CHUBBY WOLF – SEASICK (CD by Mystery Sea) *
KATSUYOSHI KOU & SATOSHI HIRONAKA – STATE, STATE, STATE (CD by Ftarri) *
KATSURA YAMAUCHI & TOSHIMARU NAKAMURA – YOKUTOJIN (CD by Ftarri) *
SEIJIRO MURAYAMA & KAZUSHIGA KINOSHITA – 59:01.68 (CD by Ftarri) *
KLAUS FILIP & TOSHIMARU NAKAMURA & ANDREA NEMANN & IVAN PALACKY – MESSIER OBJECTS (CD by Meenna) *
THE ENCHANTED WOOD – MONSTER PARADE (CD by Doryphore)
BJ NILSEN & STILLUPPSTEYPA – GOOA NOTT (LP by Editions Mego)
TAPES & DIGGORY KENRICK – PIPE CLEANER (7″ by Meeuw Muzak)
THE AVONS – HARDSCRABBLE (7″, private)
ANDREA BORGHI – MUSICA PER NASTRO (TAPE MUSIC) (CDR by Spectropol) *
MRKVA/BOLKA (CDR by Lom)
AUTOMATING – SOMNABULIST (CDR by Second Language Records) *
MECHA/ORGA – 53:30 (CDR by Very Quiet Records) *
FREDERIC NOGRAY – SUNSET SOUNDRISE (CDR by Very Quiet Records) *
FRANCISCO MEIRINO – FREEZING THE MIC (CDR by Very Quiet Records) *
TWENTY THREE SECONDS OV TIME VOLUME 4 (CD by AIN23)
NOTEHERDER & MCCLOUD – THE BOTTLE LOOSE IN THE DRAWER (CDR by The Slightly Off Kilter Label) *
GOLD DUST (CDR compilation by The Slightly Off Kilter Label)
PAUL KHIMSIA MORGAN – EAVES DROP (3″CDR by Aural Detritus) *
FILE UNDER TONER – RESISTANCE EMOTIONAL MIXES VOL. 1 (CDR by Hazard Records) *
JAVIER PINANGO – I.R. REAL METAL MUSIC (CDR by Hazard Records) *
HYDRA – HIEROGRAPHICAL (CDR by Hazard Records) *
SMALL THINGS ON SUNDAYS – DRILL (cassette by A Beard Of Snails Records)
CHUBBY WOLF – SEASICK (CD by Mystery Sea)
This year the mothership Mystery Sea was very quiet – zero releases – but the sister division Unfathomless did well. So well, that the mothership now returns on CD, and no longer on CDR. Chubby Wolf was the name used for solo projects by Danielle Baquet-Long, one half of Celer, who passed away in 2010. The only other solo release I heard from her was ‘Meandering Pupa’ (see Vital Weekly 678), which come as a set of four business card CDRs, and which I thought was not much different than her with Celer. Here she uses field recordings, by which most likely (judging on what I heard) it is meant to be recordings of the sea, plucked cello/violin, morse code and electronics, with some ‘additional aural debris by Mathhiue Ruhlmann’, who also did the mastering. As before here too we have something that is not much different from her work with Will Long in Celer: long stretched out patterns of interwoven sound, with perhaps the clarity of the water sounds here being more present than in the work of Celer – the small amount I actually heard from them. This is one of those things were one wonders if we should look at this in terms of hearing something new or wether this is just great atmospheric music with nothing new under the sun. I think it’s save to say the first the latter. I didn’t hear anything here that I haven’t heard before, even some better at that, and Chubby Wolf is nothing new under the sun. Now, should I care about that? No, actually I don’t care. It’s winter time, it’s dark, inside it’s cosy and warm, a stack of unread books is never far away, and this is great music: what more can you wish for? Perhaps that’s the whole point of music anyway? (FdW)
Address: http://www.mysterysea.net
KATSUYOSHI KOU & SATOSHI HIRONAKA – STATE, STATE, STATE (CD by Ftarri)
KATSURA YAMAUCHI & TOSHIMARU NAKAMURA – YOKUTOJIN (CD by Ftarri)
SEIJIRO MURAYAMA & KAZUSHIGA KINOSHITA – 59:01.68 (CD by Ftarri)
KLAUS FILIP & TOSHIMARU NAKAMURA & ANDREA NEMANN & IVAN PALACKY – MESSIER OBJECTS (CD by Meenna)
