BANABILA & MACHINEFABRIEK – ERROR LOG (CD by Tapu Records) *
DANIEL LERCHER – MISSA BREVIS (CD by Cmafu Nocords) *
THE 23S – FLAMINGO (CD by Karaoke Kalk) *
WILL SAMSON & HEIMER – ANIMAL HANDS (CD by Karaoke Kalk) *
PHILIPPE PETIT – MULTICOLOURED SHADOWS (CD by Aagoo Records) *
TAMAS – TAMAS (CD by Ti Records)
NITON – TIRESIAS (CD by Pulver & Asche)
EMMANNUEL MAILLY – RODEO RANGER (CD, private)
WHIRL – REVOLVING RAPIDLY AROUND AN AXIS (CD by Den)
D BAYNE – MEDITATIONS ON PRESENT TIME (CD by Luminescence Records) *
ØKAPI – PRUFFOLI (CD by Onglagoo Records)
FROGBELLY AND SYMPHONY – BLUE BRIGHT OW SLEEP (CD by Labelship)
ACT – LILURARIK EZ (CD, private)
OZMATIC & FENNESZ – AIREFFECT (CD by Folk Wisdom) *
PAULINE OLIVEROS/ZEENA PARKINS (LP by Lucky Kitchen/Serralves)
ROBERT PIOTROWICZ & LUKAS JIRICKA – SAMOOBRONA (LP by Bolt Records)
JLIAT & DYECAP – THE ANTI-DELEUZIAN (CDR by Pre-arlophone Records) *
LAUKI – WAITING FOR THE THAW (CDR by Luscinia) *
GENITAL WARTS – PARAPPAIO (CDR by Viande Records) *
GEHIRN. IMPLOSION – DER WEG GEHT WEITER (CDR by Tosom) *
JODA CLEMENT – I HOPE YOU LIKE THE UNIVERSE (cassette by Notice Recordings) *
PRANTS – HOT SHAKER MEET LEAD DONUT (cassette by Notice Recordings) *
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Vital Weekly #984 by Vitalweekly on Mixcloud
tracklist for Vital Weekly 984:
0000 Tune
0014 The 23s – Ann’s Theme
0316 Will Samson & Heimer – Juniper
0621 Michel Banabila & Machinefabriek – Stemmenspel
0928 Philippe Petit – Pyramid Of The Moon
1238 Lauki – Love Theme/Torarin
1546 Ozmatic & Fennesz – LiquidMrkt
1853 Joda Clément – Part 1
2157 Prants – Vapor Viper
2504 Daniel Lercher – Missa Brevis
2814 D Bayne – One South Wacker Drive
3121 Genital Warts – Cut And Shit pt.1
3421 Gehirn. Imploded – Es Ist Kalt
3727 Jliat & Dyecap – The Anti-Deleuzian
4034 Tune
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BANABILA & MACHINEFABRIEK – ERROR LOG (CD by Tapu Records)
This is the third collaborative effort of Michel Banabila and Rutger Zuydervelt, also known as Machinefabriek. The first two were released in 2013, in a time span of nine months (see Vital Weekly 860 and 898), but no doubt it’s not easy to get these two busy bees together, hyper active as they seem in working with electronic music, collaborating with others and playing live. There was, I think, quite some difference between the first two releases; the first one was perhaps what we could expect from both of them: ambient like, digital noise, improvised and yet very much composed. ‘Travelog’, the second one (the first being untitled) seemed less abstract, more songs (as in ‘songs’ as in ‘pop’) like, with great little melodies somewhere. So the third one was highly anticipated by me. ‘Error Log’ has three pieces (divided in such a way that it says ‘release me on LP too, please’), which are quite long, compared to the shorter songs on the previous release. It’s however not exactly a return to their first release either; it seems they are exploring the ambient side here more and more, but also in a more orchestral way, especially in ‘Stemmenspel’ and the title piece. ‘Animal’, the eleven-minute opening piece here works with more loosely improvised sound embedded in larger clouds of sound. It’s all right, but not their finest moment. The violins and voices of ‘Stemmenspel’ (play of/with voices) have an orchestral feeling, along with those swift changes we know from Zuydervelt, the melody of Banabila and the electronic treatments of both. It moves the listener gently through an excellent set of moods and textures, almost like a soundtrack. The field recordings of the title piece are just a start to move into quite a cosmos of drones (courtesy of the guitar), small rhythms and rainy day recordings; Here too a fine trip, spanning some nineteen minutes but perhaps less soundtrack material. Having said that: it’s an excellent piece, which once again brings out the best of both composers. Perhaps this third CD is less of a surprise, but it explores their joint interests further. (FdW)
Address: http://www.banabila.bandcamp.com
