaring trombone and post rock climax. Nicely long tracks with room for each one to develop and spacious playing. Maybe its partly improvised, come to think of it, or maybe its jazzy come to think of it… god, I don’t know really. What I do know is that I very much enjoyed the mood and textures played by this instrumental rock band. Very refined. (FdW)
Address: http://www.hubromusic.com
AIDAN BAKER – NOISE OF SILENCE (CD by Essence Music)
From the ever prolific musician Aidan Baker comes
another release, and again (?) its a re-issue of a limited run CDR, this one from 2007. Its a single piece of music, spanning almost fifty minutes. Its also a narrative piece, since it deals with the voice of Romeo Daillaire, a Canadian general who was head of the UN troops in Rwanda, trying to stop the genocide. Ultimately, when back in Canada, he suffered from post-traumatic stress and attempted suicide in 2000. The word ‘suicide’, whispered, lingers throughout this piece. Baker adds guitar and tape loops and creates a haunting piece of drone music. The album is remastered by James Plotkin, who brings out even more depth (I should think) than the original, which I haven’t heard. Baker around with many layers of guitar sounds, looping them around and generating largely a sort of organ like drone, that works its way up and up until say the thirty minute mark and then slowly goes down and down, all with that whispering set of voices. Towards the end (the last eight minutes), the voice changes from whispering the word ‘suicide’ to something which I couldn’t understand either, ‘evil’ and ‘I became suicidal’ pops up every now and then, but which adds to the drama of the whole piece. Like said, a narrative piece of music of an utter dramatic impact. Frightening, sad and beautiful. One of his best releases I heard! (FdW)
Address: http://essence-music.com/
YOSHIMI! – SOWIESO (CD by Kikvors)
Music by Niek Hilkmann, also known as Yoshimi!, was reviewed before, when I thought he would be the Dutch version of Felix Kubin, but with his new CD ‘Sowieso’ I am less convinced. No doubt Yoshimi! is a gifted musician, playing a multitude of instruments, but I must admit I don’t get this very much. It must be that perhaps this is too much modern pop music for me, but also the fact that all of this is sung in Dutch is something that I don’t particularly like. I never care that much for vocal music, but somehow I never liked stuff sung in Dutch (with the notable exception of the first album by Het Goede Doel, but that’s wholly private information). At times pretty confusing lyrics, but overall perhaps a great CD, but just nothing for Vital Weekly to discuss. This guy can be a big star in The Netherlands and Belgium, and good luck with that. It has nothing to do with me. (FdW)
Address: http://www.kikvorsrotterdam.nl
COUPLING: DEDICATED TO THE MAN AND BASED ON THE WORK OF STAN BRAKHAGE (CD plus book by Silent Media)
Not being a particular lover of experimental film I always like to make an exception for the work of Stan Brakhage. Its perhaps because I first saw his work on the video release of ‘Loud Visual Noises’ and three other films with the music of Architects Office, but later on I saw some of his other movies and liked the poetic nature of his work. In the past there have been other releases of music composed for his mainly silent films, this is a new package of music and images dedicated to Brakhage. An excellent smallish booklet of images, paintings, photos and video stills with the same great poetic quality. For the music side of things – our core business anyway – we have a bunch of people I never heard of, plus some that I knew, such as Electric Bird Noise, Pacific 231 (which I think is one of the few non US participants) and Jon Mueller – Taxidermy Cats On Subwoofers is perhaps the silliest name I heard in a long time. Brakhage made a lot of films without sound and I don’t know all of the titles of his films, so its a bit hard to say wether these pieces here are to be seen as soundtracks to his silent films. Poetic is a word that also applies to this release, not in an ambient sense of the word, but in a more concrete sense. At times there are whispering voices (in Kevin Paul’s or Derek Piotr’s pieces for instance), but also the sounds of concrete objects being explored, like zooming into the surface of an object and exploring them. Sometimes guided by a beautiful drone (Piotr again, but also the very refined ones of Mueller) or field recordings (Pacific 231, Ben Link Collins, or the fire like sounds of Bryce Clayton Eiman). less convincing where a few tracks dealing with improvised music by Caldonian Laughing Bags (also another silly name) or Crowmeat Bob and the noisy outing for Small Life Form. But mind you these are a minority here. Overall: a great compilation. You have to love them. (FdW)
