- Administrator
- Albums and Singles
Jarboe’s group for Mahakali includes all three members of Dysrhythmia as well as Josh Graham from Red Sparrowes/A Storm of Light/Neurosis. Thus, the heavier parts of Mahakali sound like a typical Neurot Records band but thankfully never quite as derivative. Strings by way of Julia Kent and Kris Force and the inclusion of decidedly non-metal rhythms expand the range of the music which allows Jarboe to try out lots of different styles of vocals throughout the album. This is a good and a bad thing. Yes, there are some great performances by her on many of the tracks and arguably they are some of her best. Equally, there are a couple of absolutely dreadful moments that do their best to sour one of her best albums in years. Jarboe herself is to blame for only one such moment as she attempts some bizarre child-like out of key mewling on “Bornless,” which completely sits askew on top of the music (which is terrific).
Luckily this sort of outburst is a rarity and elsewhere she puts on a stunning performance whether it is her commanding lead vocals on songs like “The House of Void (Visceral Mix)” or her haunting backing vocals on the pieces where she takes a backseat. Her intensity is matched by the music, her backing musicians reciprocating her performance perfectly and vice versa. The last times she has been matched by such a confident band was with Neurosis and before that with Swans. It says a lot that she has worked with many different artists from the extremes of rock but only a few can keep up with her. She has always had a powerful and decisive voice so it is no surprise that on “Ascend,” when she sings of the sky opening up, she sings with such fervor and energy that it is difficult not to go outside and check that the sky is still there.
Jarboe has invited two other vocalists to contribute to a track each to varying effect. Attila Csihar’s vocals on “The Soul Continues” are not his best but in the context of the song they work well enough. Once the group gets their groove on, the piece quickly goes from being just a showcase for Csihar’s menacing growls to being a truly heavy and ominous piece. The other guest vocalist on Mahakali came as a surprise to me as Phil Anselmo strikes me as the antithesis of Jarboe; the “is he/isn’t he racist?” figurehead of meathead metal is a million miles away from what I would expect her to be associated with. If he was a good vocalist I could look past his dubious persona but his voice has not improved since his days in Pantera or Down and “Overthrown” features some of the most overwrought and hammy vocals ever committed to disc. Yet, as with Csihar, the song does blossom when the music gets going and once Jarboe starts wailing in the background it is amazing.
One annoying thing about the album is that there are three different versions depending on the territory and packaging. The US digipack version (the one this review was based on) is different to the US jewel case version and both are again different to the European version. This is unnecessary and not what I would expect of the artists involved. I am not angry, just disappointed.
Overall, Mahakali is one of Jarboe’s best albums but is unfortunately marred by some less than stellar vocals on some tracks. However, these are mainly out of Jarboe’s hands and the good parts outweigh the bad by a considerable margin. Jarboe should definitely do a repeat performance with these guys as they are a perfect fit for her style of singing.
samples:
Read More
- Administrator
- Albums and Singles
The kitchen sink production could have been a disaster but aside from the odd over-arrangement (is a saxophone ever necessary in country music?), the large range of instruments being used works in the music’s favor. The band is culled from Oldham’s touring group of last year, which is normally a good sign as the musicians have time to build up a rapport before entering the studio. The band sounds like they have been playing together for many years rather than just one. Emmett Kelly’s guitar provides a mainstream country confidence as a foil for Oldham’s more rustic flair. While Jennifer Hutt’s violin and occasional pedal steel from Greg Leiscz pushes the music further into a typical Nashville sound, the inclusion of accordion and marimba give the music a feel that escapes the traditional borders of country music.
Without doubt this is the kind of album that could serve as a crossover for Oldham to a new and more commercial audience. His lyrics are safer than they have been in the past and the smooth production makes the songs easier to swallow. However, to suggest that this is some form of selling out on his behalf is silly. I always got the feeling that Oldham would make a straightforward country album if he could and like the aforementioned Neil Young, his foray into straight country has not come at a cost to his integrity. The songs here are as strong as ever (and it is a marked improvement on the somewhat lacklustre Lie Down in the Light) but while there is not a bad tune on Beware, I must admit that some of them are better than others. “My Life’s Work” takes a lot of the joyous fire that has been present in his live performances with jubilant lyrics to back up those flames. “I am Goodbye” sees his sense of humour come through, belting out the somewhat grisly lyrics with good spirit.