DANIEL LERCHER – MISSA BREVIS (CD by Cmafu Nocords)
One could of course conclude that by composing a short mass, Daniel Lercher is a Roman Catholic composer. Maybe not? ‘Missa Brevis’ could mean short mass, but in Austria (especially) it can also mean that various parts of the longer text are sung at the same time, by different voices, especially in the ‘Credo’ and ‘Gloria’. That’s what Haydn and Mozart did. The parts for ‘Missa Brevis’ are ‘Kyrie’, ‘Gloria’, ‘Credo’, ‘Sanctus’, ‘Benedictus’ en ‘Agnus Dei’, but on the cover of Lercher version none of these are mentioned (and there are other versions of the ‘Missa Brevis’, such as a French and German version, but this was commissioned by Austrian radio ORF so let’s stick to that Austrian interpretation). So maybe he’s less of a Roman Catholic composer, and just uses the form of a mass for a four part piece, and, judging by the liner notes, he plays various parts at the same time: “In the first part of the piece 2 gongs in the room get excited by their respective spectral harmonics using sound pressure transducers and a field recording of an African mass is projected onto a large glass plate in the church via a third transducer.” And such like. There is another reason for thinking this is not a very religious record per se, not in the classical mass sense: there are no vocals here, except for the third and forth (which appear together!) we hear a cloud of voices, humming in a large hall, but with some great sound effects to it, which sounds like the sound is all around you, and not coming from two speakers. It’s also the part that has the most religious feel to it. In the other two pieces the mood is also dark and introspective, but maybe also a bit more traditional drone like in both of these. They build slowly from ‘nothing’ towards a big dark cloud of sound; in the second part via the transformations of the recording of a church organ. This is quite a moody work, one that leaves open many questions I think (for instance about the fact if this is truly religious work or taking the form of a piece and transforming it into a musique concrete work) but it’s also an excellent piece of electro-acoustic music. A bit ‘brevis’ for my taste. (FdW)
Address: http://www.nocords.net
THE 23S – FLAMINGO (CD by Karaoke Kalk)
WILL SAMSON & HEIMER – ANIMAL HANDS (CD by Karaoke Kalk)
Karaoke Kalk belong, along with say Static Caravan, to the labels operating on the fringes of what we like. Sometimes inside, sometimes outside, being too poppy. But firmly inside the kind of electronic music I like to hear after a day of hard-core experiments (or not, see elsewhere) and some unwinding needs to be done. For instance with The 23s, a mysterious (often used word, but what’s mysterious about a guy who doesn’t want his name to be known?), one-man band, who released his debut ‘Bolivia’ in 2008. This is my first introduction to his music, and it comes via ten cute pieces of electronic music, which are all brief. Loop/sequence based but all of these pieces remain rather brief and to the point. I have been this release most of this morning and even while it lasts only thirty-seven minutes I didn’t mind having it on repeat, while I was doing other stuff. I filled in an online questionnaire, read the newspaper, went to have a shower, hovered a bit, checked what else was going on in the digital domain and in the background these electronic pieces were humming away. Held together with some nice bass lines, the rhythms themselves are quite exotic; not always a strict 4/4 rhythm thing, but a bit jazzy, such as in ‘The Invisible 5’, but also with it’s more spacious piano tunes, which also seems to owe to the world of jazz music. Other pieces, like ‘Spider’ are more orchestral, sampled together perhaps, maybe using a MIDI keyboard or something such like and has a more filmic character. Going from trip-hop rhythms to jazz, sometimes laced with a fine delicate guitar sound, this is a highly varied journey and one that could easily be on repeat for some time. Nice 80s cover too.