Address: http://www.silentmediaprojects.com
BARRIKAD – WE MAKE NIHILISTS SMILE AGAIN (CD by Phage Tapes)
The KALI ENSEMBLE – THE KALI ENSEMBLE (CD by Phage Tapes/Turgid Animal)
First – Two tracks 33.33 minutes each?! by Page &. Dassum?? Essentially industrial noise, clangs and bangs and massive amounts of reverb. The artificiality of reverb, its electronic deception if at all can only be justified by it being a politico-fetishization, but that doesn’t work for me…I think there is politics – which has to lie- or exists only as un-truth and a more radical one that has little or no reverberation which we come across in the next work… three tracks in which Barrikad collaborates with Kriminaaliset Metsanhaltijat , Fear Konstruktor, both fairly dark ambient industrial and Government Alpha, harsh noise… plus a booklet with five passages by Giorgio Agamben, who – and here I can stop because anyone wondering who and reading this before I can type will have cut and pasted the name into Google and Wiki the result. From that I need an antidote- and one already exists – an anecdotal antidote – I have been listening to the offspring of his bio-politics in the recent lecture series held at MaMa in Zagreb this year – ‘TO HAVE DONE WITH LIFE: Vitalism and Anti-vitalism in Contemporary Philosophy’… whilst ambivalent towards Che and Lenin as I am I guess I didn’t ‘get it’ – they are kind of avatars or tropes these days, but I still really don’t like the post Heideggerean use of IT. That’s the definite article? And I guess in sound it should be said that the first two tracks regain the politics of IT (the THEY etc) whilst Government Alpha reverses this procedure in a way that could be described as learning FROM Heidegger, or learning from Jazz, that philo-accuracy denied – but once removed always bounces back on elastic, just as industrial noise will remain “musical” so will philosophy remain not only “political” but determinist – philosophies pre conceptual decision, scission, cut etc. so along with GA we must attack both the IT and the BIT so Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;
Or close the wall up with our English dead.
(that’s @3.55 on track 3?)
In peace there’s nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility:
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger;
And so by imitation of politics, and here I mean Marx- Che, Lenin, Mao et al. can this kind of very dry politics, a politics without *artificial* theyness (i.e. popularist media(ted)) reverberation be internalized as some metaphorics or dream and so open itself to analysis both biological, biographical and psychological. (Jliat)
Address: http://phagetapes.blogspot.com/
ERIC LUNDE – A WORLD OF HURT IN THE KINGDOM OF GOD (CD by Heart & Crossbone)
BALATA – WE ARE ALL TERRORISTS (CDR by Heart & Crossbone)
As mentioned in Vital Weekly 795, Eric Lunde is back on track, and expanding his wings through releases on other labels, such as this one from Israel. Lunde might be seen as a noise artist, but his ‘noise’ extends to a lot. Music, visual arts, writing. His music isn’t that of the strict harsh noise walls, but certainly loud and present. His method of creating music is not by putting on some machines and distortion boxes, but analogue transformation of sound in a rather unique way, by playing back sounds in a room and re-recording them, a lot of times. Part of this new CD is based on texts for a book ‘Prison Sex’, as well as the notion that ‘religious people have to proof nothing, but the atheist ones have to proof everything’. Lunde’s work is both noise and poetic and so much more interesting than all those HNW type of laziness that spreads like a disease. This new album is quite loud, but diverse in approach – a great work. Compared to the two CDs he released himself recently its more varied and more the classic Lunde approach. Excellent one.
Named after a Palestinian refugee camp is a duo from Israel, of David opp and Aviad Albert, both members of Lietterschpich. A highly political release, discussing the nature of the state of Israel through the use of drums and feedback guitars, along with the screams of voices. More hardcore music that is at times slow, such as is in the opening piece ‘Ring Around The Rosie’, but which can also be fast in ‘You Are My Sunshine’. No doubt I miss out a bit on the political edge of this, perhaps I can’t always follow the lyrics on this, and strictly speaking from a musical side, I must say this is not entirely my cup of tea. Perhaps something that works better in a concert situation anyway? Not bad to get some adrenalin flowing. (FdW)
Address: http://www.hcbrecords.com
DIEGO CHAMY – THE INTELLIGENT DANCER (DVD by Absinth)
There are two ways to approach for a review:
1. anybody out there entirely fond of modern dance, come forward and I’ll send this to you.