Four releases of improvised music from Japan, three of Ftarri, featuring solely Japanese artists and one on a sub-division of Ftarri with international artists. I started out with the release by two musicians I never heard of, Katsuyoshi Kou (guitar) and Satoshi Hironaka (drums), who work together in a more of a conceptual fashion. In the first piece both instruments were recorded separately, then two solo’s (of quite an unequal length, Kou plays for twenty-seven minutes and Hironaka for only four, and then a straight forward improvisation. In the first piece there is something about split seconds of silence during the recording. Here in this first piece the guitar cables don’t seem to have made the right connection, and very occasionally it does. The drums here sound will be wild also but at the same time perhaps a bit normal. This first piece goes almost blindly over into the solo by Kou, with the small exception there is a bit more guitar to be detected here. Nice piece, but being the longest, perhaps a bit too long. The solo drum piece is also something of wild nature, like a repeated drum break and still with some extra arms available to bow some cymbals. That is the sort of playing that is also used in their straight forward improvisation, with the guitar singing in feedback and cracking about. Itunes’ database lists this as punk, which it is not, but this sort of playing is perhaps punk to the more traditional standards of improvised music.
From the second release I expected, perhaps for no good reason, something soft and intense, but it’s the contrary: it’s loud and intense. Katsura Yamauchi plays alto saxophone and Toshimaru Nakamura plays no input mixing board. The whole thing lasts about thirty minutes and captures with a bunch of microphones – one at least – this adds to the raw music also a certain raw quality, which works pretty well. This is not the sort of noise that is noisy throughout, like in the harsh noise wall sense of the word, as the volume may drop a bit, but especially since this is captured in space, rather than through a line, soft is never really soft, which is nice. The high pitched sounds from the no input mixer is piercing and nasty, while Yamauchi plays his saxophone with furious intend and doesn’t always sound like one. Not for the faint of hearth this release, but actually that should make some conservative harsh noise wall lovers turn their head and learn there is great noise and their noise. Excellent stuff all around.
Of a more conceptual nature is the release with a composition by Murayama, investigating again the notion of silence. According to him there are three types of silence, “the John Cage version, the experience of ‘sudden death’ in the earthquake-tsunami-Fukushima catastrophe and in the end, that of today’s “our silence”. I think these are the 3 types of silence we could live actually in improvisation”. In these five compositions, or perhaps five different versions of the same piece, Murayama plays percussion, Kazushige Kinoshita plays violin and there is a role for Makoto Oshiro who recorded this and put the level to zero, and in one case put the microphones aside. Each of the musicians could choose to silence their playing and sometimes it happens at the same time. It’s been a while since we last heard so much silence on a Japanese CD, compared to a decade ago when this was all top notch for some players on that scene. But silence here is also not really silent. It seems to be dealing, though not always, with field recordings, as if these musicians were recorded outside somewhere, but then at other times there is indeed ‘real’ silence. Quite a demanding release I’d say, especially because there are times you don’t hear anything at all. Perhaps old hat by now, but it’s done here in quite an alright version.