Something else is the CD ‘Animal Hands’ by Will Samson and Heimer, who has no last name. They worked together, as producers on Samson’s two solo CDs from 2012 and 2014, and through mail they already worked on a piece of music, but found it more effectively to work in a studio. This they did in Berlin where they recorded the nine pieces on ‘Animal Hands’. Duties are divided among the two but we don’t know who does what here. Over the mood is laidback and pop-like, sung with the somewhat husky voice of one of the two (I have no idea, the cover nor the information tells us). It’s not something I am particular fond of, husky voice, but the laidback, dubby, rhythm heavy pop music works quite well. After a long day of listening to experimental music, it’s the kind of tunes by the likes of The 23s and Samson and Heimer that unwind me, even when I have to think about a review. Still, I can always write, I have no idea what this is and I could get away with it. I don’t know a lot about this; it is no doubt connected to lots and lots of other things, hidden, for me, in the world of alternative pop/techno/dance music, and the few instrumental pieces are obviously my favourite here, plus I enjoyed especially for that reason The 23s disc a bit more, but here too I was pleasantly entertained by a good tune or two (well more actually). (FdW)
Address: http://www.karaokekalk.de
PHILIPPE PETIT – MULTICOLOURED SHADOWS (CD by Aagoo Records)
From the press text I learned that in 2014 Philippe Petit has been active in music since thirty years. I knew it was a long time, but not this long. It seems that in recent years his production sped up and here’s another new release. In the early days he was very much a DJ, of the wackier variety, but these days uses a lot of instruments to create soundscapes of a musique concrete like nature. The multi-track possibilities to be found on the computer perhaps make life easier for composers to (mal-) treat recordings and create such soundscapes? Some of the instruments Petit uses on this recording were made by Yuri Landman (google him to see what sort of stuff you learn from him during a workshop) and perhaps he added some of his own tricks. There are guitars, cymbalum, electronics, kazooed voice, piano, organ, bass and percussion here. Petit does a great job, as always. His music always seems to have a massive aspect, like using a lot of paint on his canvas. Different colours of paint that he smears together and with brushes pushes them apart, so you can see a bit of red here and a bit of yellow there, but also the green when it blurs together. That’s how his music sounds. Sometimes you recognize the separate instruments, but then they get quickly transformed and changed into something new, but then all of a sudden you think: oh yeah, guitar or piano. In that sense is Petit’s music quite psychedelic thanks to this massive layering of sound and sound effects creating these likewise massive fields of sound. Not something you would easily perform in a live concert on your own but, again thanks to the computer, this one can ‘easily’ create in the digital domain. Not that this sound digital; not at all, in fact. This is some wild and vivid, imaginative electro-acoustic soundscape. Nothing quiet, hardly introspective but nevertheless a great bumpy ride. (FdW)
Address: http://aagoo.com
TAMAS – TAMAS (CD by Ti Records)
Ti-Records I know from a few vinyl-releases by DUS-TI, an interesting project of trumpeter Pablo Giw and Mirek Pyschny. They created Ti-records as an outlet for their music. With ‘Tamas’ they choose for a cd-release, offering recordings that predate the Dus-Ti phase and don’t have Mirek playing on it. We are talking here of a project that was started by Giw and percussionist Joss Turnbull in 2009. On this 2010-recording, Giw is in the company of ney virtuoso Mohamad Fityan from Syria, plus singer Abdu Almassoudi from Morocco and German guitarist Matthias Kurth. Joss Turnbull did the field recordings, electronics and percussion. Point of departure is his field recordings dating from pre/civil war Syria and Lebanon, city noises of Damascus and Beirut. The music is free improvised following tonalities from the Middle East. It has beautiful singing by Almassoudi and playing by Fitwan. Eastern tempers and moods dominate in these free improvised constellations, implying that Matthias Kurth has to do his best to accommodate to them. Only in one track, not coincidentally called ‘Contrast’, things are the other way around. Here Kurth gives way to a fabulous ride of heavy aggressive electric guitar. It is evident that a fine bunch of musicians are at work here. Also the recording is well done. But too often I was asking myself what are they up to. At these moments I missed a clear focus in their improvising, just beautiful lines, well played and performed, but I wished the structures of the pieces were more pronounced. Why releasing an album of a project of five years ago? Well, I hope this means this unit is still active as I sensed a lot of potential in this combination. (DM)
Address: http://www.ti-records.com/
NITON – TIRESIAS (CD by Pulver & Asche)