2. from all the arts, modern dance is the one I don’t get. Full stop. Never did, never will. You can add Robin Hayward on tuba or Axel Dorner on trumpet and walk half naked through the audience kissing everybody, but what’s the point? I like modern music. Full stop. I like a lot of modern painting, some film, or literature, scuplture, but this modern dance I really really don’t get. Full stop. (FdW)
Address: http://www.absinthrecords.com
THREE YEARS IN NODAR (book plus 2CDs by Edicoes Nodar)
More books. The fourth one in two weeks. This is a hardcover bound, 315 page book on a small village in Portugal, called Nodar. From 2007 to 2009 artists visited this village to create site specific works and this can be seen as the catalogue of that. Not just music, but also visual arts and community projects, all of which are described in this book, both in Portuguese and English. Idyllic I’d say, this rural village in the hills, with streams, green grass and no doubt good food. This will make you jealous. On the two CDs we find results of the various sound artists who worked in this place. The book details their work through words so everything is pretty clear. Lots of wind/water pieces (by say Jason Kahn, Satoshi Morita, Aaron Ximm, Wolfgang Dorninger) but also water tanks (Maksims Shentelevs, almost musical with resonating metal), combinations of field recordings and electronics (Ben Owen, John Grzinich, Rui Costa, Pali Mersault), vegetables (Xesus Valle). The second disc has a more musical approach, with folk like music (Martin Clarke), electro-acoustic music (in ‘Music For Five Instruments And A Gun’ by Arnold Haber or Dennis BathoryKitsz and Melanie Velarde)), vocalizations (Manuela Barila), football match (Duncan Whitley), tea party (Keiko Uenishi), animal sounds (Marta Bernardes & Ignacio Martinez), interview/documentary like (Viv Corringham and Maile Colbert). Whereas the first CD focusses on field recordings, isolated from much human action, the second CD deals with Nodar as a community. It sounds like an idyllic place indeed. They can invite me anytime – I may even do work there! (FdW)
Address: http://www.binauralmedia.org
EDEN CARRASCO & LEONEL KAPLAN & CHRISTOF KURZMANN – UNA CASA/OBSERVATORIO (CDR by Three Chairs Recordings)
Two recordings from two locations, which provided the titles for these pieces, in two countries but with the same three musicians: Eden Carrasco (alto sax), Leonel Kaplan (trumpet) and Christof Kurzmann on lloopp, which the same kind of software that Fennesz uses. A recording from Buenos Aires and one from Santiago. Two pieces, just over forty minutes, of very careful, silent improvisation. Despite the fact that I think I never heard of Carrasco and Kaplan, they seem to fit in nicely with that particular group of careful and silent improvisers, who sometimes use their instruments as objects. The three of them make a nice play together, listening to each other, interacting and opposing each other. Both pieces are very well made, requiring a lot of concentration from the listener to join into this careful world. That said, I must also admit that at the same time I didn’t hear much news under the sun of this kind of music. An exploration of a path that is already quite well known. In itself fine pieces of music, well done, great recording but perhaps a bit too well-known. (FdW)
Address: none given
MARTIENSGOHOME & AYMERIE DE TAPOL – MARTIENSGOHOME & AYMERIE DE TAPOL PLAYS LOST FOXES (CDR by FFHHH)
CUMULATIVE TRAUMA DISORDER (CDR by FFHHH)
From this Belgium label two new releases, all
with musicians from their own country. Martiensgohome is a collective of musicians who work mainly in the field of computer music, and sometimes I like to think of them as Belgium’s answer to Farmers Manual, if you get my drift. They have a whole bunch of releases of which I remember best ‘Abscons Depuis 1996’, a USB stick with ten albums of music (see Vital Weekly 671). Here they team up with one Aymerie De Tapol ‘a farmer in a magnetic field. Monster frequencies and massive click beats’. I didn’t detect much massive click beats on this release, but perhaps that is a good thing? In these four pieces we hear a lot of fine stuff of carefully produced sounds from magnetic waves, small clicks, static hiss and perhaps instrument abuse. Microscopic music, glitch music (you don’t have to call it…), ambient like gestures, drone parts, all in a remarkable great fashion. Quite vibrant as it happens. From what I can see its all improvised on the spot, but things are tied in together in a nice way: no real weak spots anyway. Very refined music.