The final release has Nakamura again, but also Klaus Filip on ‘ppooll’ (reverse that), Andrea Neumann on inside piano and mixing board and Ivan Pakacky on ‘amplified Dopleta 180 knitting machine and photovoltaic panels’. The longest piece here was recorded live last year in Prague and a day later this party was already in Vienna to recorded a studio session with Christof Amann. Like the other release with Nakamura this one is pretty loud at times too, but here the loudness doesn’t really agree with me. I skipped a bit around the fifteen minute mark. The whole thing is rather heavy on the lower range of the frequencies, which is perhaps a thing we don’t have a lot with the improvised music scene. I am not sure what to make of this however. From these four this is the one that I least favored, and I am not sure why. Maybe it’s the radical nature of the music, but maybe it’s just not my cup of tea for today? Maybe it’s the fact that sometimes these sounds have a more or less random character and don’t always seem to fit together? I guess it must be one to those things that is at play here. It’s probably me, and not the CD. That seems to me the most logical conclusion. (FdW)
Address: http://www.ftarri.com
THE ENCHANTED WOOD – MONSTER PARADE (CD by Doryphore)
A Nick Cave clone? Leonard Cohen on parade? No idea, but what I do know is that the French band The Enchanted Wood has compiled a wonderful album with nine intriguing numbers. Michel Le Fauo is the leading man behind this musical project and he is responsible for many of the played instruments. He is supported by guest musicians and vocal choirs. The atmosphere on the album Monster Parade is nostalgic to mention. The use of piano, organ and melodies concerns with roots in folk, gospel in an experimental manner are key ingredients to this mood. The songs have a poetic and melancholic message. The texts trades for example of a child who has an invisible friend and at one point disappears. How or why the child disappears is a big question, but the narrative tone gives a horrible suspicion. The booklet is beautifully designed with playful and authentic way of typography and drawings of Perinne Labat. At last, Monster Parade is a wonderful composition of sound and image which has been carefully compiled. (JKH)
Address: http://theenchantedwood.org
BJ NILSEN & STILLUPPSTEYPA – GOOA NOTT (LP by Editions Mego)
Having missed out on the two previous releases by BJ Nilsen & Stilluppsteypa (no doubt because it was too expensive to mail a LP over), I got this one handed over by one of the two members of Stilluppsteypa and its good to see this to be an ongoing collaborative concern since 2005, and with a small catalogue of great records. This is not a project that is about doing something wild, new and exciting all the time. Maybe you could even say that, give or take, all of their records are similar affairs. You could also see it as a conceptual, minimalist artwork, which is what I prefer in this case. All of their music is drone based, synth based and field recordings based. All three of these elements are always heavily treated, making the original sounds not sound like anything it may have, and melting all three of these into a densely layered pattern of sound. Closely knitted patterns, like a Nordic sweater with lots of lines and lots of colors, even when the colors of this music is probably all shades of black and grey. They build and build their pieces in a rather minimal vein, adding, stapling and layering their sound upon sound and yes, that’s perhaps something we already heard on say ‘Drykkjusivur Ohljodanna’ (see Vital Weekly 548): isolationist music – even when nobody uses that term anymore these days. I said of that previous record that it was ‘not holding something that is entirely new to the world of electronic music, but rather carries on a tradition, which sometimes is fair enough’, but now I’d like to think that they create their own long term tradition with these side long drone pieces. The side which uses field recordings supplied by Anla Courtis is the side which has the most abrupt changes – and that might be the most significant new direction for this ‘group’. (FdW)
Address: http://editionsmego.com/
TAPES & DIGGORY KENRICK – PIPE CLEANER (7″ by Meeuw Muzak)