Here we have the second album by Niton. Their first one dates from 2012. We are talking here of an Italian trio: El Toxyque or Enrico Mangione (electric marranzanu, mic’d fan heater, springs, oscillators, prepared six strings banjo, theremin, mystic pipe, loops, Ikea stereo delay, effects), Luca Xelius Martegani (Roland SH-101, Korg MS20, Korg SQ10, DIY modular analog synth, Doepfer A-100, Korg Poly 800, Memorymoog, Xelius’ Fuzz, sound direction) who is a sound designer, composer of electro-acoustic music and sound technician, plus Zeno Gabaglio (electric 5-strings cello, effects, loops). Their first album ‘Niton’ contained music that was free improvised. The recordings for their new effort, ‘Tiresias’, underwent considerable elaboration in the studio. The cd counts twelve works, recorded between June and September 2014 in Switzerland and Italy. Most tracks are rhythm-based instrumental sound works, with proportionate use of instruments and objects. The opening track reminded me a lot of Art Zoyd. Other tracks, like the closing one evoked good old days of Kosmische Musik. Overall their music is referring to ambient-like music from the past. No new windows are opened, but it is an enjoyable and captivating trip of minimalistic sound works. (DM)
Address: http://www.pulverundasche.com
EMMANNUEL MAILLY – RODEO RANGER (CD, private)
Mailly is a French composer, active in experimental music for about 20 years now. Some of his work is released, like ´La dynastie des Polygones´(2013). From what I read, his work is very divers; sometimes composed for exhibitions, dance performances, etc. His new work ‘Rodeoranger’ is meant as soundtrack for an imaginary western. Mailly composed, played and recorded everything himself at home, except for some vocals by Cathy Fern Lewis. It is a pieces where she sings, like ‘It’s pouring Outside’ and ‘Cowboy’s going out’ that the music comes most close to country and Americana. In most pieces however Mailly builds deranged and disorienting sound works. Not from a highly academic level, that is not his thing, but from a do it yourself attitude as is to expected from a lonesome soundbastler. Dominant in his music is often his distorted electric guitar playing. In ‘Blues Solo Now ‘ in contrast, Mailly gives way to an introvert, dreamy blues. At a few moments Mailly nears the free country-madness of someone like Eugene Chadbourne, but most of the time his electro-acoustic manipulations lead to sound collage and somewhat mechanical sounding vehicles. (DM)
Address: http://www.emmanuelmailly.fr/
WHIRL – REVOLVING RAPIDLY AROUND AN AXIS (CD by Den)
A small beauty, released by the Italian label Den Records of improviser Stefano Ferrian. Nine short vivid improvised conversations, taking no more than 33 minutes in total. Whirl is a trio of English improviser Tobias Delius (saxophone, clarinet), plus two young Norwegian players: Adrian Fiskum Myhr (double bass) and Henrik Munkeby Nørstebø (trombone). The improvisations were recorded last year in Trondheim, during a short tour. There is a strong togetherness in their highly communicative interactions. The music lives from intense playing through small gestures, short runs, microtonal timbres, and whirling and rapidly moving patterns. No doubt the title of the album is meant as a ‘description’ of the music. The playing is very expressive and the three show a fantastic musicality in conversations. Pure joy! (DM)
Adress: http://www.denrecords.eu
D BAYNE – MEDITATIONS ON PRESENT TIME (CD by Luminescence Records)
ØKAPI – PRUFFOLI (CD by Onglagoo Records)
FROGBELLY AND SYMPHONY – BLUE BRIGHT OW SLEEP (CD by Labelship)
ACT – LILURARIK EZ (CD, private)
OZMATIC & FENNESZ – AIREFFECT (CD by Folk Wisdom)
Many of the releases you read about in these pages are sent this way by the label. Now, if, as a label, you have a bit of cash and you want to promote your release in lots of places, yet you don’t know these places, then you can hire a company that does this for you. Dense, for instance, in Berlin is one I recommend. They do an excellent job. Some of the releases coming our way came from them. Recently however a lot less; partly because more and more is offered via downloads only and it seems that one of the musical genres where they actually have money to send out physical promo’s is in the jazz/improvised/classical music scene. But it’s sometimes a bit too far away from what Vital Weekly is about. Here are some releases that made me scratch my head for some time. D Bayne (no {.} in there, no first name) is a piano player who had the brilliant idea of combining field recordings with piano music. At the local Nijmegen railway station there is a public access piano, where people can tinkle away waiting for their train. All good for social cohesion but I am really no fan of these things: I can never hear what’s on my iPod. That’s a bit what I thought about this CD: of course D Bayne can play quite well and does so in a very modern classical style (the name Lutoslawki is mentioned) and there is the field recording of a bridge, East Washington Street, Cafe Du Monde, Bourbon Street, but all of these field recordings are really not rising above the level of background hiss. The drill of ‘One South Wacker Drive’ is only at the beginning of the piece. It’s actually a nice piece, quite minimal, but overall the piano sounded a bit remotely away, like it was also recorded from some distance. Like it is a bit clouded and disguised. Maybe part of the concept? A concept that was not well-spend on me.