Refinement is not exactly a word that applies to the music of a duo calling themselves Cumulative Trauma Disorder. They have a bunch synthesizers and a simple drum machine and create music that dwells heavily on rhythm and noise. That can be truly exciting – see some of the great work done by Esplendor Geometrico. In the hands of Cumulative Trauma Disorder however it doesn’t lead to anything of particular interest. All these nine pieces sound like excerpts from improvisations around one theme (hence every track is called ‘Trauma’ I think), repeated nine times. No doubt, and I said this before, its great to spend your time fooling around with musical apparatus, but without a single great idea, why would you want to share this on a CDR, even when its only limited to 50 copies? (FdW)
Address: http://www.ffhhh.be
LOOPOOL – ALIVE.LIVING.LIVE (CDR by Ilse)
BILLY GOMBERG & ANNE GUTHRIE & RICHARD KAMERMAN – BLUE & GOLD, DELICATE SEN (CD by Ilse)
HALF AN ABORTION – NAKED MATH MACHINERY (CDR by Ilse)
From the ever active Loopool, Jean-Paul Garnier a
new release with four pieces, all recorded live. Two of these pieces should be seen as covers ‘Tattooed Man’ from Coil and ‘Somewhere’ from Gitane Demone. Garnier plays a MS-1, vocals, alto recorder, music and tape loops. Two of the four pieces, which were actually recorded at three different concerts, are quite long, especially the thirty-six minute song ‘The Pleasure Of Cleaning Up’ is indeed a song, with a repeating melody looped, and a voice, and its, sorry to say, incredibly boring. The other long piece is ‘Notation Improvisation 3.6’, for a music box and some kind of loop device (I assume), and its actually quite a nice piece of music, be it perhaps a bit long. I can imagine however in a concert situation that this, when dimly lit, it might be a great lulling experience. The covers are more distorted rock like songs, which aren’t really my cup of tea. Four quite different pieces of music, which may or may not proof the many talents he has. It mighty be risky to invite him for a concert, unless you like risks.
The next CD is also a long one, also with four pieces, all of improvised music. Billy Gomberg plays synthesizer, electronics, field recordings (on the first three pieces) and Annie Guthrie plays on the same three tracks French horn. On tracks two, three and four we have Richard Kamerman on percussion, motors, objects and guitarron. In the first piece everything is very silent, but in the next two pieces, when they operate as a trio, the volume picks up and gritty sounds are added, feedback/sine wave like, but with great dynamics with enough space for something altogether a bit more soft. Kamerman’s solo piece is a nice one, with sparse guitar sounds, bits of electronic sounds and rumble of electro-acoustic sounds – the microphone scratching the surface type of sound. Its certainly not easy music, especially the first piece could have been edited down a bit more, or placed towards the end of the disc, but especially the two trio pieces are quite alright. Maybe would have been enough even.
To which we finally land in noise territory, no real surprise with such a band name and such a title. This is a very noise based release, and I can keep this brief. A true racket of feedback, distortion and noise. To which I sigh and think: why? Noise music of this kind seems to me like a lazy exercise. And we know there can be great noise music: it doesn’t have sound like a lame excuse to do another release. (FdW)
Address: http://www.ilsemusic.info
ALEXANDRE ST-ONGE/PIER-EMMANUEL TREMBLAY (3″ CDR by [Walnut + Locust])
Although I am not entirely sure if the 3″ format is the right place for a split release (who goes on first? is there enough time to get your thing heard?). Both have ten minutes at their disposal. St-onge goes on first with a piece of sine wave like sounds, feeding through what seems to be a max patch, but perhaps these can also be analogue synthesizer sounds. There is also, at least so it seems to me, some form or another of voice material in there. In these ten minutes St-onge bounces back and forth between chaotic material and glitchy instrument processing – guitar most likely. Tremblay has two pieces, a short one for piano solo, and a much longer one, also for piano, but perhaps with a bit of delay – although that might be the space in which this is played.
Address: http://www.walnutlocust.com
PBK – WARFARE STATE/APPEAL (2 cassettes by Impulsy Stetoskopu)
Polish label Impulsy Stetoskopu does some good work unearthing obscure musicians through their multi-volume encyclopedia of industrial music and at the same time re-releases long forgotten works. Here we have two early works by Phillip B. Klingler, also known as PBK, which is the name he uses since 1988. ‘Warfare State’ and ‘Appeal’ were releases on his own – not on label as discogs would say – and date from 1988. Over those many years PBK has dabbled in electronic music, going from the good ol’ industrial music, to more structured pieces – composed if you will – and also improvised music. Although never ‘away’, they was a quite a gap of hardly any new work in the late 90s, early 00s. But he’s back and so people seek out his older work and if industrial music is your cup of tea and you like to investigate this particular part of his work, this double cassette is a good place to start. ‘Warfare State’ is a particular harsher affair of distorted electronics and only a desolated trumpet plays a part in ‘Ursonate’ (at least, if I counted the tracks right). Crashing and cascading – typical music of the late 80s. ‘Appeal’ is softer in approach and for me at least the more interesting tape of this package. Of course this too is all electronic, but it has some great dynamics. Here PBK can sink to an almost inaudible level and put on some delicate sounds, before leaping into a tape loop of industrial, mechanized rhythms. ‘Appeal’ is also classic PBK music, and of the two the better one, I think, more appealing to me (pun intended). Excellent retro music, and a nice archival find. (FdW)