Last time Meeuw Muzak released Tapes I seemed to have been all wrong. It seemed that Tapes and Pampidoo are all famous and that 7″ sold without problem, twice the complete edition. Mister Meeuw mentioned the name of this musical style but I must say I forgot. Here Tapes has a new 7″, and on one side he created a rhythm and asked one Diggory Kenrick to play flute all along and then Tapes assembled the thing. The other side is an instrumental rhythm piece by Tapes. Really weird sort of digital dub music, but in nothing to be compared to the stuff Incoming! presented as such fifteen years ago. Stripped down, this is more close to the origins of dub music, as far as my limited knowledge of that may go. Kenrick plays some nice laid back flute tunes on top of these stripped down rhythm and the b-side is almost like a fine instrumental/beat version of it, except it’s not. This is great music. The picture of the artist behind a stack on cassettes made the whole thing perhaps more mysterious. What the hell is going on here? Tapes??? (FdW)
Address: http://www.meeuw.net
THE AVONS – HARDSCRABBLE (7″, private)
It was a wise thing to mail some information in advance of this, as the record cover has besides band name and title absolutely no information. It’s a “grayish blue mixed colorblob vinyl 7″, hand stamped side notification markings, and golden Avons symbol of authenticity on record, one-sided color insert”, and no indication of the the RPM. An edition of 50 copies, apparently. They are from central Illinois. I hear drums, saxophone, bass, guitar, voices and lots of crackling of the vinyl, indicating this has not been coming from the best pressing plant. The drums and bass play in a vaguely jazz oriented manner here, whereas the voices mumble and the guitar operates in a more free role. The saxophone tops it off with more smokey jazz club vibes. God, I wished I smoked my pipe again. I could snap my fingers along with this, in that smokey club. Is this 2012, come 2013, or is it new year’s eve 1961? I lost count. I thought this is perhaps out of place in Vital Weekly, or perhaps more in place with our usual jazz man Dolf, but somehow, somewhere, sometime I think this was a pretty neat release anyway. Odd and exactly because of that a great one. Shimmering and vague by all means. (FdW)
Address: http://www.intangiblecat.com/releases/hardscrabble.html
ANDREA BORGHI – MUSICA PER NASTRO (TAPE MUSIC) (CDR by Spectropol)
At one point I looked up and said to myself: what is it that I put on? That is, of course, never a good sign, but doesn’t necessarily mean to say anything about the music. Perhaps I am not paying enough attention myself. So, let’s start again. I read on the label’s website: “Originally intended to be released on cassette, the work is also a tribute to composition methods used in electronic tape music of the 1960s. Every track is processed in real-time by a patch built in the Max application and is based on cut-up, sovraposition, sound stretching, loop, echo and feedback.” That’s perhaps something I indeed already heard in this music. well, perhaps not so much the real-time aspect of this, but most definitely the computer music aspect of it. He uses them in a pretty regular fashion, but all along he also keeps an eye open to make it sounds like a sixties electronic record from a private home studio. As such that works pretty well here. It’s quite raw as such, with mild distortion in places, which is good, as it makes it all the more genuine, and Borghi keeps his pieces short and to the point which is nice too. In each of them he explores a few sounds and expands on these as if they were themes. The briefness of the music works quite well here. Nothing we haven’t heard before, but executed in a nice way. (FdW)
Address: http://spectropol.com/
MRKVA/BOLKA (CDR by Lom)
Without wanting to sound patronizing (or perhaps I would), this is not the way to release your music. A slim jewel case, no printed matter, just a CDR with the names of the two artists and the name of the label. No label, no website, no context. What’s the point in all of this? Are these musicians only selling at their concerts, so everyone knows what it’s about. Why not create something nicer and more informative? Because, as they write in the letter that comes with this, there is something to tell about these artists. Both Mrkva, being one Jonas Gruska and Matus Kobolka (Bolka) are from Slovakia and both studied sonology in The Hague. When this CD opens up in Itunes, one notes that four pieces are by Mrkva and three by Bolka, each about fifteen minutes in total. Both of them use computers extensively, I should think. The differences between the two are in the details I think. Whereas Mrkva displays a sense of warmth in his four pieces, most defined in ‘Anders’ with its drones, and insect like sounds in his other pieces, Bolka operates from a more noise end in cracking and crackling his sound world. More louder, more angular in his approach. Hard to say, in either case actually, what the input might have been, sound sources unknown me thinks. Its actually quite nice stuff, and it wouldn’t have been a bad idea to give each of these artists some additional five or ten minutes and get an even more complete picture of what it is they are doing. A fine introduction – sound wise that is, not information wise, let alone design wise. (FdW)