‘Here’s aural excitement! Electrifying musical stimulation! It’s the articulate genius of maestro Filippo Paolini!’ Of course they know how to sell a CD. Paolini is the guy behind Økapi, who gets a bit of help from Niobe and Till Albrecht Jann. Økapi is an Italian turntablist and sample cut-up artist. Ho-ho. He was once in Metaxu (a laptop duo, which I do remember) and Dogon (which I don’t remember). These sampled pieces owe to the world of hip-hop and actually did nothing for me at all. I don’t like hip-hop at all, not even the instrumental variety of Økapi; I am not particular fond of sampling artists, lifting a few rhythms here and there, a bit strings off and on and there’s your next track baby. Maybe I am not in the mood for this? Maybe this is a party soundtrack, and I am not part of the party? Maybe I don’t want to be part of that? Most likely this is just something that is too far off from what we usually write about.
Which happens to be also the case of Frogbelly And Symphony, a four-piece group from a band both based in Brooklyn NY and Sheffield UK. Not a CD I received from Dense, so you know, but surely something mistakenly sent to here; just another address to get a review. Produced by Martin Bisi (whose record was reviewed in Vital Weekly 840, so maybe that’s why we got this). ‘A progressive rock sound echoes in folk landscapes. Urban poetry, pop melodies and repetitive chants cast a rousing wave of contemporary performance’. Oh. I hear folk music, mixed with rock, lots of lyrics, so they are probably important, but none of this could interest me very much. Standard sort of rock/folk music to my ears, but again: what do I know?
Guys with beards: always good if you want to sell a bit of ‘alternative’ music. Because beards equal ‘hip’. Right. Now, the use of those ‘…’ means I am a bit sceptical. It’s not alternative when everyone has a beard, so you’re not hip; you are no longer different. ACT is a French band which aims to ‘create a sound cocktail travelling through different universe such as trip-hop, rock, noise, industrial and experimental music’ – ho, ho… Noise, industrial and experimental are surely in the eye (ear) of the beholder, and to your granny this might sound like a conveyer belt, but the seasoned listener doesn’t hear much of that. Lots of trip hop like rhythms, lots of dramatic voice intoning and a dash of trashy guitars, but oh my god, this all so middle of the road. I’m sure they are a popular band at festivals (probably of the ‘alternative’ variety) and I wish them all the luck the world; but next time I think there are better places to ship a promo too.
