Stichting Mixer is a 2-year-old foundation for minimal electronic/acoustic music, it's goal "to start and stimulate initiatives which encourage the encounter between sound and other media". Its recorded output, from knowns and unknowns alike, is released through the Mixer label. This disc is the first release on CD, limited to 500 copies.Battery Operated, apparently the duo of TomKz and Wade Walker, "chase" (i.e. DAT record) sound signals in 8 architectural non places, those modern structures of repetition such as airports, rail stations, hotels and shopping centers. Thus, they use the spaces themselves to construct soundtracks for them. The 8 tracks are roughly 5 to 6 minutes apiece and the digipack offers only the abstruse clue of a greyscale texture for each location. All sorts of unidentifiable sound tidbits are churned up and around, molded into quasi-rhythmic patterns and ambient-ish soundscapes. Tracks 3 and 8 are the real standouts though, simply because they're the most musically dynamic. The former in particular perfectly segues between cluttered and calm moments. Good stuff. Future Mixer releases I'll be keeping an ear out for include a split LP by Pimmon and K?n and a double 7" by Kaffe Matthews.
 
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