The rough edges may have been planed off but Oldham’s charm still shines through these polished recordings. Beware shows his Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy character in decidedly less morbid form than the man who sang about being a wolf among wolves. Here he doesn’t see a darkness, he sees a light. Anyone still expecting the Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy of ten years ago would be better served ignoring Beware but anyone who genuinely enjoys good songs could do far worse than listen to this.
samples:
Read More
- Administrator
- Albums and Singles
The opening "Tunnel Of Love" starts with field recordings of urban menace: squealing metallic scrapes, emergency sirens and a few metric tons of reverb covering everything. Sounds continue to become deeper and more menacing, ominous hums and metallic clattering like an evil gamelan lead to an uneasy rhythm. The swells continue to just float ominously throughout before everything fades away quietly.
"Mystery Man" opens with delayed metallic guitar shards that cut through, and then just linger a bit, allowing the vestigial feedback elements to drone on and on. The sound and concept here is good, but the problem is that it is allowed almost too long to build and segue into the more complex tones and reverbed shrieks. It is a good idea that is too slow in its execution, and the payoff isn’t really as satisfying as the long build-up would indicate.
The longest track here, "Candle Light Dinner Actress" fares better, opening with cannon like thuds in the distance, processed string-like tones slowly weaving around the sparse ambience. In this case the length and slow pace is an asset, allowing a more diverse set of sounds to intermingle, such as the high register plucked strings and reverbed soaked saxophone notes. The track fades into subtle, quiet passages before roaring back with harsh, dissonant squeals and noise blasts.
The shorter, closing track, "Last Light" is more melancholy than the darker preceding ones, it is based more on a sustained hum rather than the layered structure of the rest of the album, based on dark processed strings and dark drones. Over the length of the preceding two tracks, this would probably be too static, but in the shorter duration it works better, and is one of the more captivating tracks here.
The problem with this album is that it simply doesn’t do anything that a legion of other artists haven’t done before. I’m not sure why this is suddenly labeled as "doom", but it fits in with the pantheon of dark ambient music of the mid-1990s that are difficult to remember specifically bands or albums, but almost anything could be easily traced to Bill Laswell somehow. This has the same feeling: it’s a nice take on dark, bleak music, but isn’t enough to stand out from the crowd, and probably won’t be memorable in five to ten years.
samples:
Read More
- Administrator
- Albums and Singles
Bryn Jones completed Sycophant Of Purdah ("Purdah" is the practice of preventing women by being seen by any men that are not their husbands) in 1994, but he changed his mind after submitting it and decided to release a different album in its place. It is amusing that he had to pick and choose which albums would actually see release, as he still managed to put out six that year (two of which were double albums). Jones' biographer Ibrahim Khider describes Purdha as the "missing link" that connects Muslimgauze's more industrial albums (Izlamaphobia, Zealot, Silknoose, etc.). I will have take his word for that, as acquiring my own comprehensive understanding of Muslimgauze's creative arc would delay this review several months. (On a related note, there is a Muslimgauze biography being released by SAF Publishing...someday (it is now delayed indefinitely). I hope it eventually sees the light of day, as I have long found Jones to be one of the most compelling and bizarre figures in contemporary culture.)
The aberrant opener, "Jericho Loop-Bin Duplicator," combines a decidedly non-Middle Eastern-sounding breakbeat with a thick, funky bass line. Bryn Jones clearly came to party, as the only clue that this is even Muslimgauze at all is that indecipherable (presumably Arabic) radio broadcast snippets keep wandering into the mix. Despite the general absence of weirdness/darkness, it is a pretty awesome and heavy groove.
While the playful and funky tone of "Jericho Loop-Bin Duplicator" is unique to that track, it still fits comfortably with the rest of Purdah in being heavily (almost exclusively) rhythmic. In fact, musical accompaniment on this album is extremely minimal and mostly limited to vague ambiance buried low in the mix. I initially thought this made the album feel like a series of very repetitive and sparse unfinished song sketches, but after a few listens I found Purdah to be quite compelling and hypnotic. Also, when I eventually listened to it with headphones, I realized the percussive loops were not completely static and that constant subtle shifts were occurring in and around them.