Let’s end on a more positive note here; Fennesz is surely someone who has been applauded in these pages? Here he teams up with a duo named Ozmatic, being Stanislao Lesnoj (soprano sax, soundscapes and electronics) and SmZ (drums, electronics and objects), whereas Fennesz plays guitar and electronics. Ozmatic find their inspiration in anything from classical music to ambient “mixing soundscapes and concrete music with glitch, noise and jazz, creating sonority characterized by a deep variety of timbres and refined rhythmic research”. That all sounds great, and this is certainly a fine album. Fennesz is on top of the game with his guitar/laptop doodling, making mildly distorted patterns, which seem to fit the lounge jazz atmosphere of Ozmatic quite well. It’s just that I am not the biggest fan of that sort of saxophone playing. It sounds to me very standard nightclub jazz like, and unfortunately it’s something that returns in most of the seven pieces. Now, I’m sure there are lots of people who like this kind of free jazz honking on the horn, whereas I think I only liked the drum bits and whatever Fennesz was doing. Maybe he should have done a record with SmZ, and Lesnoj a day off? My favorite two pieces seemed to be ‘LiquidMrkt’ and ‘Epilogo’, mainly for the absence of the saxophone I guess. A record received with mixed feelings, which seemed also to be the case with some of the others here. This last one also seemed to proof that the money is in the jazz. (FdW)
Address: http://www.luminescenerecords.com
Address: http://www.onfglagoorecords.com
Address: http://www.labelship.com
Address: http://actofficial.com
Address: http://www.folkwisdom.net/
PAULINE OLIVEROS/ZEENA PARKINS (LP by Lucky Kitchen/Serralves)
Two confessions here; I know both these ladies by name, and from Pauline Oliveros also quite some of her music, but I must confess I like her earlier electronic music better than her more recent accordion pieces. Zeena Parkins I must shamefully admit I only know by name, but somehow never got to hear properly. Both of these are my mistakes no doubt. This record sees the resurrection of the Lucky Kitchen label, which ran from the mid 90s to mid 00s by artists Alejandra & Aeron and is now born again, only to bring us recordings made the Fundacao de Serralves in Porto. These will a series of LPs. I started with Parkins’ side. She has played the harp solo and electronics, but also recorded with Björk, Yoko Ono, Pauline Oliveros, John Zorn, Elliott Sharp and Jim O’Rourke (and tons of others). Her piece was recorded on February 15th, 2004 and here her frantic, nervous playing start out before it meanders out more in order to return to a state of chaos. It’s quite some piece, as far as I can judge, being the novice here. It sounds like a solid piece of improvisation, in which the harp is clearly to be recognized; there might be electronics, but I’m not too sure.
I am likewise not too sure why I never got along with Oliveros accordion playing. Maybe it’s that downstairs neighbour who has one too and while rehearsing stamps his feet along? But he’s not been living here for very long. Maybe because it’s the instrument that I associate with those corny, sad Dutch songs? Or maybe the way Oliveros plays it sometimes? Surely it’s a combination of all of that, but as I was playing this recording from 2001 (September 10, a Monday night as I recall) I was actually enjoying it quite a bit. ‘Land Escaping’ has some of that nervous playing, but Oliveros also uses her box of electronic tricks and expands this piece into a fine wavering pattern of shifting tones. It has a fine, drone like quality (which is something that this instrument is no doubt highly suitable for), but at the same time also owes a great deal to the world of improvised music. This is a work that retickled my interest in Oliveros’ more recent music. (FdW)
Address: http://www.serralves.pt http://www.luckykitchen.com
ROBERT PIOTROWICZ & LUKAS JIRICKA – SAMOOBRONA (LP by Bolt Records)
If I understand correctly this piece is based on a work recorded by Helmut Kajzar in 1974 and 1975. “Samoobrona. Magiczny manifest” (Self-defence. The Magical Manifesto) is a play he wrote and recorded at home, but the version on this record is for a stage performance, carried out by Lukas Jiricka and Robert Piotrowicz. They use recordings from the author but also reduce those and add voices from others, while adding sounds and music of their own; maybe they are using the original voice to manipulate it and transform it using traditional musique concrete techniques. I tried finding out what this play is about, but the text on the cover is not very clear; ‘Samoobrona treats about human enslaved, first of all, by his/her own physicality’ – maybe there’s a clue. Not that it is easy to find information on the Internet, nor does the record actually give much away. Much of the voice/text/words are chopped up, coming to haunt us as ghosts. They have been reduced to single phrases, sighs and breathing; along we find deep bass sounds, crumbled field recordings and more voices coming from above and below. I wish I would understand more of the origins of the piece. Now, for me as an outsider, not privy to the language or the history of the piece, so it remains on some distance here. Judging purely on musical terms I quite enjoyed this radio drama piece: it was exciting, wild, captured with some great power and throughout an excellent work. (FdW)