Address: http://www.impulsystetoskopu.pl/
JEFF REHNLUND – GANGNAM ATTIC (cassette by Oms-b)
So far the work of Jeff Rehnlund dabbled with field recordings, but usually captured on microcassettes, which adds a somewhat noisy texture to the music, which is very nice. On this new cassette he presents some straight field recordings from Korea, street performers, traditional narrative song, shaman music and Korean Buddhist practice. Korea is not a country I have been too, but I guess it would sound like this. The big difference with the previous releases of Rehnlund is that the sound quality is much better, yet its doesn’t suffer – strange as that may seem. Whereas his previous releases sounded nice because they were pretty raw, this one sounds great since the recording quality is great. Almost like one of those tourist type of releases you buy on cassette when you visit the far east. Perhaps the only downside is that there is absolutely no information on the tape. What I say about the nature of the pieces is what I quote from the letter that came with it. Otherwise this is a great cassette of ethnic field recordings. All to do with the actions of humans. Excellent. (FdW)
Address: http://oms-b.org
VARIOUS AUTO BADAU TAPE SAMPLER CATALOGUE NO.01 (cassette by Auto Badau Kassettenmanufaktur)
Tracks by Dissecting Table: Werewolf Jerusalem: DNZ: AMK: Hollow Bush: Errare Humanum Est: TheTobacconists… By artists such as.. Ichiro Tsuji, Richard Ramirez, Rodger Stella Scott Foust, Frans De Waard… is something of a dilemma- fabricated on a retail TDK tape and with an “impressive” roster of well known “artists” a low fi production harsh noise and electronica – which ends is some agit-prop regarding being rich or the rich…. Works range from the subtle DNZ / AMK through musical – Errare Humanum Est and the chaotic – Tobacconists… I’m led to believe that compilation tapes are collectable, so surly this will be, so if I keep it long enough I could well become rich myself, one problem about what was once alternative is it becomes the norm, you hear Leonard Cohen in supermarkets… not Merzbow yet – maybe never – but capitalism’s appropriation of anything and everything is history, as is the idea that it is continually dieing, only like those
monsters in B movies that seem to take one hell of a killing. Hmm the Devil and Sony do have all the best tunes- but not a decent cassette tape collection – YET! (jliat)
Address: http://autobadau.blogspot.com/
POTIER – EINSICHT IN DIE NOTWENDIGKEIT (cassette by Potier)
Although I get a credit on this cassette its (only) for the mechanical task of producing the artwork from supplied text and pictures, as such I had no creative input, but was interested to hear what accompanied the pictures of bleak modernist housing estates of European Bauhaus utopias that proved to be such a social disaster to the extent that the date of the beginning of post-modernism was that of similar buildings being blown up on 3 PM on March 16, 1972. Michael T–pfer’s tape is well with the aesthetic of a failed mechanical solution – to any problem – here music or sound- as the mechanics are is diss-array, the tape is saturated mechanics of failure and destruction, Heidegger’s critique of the technical and the technology of science as the lack of the depth of the hidden, the all too over exposure of the openness and earthlessness of modernity. Perhaps in lots of things he was wrong, very wrong, but in a vision of the inhumane which technology has given birth to he was sadly on the nail. A cassette which is a sound track to this technology, to urban failure and a cancer of body and soul. (jliat)
Address: http://www.potier-point.blogspot.com/
JASON KAHN – WALCHETURM (cassette by Banned Production)
Cassettes are a great way to get your music out there, and might be the stepping stone for CD or vinyl releases. But nowadays, with the resurrection of the medium also something to try out something that you are working on, an experimental stage or perhaps a work with lesser commercial potential. Jason Kahn’s pieces on this cassette is a mixture of all of it. The artcentre Walcheturm in Zurich is a large space with quite some resonances. Kahn set up a mixing board, contact microphone, radio and a electro magnetic conductor and placed a microphone close to the speaker, one further away in the space and simultaneously doing a line recording. It all comes down to mixes these various stages and do a great cassette. That’s one thing: an experimental set up to try out something. Another aspect is that it seems to me that Kahn is doing something that he normally doesn’t do. It has some elements of the music of Kahn that we know, the static minimal hiss like sounds, but throughout it seems that this work is a bit more louder, more improvised and using more isolated sounds than much of the work we know from him, released on CD/CDR. I am not entirely if the large resonant space is sounding enough here: everything still seems pretty close up-front, save perhaps for some far away textures, but that might be due to the those textures just low in the mix. Quite an interesting release, I’d say, and certainly a direction for Kahn to explore further, both the technique to record such music, as well as the more improvised playing of such soundmaterial. A well-done experiment. (FdW)
Address: http://www.bannedproduction.com