The whole album is quite strong, but I found the harsher, more industrial tracks to be more immediately memorable and engrossing than the ethno-percussion ones (although the addition of droning sitar and speech fragments in "Dupatta" stands out quite nicely). "Mossad Evil" combines a heavy, rumbling groove with some sort of strange liquid-y sucking sound and a somber violin loop, while the title track transforms Arabic percussion into a crushing and insistent mechanized groove with a somewhat shrill wavering tone panning around deep in the mix.
I am a bit curious about what Jones was trying to convey thematically with this album. Historically, I have completely disregarded the political aspect of Muslimgauze, but I have since become fascinated upon learning that Jones issued albums almost as real-time reactions and commentaries on unfolding Middle Eastern events. Now that albums conceived in the distant past are being released, I was expecting an odd temporal disconnection. I didn't find one here, but neither could I find a unifying theme among the song titles (traditional Persian music and poetry, Indian scarves, the Mossad, genetic engineering, etc). Enigmatic.
Sycophant of Purdah is a worthy addition to the Muslimgauze oeuvre. It is certainly less melodic, strange, and dark than many of Jones' more celebrated releases, but it is also extremely listenable and mesmerizing. I hope the rest of albums sifted from Jones' mountainous backlog of material for Staalplaat's archive series are similarly excellent—this release makes it clear that they are far from scraping the bottom of the Muslimgauze vault.
Samples:
Read More
- Administrator
- Albums and Singles
While I do not have any particular animosity towards Deerhunter, I've always felt that the enthusiasm they generate seems to be disproportionate to the quality of their music. Consequently, my expectations for guitarist Lockett Pundt's Lotus Plaza solo project were not especially high. I turned out to be pleasantly surprised though. He has managed to produce a couple of memorably warm and artfully blurred pop gems here. I suppose I owe him an apology, but first he has to apologize for sabotaging his debut album with so much filler.
Kranky
The album's cover (a hazy, washed-out photo of a young boy on a rocking horse) provides an excellent clue to the tone of the music contained within. This is a summery, soft-focus affair that evokes vague feelings of warmth and nostalgia. At least it does during its better moments, when it sounds vaguely like how I imagine The Jesus and Mary Chain would've sounded if they'd relocated to California and given up heroin for bongs and beaches.
"Red Oak Way" starts the album in strong and attention-grabbing fashion: a simple garage rock drum pattern leads into a steadily escalating swell of chiming arpeggios, melodic vocals, and lazy endlessly repeating and wordless backing vocals. While the track has undeniable immediacy and catchiness, repeated listens reveal additional depth (many studio-tweaked percussion flourishes and vocal tracks that pile-up and harmonize beautifully) that I did not expect. This is important and conveys to me that Lockett Pundt is no fool. The sleepy, blurred feel of The Floodlight Collective required Pundt to reverb everything to death (especially the vocals), which causes the songs to suffer greatly in character, immediacy, and general ballsiness. However, the album’s inherent shortcomings are (almost) ingeniously compensated for by muscular drums, thick propulsive bass lines, and dub-inspired studio wizardry. This approach works extremely well here, but unfortunately the opening track is the best on the album.
The second track, “Quicksand,” is also noteworthy, although I initially found it to be a disappointment. It starts off with too much clutter and sounds like a failed, less melodically gratifying variation of the “Red Oak” formula. However, after about two minutes, Lundt surprised me by dropping all the tracks of shimming guitar noise and leaving only shuffling drums and a simple and clean melancholy guitar part. The effect is quite striking and makes me forgive the song’s clumsy start. Then the roaring, ringing, and guitar layers start piling up again, but this time they work beautifully and the song builds to a lazy crescendo of sorts.
"Sunday Night" begins in spectacular fashion with throbbing and squelching electronic percussion coupled with repetitive, minimal, Steve Reich-y ringing guitar and a simple melodic bass line. This groundwork never changes, but is slowly built up with layer after gauzy layer. A complex arsenal of feedback, noises, swooping guitars, and mournful vocals burbles in and out of the mix and relentlesslessly builds to a climax of uncharacteristically raw and melancholic harmonized vocals. Oddly, it never coheres into a truly great song, but Pundt certainly manages to pack more awesome sounding stuff into one song than many bands have on their entire album.