Address: http://www.boltrecords.pl/
JLIAT & DYECAP – THE ANTI-DELEUZIAN (CDR by Pre-arlophone Records)
In a relatively short period Jliat has been producing works with Dyecap (see Vital Weekly 974 and 963), behind which Darren Pacey. In the last review we learned that he records the basic sound material used by Jliat, nom de plume for James Whitehead, using prepared fossils and meteorites which he makes for sale in various shops, galleries and museums. Here we have a slightly shorter work than the previous, still clocking in a fifty-three minutes. It’s one piece, but divided in two parts. On the bandcamp page we read this: “First part – Processed binaural recording of the slicing of 50 pieces of 240 million year old araucaria (monkey puzzle tree) root. Second part – Processed recording of the original binaural combined with an epicentripolodial fuzz wall treatment of same.” Unlike Harsh Noise Wall there is actually something happening here, as this piece moves from place to place, even when it doesn’t seem to. Yes, of course this is all very loud, but the fuzz and distortion are used here in a fine over the top psychedelic manner. I realize that if one doesn’t like noise I am wasting my breath here by saying this is not harsh noise wall music, but you might ask: ‘who are you trying to fool?’ So it’s not your cup of tea. However if HNW is your strong shot of coffee, then this please be adviced this is a great release, not entirely HNW because it comes with changes (!) and it’s super loud, so there you go. Excellent release! (FdW)
Address: https://pre-arlophone.bandcamp.com/album/jliat-dyecap-the-anti-deleuzian
LAUKI – WAITING FOR THE THAW (CDR by Luscinia)
In a rather great cover, professionally printed and all that, we find the third album by Lauki. We haven’t heard his previous two releases, but we did hear his release with Pleq a long time ago (see Vital Weekly 795), which I no longer remember. From the information here I understand that Lauki likes ‘contemporary classical music, generative art and aesthetics of error’. Recently he worked on his first soundtracks and if I understood well some of that is to be found on ‘Waiting For The Thaw’. It came from an invitation to play live music to an old movie, ‘Herr Arnes Pengar’ (by Mauritz Stiller, 1919), which I haven’t seen, but which is apparently ‘a tragedy that tells the story of a love, a crime and a cruel twist of fate, and where the cold climate (the Scandinavian winter) that accompanies the action plays role, conditioning experiences and emotional worlds of the characters, visionaries and dreamers, and the spectator’. Like said, I haven’t seen the movie, so I have no idea how the music relates to the movie. No doubt and quite rightly so, the composer thinks it is strong enough to by itself. Inside his computer he uses field recordings but also violin and cello sounds, which he plays around it in a very atmospheric way. Of course these instruments are ‘easy’ to employ when creating mood music, but Lauki does this is in a great way. This is partly abstract, but also partly orchestral, with a multitude of layered string instruments. It’s not difficult to see this music fitting to such a movie: it’s lovely, sad, uplifting, melancholic; not everything in the same portion though, as I would think sadness and melancholic have the majority here, but some of that desolate atmosphere is probably the main approach to the movie. Sometimes these strings sounds romantic and sometimes these drones depict a snow covered landscape. Lauki produced music with quite some imagination and great care for detail. Top stuff. Remind this name. (FdW)
Address: http://luscinia.ruidemos.org
GENITAL WARTS – PARAPPAIO (CDR by Viande Records)