Address: http://zvukolom.org
AUTOMATING – SOMNABULIST (CDR by Second Language Records)
More music by one Sasha from Melbourne. The digital version of this is released by the netlabel Wood And Wire, while Sasha has a few copies of this on CDR with a handmade package on his own Second Language Records. “Originally conceived as a demonstrative show reel for various psychoacoustic techniques as a form of data delivery and an approach to a philosophical understanding of the world”. About sleep states, hypnagogia, why we need to sleep and source material from field recordings, found sound, tape manipulation, noise and effects units. While it has been cut into eighteen tracks, with as many titles, it sounds like all of this music belongs together with all of these flowing straight into each other. While its not the same in some ways I am reminded of the older Hafler Trio most of the times, with some ambient textures, collaged voices and processed field recordings but all in a more rougher state. Like things recorded on dictaphones before being processed into shady loops and slowed down voices. Maybe alike ‘A Thirsty Fish’. Maybe it’s because the Hafler Trio came up in conversation a few times last week. From the three releases I heard by them so far, I thought this was by far their best release. An excellent example of raw musique concrete, philosophical thought and fine execution through minimal means. (FdW)
Address: http://secondlanguagerecords.bandcamp.com
MECHA/ORGA – 53:30 (CDR by Very Quiet Records)
FREDERIC NOGRAY – SUNSET SOUNDRISE (CDR by Very Quiet Records)
FRANCISCO MEIRINO – FREEZING THE MIC (CDR by Very Quiet Records)
A new label for me which goes by the name of Very Quiet Records. It ‘is a small independent label based in Devon, UK. The idea is simple. We release recordings of quiet places or situations from sound artists and field recordists from around the world’. And right on the first release it sounds exactly like that. Yiorgis Sakellariou, also known as Mecha/orga opened his window between midnight and 9am in Kifisia, Athens, Greece in November 2012, and recorded what was going on. Bird sounds, some church bells and lots and lots of silence. I made a phone call when I was playing this the other night, and after a while I thought: that’s odd, I hear birds, yet it’s cold, night, winter. Oh yes, it’s that near silent CDR by Mecha/orga. This is perhaps the nearest we can come to ambient music: the only real thing is listening for yourself. But it’s my belief that a pure piece of sound recorded in any environment is music, simply because the composer says so. Mecha/orga proofs this in this particular uncomposed release.
There is more happening on the release by Frederic Nogray, who recorded his work at the Centro de Investigacion y Jardin Botanico Lancetilla (in Hondarus) during the sunset from 4.30 pm to 6.30 pm on 25 August 2012, and with a bit of edits we have hear a near eighty minute release. We hear the animals of the night going away and the animals of the day wake up. Maybe it could have been edited a bit more but essentially this is a composition in itself. From the simple crackles and chirping like insects at the beginning more and more sounds are added – out of nowhere? not really of course – and the high pitched singing of insects make a loud buzzing and ringing choir at the end. Not so quiet in the end, but quite a narrative I thought.
Francisco Meirino has the most conceptual recording here, at least judging by the title and the text on the cover. I assuming that the four pieces mentioned on the cover, ‘after 20 minutes (water)’, ‘after 60 minutes’, ‘after 120 minutes’ and ‘after 180 minutes (ice)’ reflect the various stages of freezing a mic, as the title promises us. Here we are dealing with four very quiet pieces of sound, but more of a static nature, with hardly any movement at all, or distraction from outside, as we find that on the Mecha/orga release. Minimalist and conceptual, but also a fascinating release; one that calls for more questions than it gives answers, I think, and all along you can play this fine release.
Perhaps three of these highly quiet releases is a bit much one after another (for reviewing purposes I guess) but it made me think I have a some quiet recordings shelved somewhere. Must dig out, makes note. (FdW)
Address: http://veryquietrecords.blogspot.co.uk
TWENTY THREE SECONDS OV TIME VOLUME 4 (CD by AIN23)
23 Seconds ov Time is a project of the AIN 23 Network. The idea behind the project is that musicians submit a track of 23 seconds. Of all these contributions will be compiled a net release. Since many musicians in the experimental area is the fourth compilation sit oddly seamlessly with 79 entries from around the world. In addition, 23SOTV4, Xes 4 and Active Network Frequencies new compositions made from the supplied 23 seconds of music. AIN 23 (Autonomous Individuals Network) is a part of Thee Temple of Psychick Youth. This illustrious initiative from the early eighties is created under inspiring leadership of members of Psychic TV, Current 93 and Coil. They used (cut up) techniques of the artists William Burroughs and Brian Gysin and meditation technics of the occultists Aleister Crowley and Austin Osman Spare. Purpose of the members of the Temple was through occult and modern techniques to discover and develop themselves. Back to the album. The key question is what can you do in 23 seconds. Very much and I must say that many of the compositions will come quickly to a point within that limited time and come to a full composition. Sometimes it seems a take out an extended composition, but most are well done, like the contribution of Frequency 402, which is frightening and the track of William C. Jill Harrington Ellisa is surprisingly crisp and concise. Conure makes a wonderful pitch noise and Jaime Cleeland went back into the sound experiments of William Burroughs. You can have many doubt about the occult experimental nature of the followers of the mystical number 23, but this CD makes it clear that in a limited time you may come to an interesting composition and that the world is connected by a common sound. (JKH)
Address: http://www.ain23.com
NOTEHERDER & MCCLOUD – THE BOTTLE LOOSE IN THE DRAWER (CDR by The Slightly Off Kilter Label)
GOLD DUST (CDR compilation by The Slightly Off Kilter Label)
PAUL KHIMSIA MORGAN – EAVES DROP (3″CDR by Aural Detritus)
The Slightly Off Kilter Label asked the editor of VW not to forward these releases to Jliat, which I find both odd and amusing. His unique view on the nature of noise and how to approach a review, being almost noise in itself, would seem appropriate to me for real noise releases, and I’d say it’s up to the editor to make such (Vital!) decisions as to ask reviewers who he seems fit. Which brings me to this trio of releases, none of which could be called harsh noise anyway. The first is a duo of Chris Parfitt, who also plays in Nil, and Geoff Reader who organizes night in Brighton, and who both share an interest of ‘investigating the sonic environment they’ve made available to themselves, wearing grey suits and watching old detective films’ (which may or may not include McCloud?). A duo of free jazz saxophony and ‘a monochrome haze of gnarled electronics’. Thirteen pieces here, ranging between two and (mostly) five some minutes, and which are indeed monochrome affairs of experimental sax sounds, bits of electronics and something that may be regarded by some as sound poetry. I guess I think – I am not sure – it was alright, but in the end perhaps also a bit too long for my taste and without too much variety in approaches, or a more refined build up, internal drama of the pieces, which is not too present at this stage.
On the compilation we find six pieces by six different composers, who played their concerts in front of sixteen people attending ‘an intimate headphone concert celebrating the domestic soundscape’. It’s nice that every piece is introduced by a voice telling what is to come and a bit about the work carried out. I’m not sure if you would want to hear that always. None of the six I heard of before, but me thinks that opener Paul Khimasia Morgan is the owner of the label. We also find Michalis Mavronas, Neil Luck, Jon Aveyard, Marcus Leadley and Joseph Young. Each of them has about ten to fifteen minutes to present their piece and there is a variety of approaches here. The electro-acoustic rumbling of Morgan and Aveyard for instance, the odd radio play/spoken word by Neil Luck, the synthesizers of Mavronas, the field recordings of Leadley and the kitchen sink opera sounds of narrator Young. Maybe the introductional talk works a but against the release, because you may not want to hear them all the time, but otherwise this is a great release with some excellent music of an experimental yet varied nature.