Behind Genital Warts we find a trio of players from Naples who started out last year. We have Mario Gabola from A Spirale on ‘feedbacks, resonances and light’, Le Druid Guillame on electric bass and drums and Guido EKS Marziale on sampler and no-input tascam. For this project the interest lies in seeing others combine noise and hiphop (such as Death Grips, which is even something I heard of, but also DJDieSoon, Mike Ladd), with the addition of the improvisation music. In some of these pieces we recognize a hip-hop inspired beat, straightforward, such as in ‘Three Little Devils’, but most of the times it is chopped and incorporated in the rest of the chaos that makes up the music. That’s good because it leaves the hip-hop a bit out of the door, and also the whole ‘noise’ thing is of the variety that is perhaps unusual and strange but hardly a manifestation of distortion. Some of the sound effects they use, they use a bit too much and without much variation. That is a pity. There are nine songs on this release and the whole thing lasts twenty-nine minutes; for what it is that seemed long enough for me. They make a fine point: yes, you can mix noise, hip-hop and improvisation and it does sound quite all right. There is nothing spectacular or alien, nothing groundbreaking or breath taking going on here, but fine and solid and effectively weird enough. (FdW)
Address: http://www.viande.it
GEHIRN. IMPLOSION – DER WEG GEHT WEITER (CDR by Tosom)
Brain. Imploded. That’s what the band name means and the title of the release translates as ‘the road continues’. The man behind this is just known as Dirk. I have no idea who that is and whatever else he has done. He writes that we should file this release under ‘dark emo noise’; I am not sure what is emotional about this noise, despite the poetry on the cover. In the long piece ‘Es Schneit’ (it snows) there is s lot of reverb and that goes into feedback overload. That happens if you scratch the objects too much and have the microphones full on open. Noise indeed, but emo? Dark? I thought it was all a bit hard to say. I’m sure there is some pain felt by the artist who created this, no doubt there is misery, loss of love, suicide, depression, divorce, death to be thought of, but not in this piece, or in ‘Es Friert’ (more feedback here, ‘it freezes’ by now). ‘Es Ist Kalt’ (it’s cold), duh, the third piece there is low end rumble sound and a voice; maybe reciting the poem from the cover? This is actually dark, emotional and less noisy, but with a lot more impact than the two previous noise excursions. ‘Es Taut’ (It Thaws) is the final piece and has more voice, but also more noise, luckily without the wall of feedback sound coming just at the end, but with distorted radio sounds. This is surely a noisy beast, but something I didn’t enjoyed a lot. In the way the sounds are made, the compositions are built too easily from screaming blocks of feedback and an over active reverb unit. There is pain in here, but I can’t share it. (FdW)
Address: http://www.tosom.de
JODA CLEMENT – I HOPE YOU LIKE THE UNIVERSE (cassette by Notice Recordings)
PRANTS – HOT SHAKER MEET LEAD DONUT (cassette by Notice Recordings)
Originally from Montreal, Joda Clément is now based in Vancouver. In much of work field recordings seem to play a central role and this new work is not different. The pieces are simply called ‘Part 1’ and ‘Part 2’ and Clément uses a Korg PS3200, MS20, harmonium, electromagnetic feedback and field recordings made in Toronto, Montreal, Pemberton and Vancouver. That sounds a bit odd taking in account the music I hear here. Both pieces have a great, dark drone like quality, which, on the surface, seem to hold only very few sounds, but if you listen closer, if you peel off the layers as it were, you will discover there is indeed a wide variety of sounds in play here, shifting nicely back and forth and over the course of a piece, Clément took you on this great journey. I liked ‘Part 1’ over ‘Part 2’, which seemed to me a bit more single minded, maybe too dark also; ‘Part 1’ was a bit lighter in tone, with children’s playground recordings and some chords in the higher range of the keyboard. A fine mixture of industrial darkness, drones and field recordings.
Prants is the duo of Chris Cooper (of Angst Hase Pfeffer Nase and Fat Worm Of Error) and Bhob Rainey, mostly known in his own right as an improviser on the saxophone and a member of The BSC. The cover doesn’t list instruments for either of them, but on the B-side they use recordings of harps, viola, cello, contrabass and dry ice, played by other people. Whatever it is that they do here, it doesn’t sound like y’r traditional improvised music. I would like to think they took a whole bunch of their improvisations and feed these through some analogue synth set-up, recording the proceedings to an ancient reel-to-reel recorder, slowing that down, and then chopping it up into smaller blocks of sound. Especially in ‘Vapor Viper’ there is a bit that goes very low and very minimal. On ‘Igotu Otius’, the piece on the B-side, we recognize some of these instruments but throughout it’s more electronic, with these instruments acting as source material for musique concrete-like tape manipulations. A bit chaotic perhaps, whereas ‘Vapor Ciper’ is the more subdued, quiet side of their music, despite a very loud, noise-drone intro of three minutes to take the listener into ten minutes of very quiet drone music. This is an excellent piece of music. Of the two new releases, I’d say I prefer this one. (FdW)
Address: http://noticerecordings.com
http://www.vitalweekly.net/