Aural Detritus is a ‘sister label’ of The Slightly Off Kilter Label and we have just learned that Paul Khimasia Morgan is a ‘close mike improviser with a particular interest in the sonic qualities of brass and copper as well as sound derived from organic materials’ and he uses processed field recordings, cassette recordings, phase modulation and motors and on ‘Eaves Drop he has a piece of music that involves a substantial amount of silent parts, but also mild feedback and rumbling of contact microphones on a variety of surfaces. It’s not the most engaging pieces of solo improvised music I heard recently, but perhaps the absence of seeing what is actually going on might not help either. It’s just one of these things. Not great, not bad either, it’s just there and which could have been better. (FdW)
Address: http://www.slightlyoffkilterlabel.blogspot.com
FILE UNDER TONER – RESISTANCE EMOTIONAL MIXES VOL. 1 (CDR by Hazard Records)
JAVIER PINANGO – I.R. REAL METAL MUSIC (CDR by Hazard Records)
HYDRA – HIEROGRAPHICAL (CDR by Hazard Records)
Three releases from the more active parts of Barcelona’s finest underground. First off, we have Anki Toner, in disguise as File Under Toner, in which he actually has a nice concept: the audience brings over CDs and without hearing them beforehand, he plays them and mixes them (not even on the pre-fade listening button) together. He pops in CDs and as soon as the mixer indicates there is sound, he mixes them. Very much the sort of thing art curators love, rather than people who actually seek out to hear some great music. Nowadays of course these machines DJs use have all sorts of crazy buttons, creating loops on the spot, slowing down/speeding up, scratch sounds and god knows what else, and it seems Anki uses that too. Lots of the content here is probably illegal, but I didn’t recognize anything, so perhaps I am very much out of touch with the real world. I am not entirely convinced why this should be released, but if it’s anything like showcase for what File Under Toner does, then it works well. Half an hour of very random loops from all sorts of music. John Cage would have been proud of this.
Javier Pinango was in bands before, such as Cerdos, Mil Dolores Pequenos, Destroy Mercedes, Druhb, Ankitoner Metamars, Klang!, Taxi and works solo these days as I.R. Real. His ‘I.r. real metal music’ is ‘based on repetitive structures and a very personal approach to the concepts of structure and riff. Of course, the title says it all…’ – but I keep thinking what it is says. I am missing out on something. The cover has no indication, but I assume Pinango works with a computer and perhaps a bunch of analog sound effects. He is at his best, I think, when he’s not trying to play a bit of noise, which he unfortunately does about half the time. But in the other half he plays around with sustaining tones, biting frequencies buried underneath – such as in the opening minutes and around thirty minutes – and it makes up quite a bit of intense electronic music. These offer many roads to explore – more than the noise route into dead man’s curve. Something to think about I guess.
And lastly a record by Hydra, being Adria Bofarull, He sometimes works as Dargelos and had a duo with the recently deceased Joan Suara as Crater, to whom this new solo work is dedicated. Here we have eighteen pieces which are all relatively short. The whole album only takes about thirty-eight minutes. Hydra improvises on ‘sound itself […] paying a lot of attention to the texture, the grain of the sound’, and while it’s not mentioned anywhere I think he has a sound running somewhere on his computer and some real time sound processors, which locks the sound down and it is played around with. He does, I guess, an alright job here, though nothing great or refined. He could have left it at ten pieces, or he could have done a hundred of them: it wouldn’t have made any difference, I suppose. Like said, throughout the music is all alright, but nothing great I suppose. Very much the sort of thing that perhaps works in a live context better and/or would benefit from more editing and more composing. It’s a free download, so if you don’t want to spend your money on a CDR you know where to get it, and select your favorite bits. (FdW)
Address: http://www.hazardrecords.org
SMALL THINGS ON SUNDAYS – DRILL (cassette by A Beard Of Snails Records)
It was quite for some time for the Copenhagen Two who call themselves Small Things On Sundays. It seems like their first release since 2009, but maybe I am wrong here. They explore here the nature of two turntables and two laptops, and all along move away from away from the previous more ambient induced music. Maybe as an one-off? Apparently they recorded for several hours and edited it down to no less than fifteen pieces on this thirty minute cassette. Maybe that’s something I couldn’t have told you, as it all sounds pretty improvised here from one kind or another. A pretty rough record/vinyl/turntable destruction styled (stylus?) music, which is pretty noise based, even when the cassette format takes off some of the harsher edges. I guess it’s not great, but not bad either, and probably is long enough for what it has to offer here. Sketch like drawing of a ideas, which may or may not be worked out at some point in time.
Address: http://www.abeardofsnails.com