One striking thing about The Floodlight Collective is that there seems to be two strongly conflicting impulses at work here. The vocals are sleepy and mumbled-sounding, buried in the mix, and absolutely swathed in reverb, which renders most attempts to decipher the lyrics or connect with the songs utterly hopeless. Nevertheless, the songs are extremely melodic and tightly structured and the omnipresent tambourine and rockabilly-flavored drumming can be best described as "bouncy". In fact, the whole album is unexpected driven by the rhythm section- not at all what I would anticipate from a guitarist's solo project. Pundt's aesthetic seems to lie somewhere between self-sabotaging indie pop and drone music (but for parties). Either way, it works quite well on the poppier tracks.
Lamentably, the album wavers in quality a bit during more instrumental, "atmospheric" moments like “These Years” and the title track. There is nothing particularly unfortunate about them, but they veer into territory that other artists have tackled more impressively and they tend to drain the album's momentum. The fatal flaw of the album is, perversely, its own aesthetic. Despite his best efforts, Pundt’s reverb-mongering causes the album to feel somewhat endless and same-y. When heard on their own, songs like “Red Oak Way” and “Sunday Night” are unique, head-turning, and wonderful, but attempting to listen to this entire album is an endurance test that will make those around you beg for something else to be put on. This could have been an absolutely scorching EP.
Samples:
Read More
- Administrator
- Albums and Singles
The album opens with a bang as Corsano's drums and Flower's virtuosic Japan Banjo (or Shaahi Baaja) explode forth for "I, Brute Force?," a propulsive shredding session that finds fertile exploratory ground in the brief gaps allotted by Lightning Bolt levels of energy. Corsano's drumming can rival anyone's, and his playing here is absolutely frenetic, bounding across, over and through Flower's arbeggiated shards with reckless confidence. There are few sounds so unique in improvised music today, and the duo's perfection of this kind of head-on freedom is rarely matched in any circle. Beneath all of the notes—and there are plenty—is an overall shape the form of which unravels with patience and (relative) clarity, but whose moment to moment discourse of ideas is that of a structure far briefer in length.
If the first track represents the duo's forte, the rest of the album displays its depth. Both members' instrumentation extends beyond their usual associations, as Corsano variously picks up a melodica and cello while Flower also plays tanpura and organ. This provides some necessary pockets for the two to extend into and they take full advantage of it. On "The Three Degrees of Temptation," Corsano's pot and pan drum kit rattles, shakes and chimes beneath Flower's nimble string manipulations, creating an eerie and amorphous spatial realm.
This sparse sound is counteracted by the thick duel-string drones on the following track, "The Drifter's Miracles." True to Flower's Vibracathedral Orchestra roots, the number finds the ample dialogue to be had between La Monte Young's drone experiments, contemporary free drone music and Japanese shamisen. Corsano's cello undulates underneath while Flower ornaments his moves with layer after layer of shapes that change effortlessly despite the consistent density of sound.
The duo return to what appears to be their signature sound on "The Beginning of the End," although this time the proceedings maintain a distinctly Skaters-like feel as Corsano's drums patter about beneath Flower's riffage. While the approach may be the same, it's encouraging—though not surprising—that the unit can extend it into different modes through what they're playing rather than how loud or fast they are.
The closing track, "The Main Ingredient," is the longest here, and the duo takes advantage of the length to explore depths previously only hinted at. Building into a frenetic and undulating weight, the unit moves with a singular vision all too rare. Instant response is one thing, but Flower and Corsano can shift mood along with tempo, atmosphere with melody and approach with feel. This sort of elasticity and balance results in some of the most distinctly surprising and exciting sounds happening today. And the long raga-like fade out at the end? It only encourages another go.
samples:
Read More
- Administrator
- Albums and Singles
Actually this disc, in a matter of speaking, has already been released before. Drawn from masters that were later retracted in favor of those that would become 1998's Vampire Of Tehran, this collection is essentially that album with two tracks missing and nine more added. While this may sound like a lot of bonus material—and it is—the album hardly reads like an attempt to squish as much in to one disc as possible even though they're nearing it with almost 70 minutes of music here. Still, Jones' precise concoctions are so stylistically singular that the whole of the disc reads like an album, not a compilation.
Stylistically speaking, Jones sticks with his usual ammo on this release, mixing an ample amount of Arabic source material with breakbeat, electro and dub tactics. The result is a relatively mobile and downright dancey release. Which is not to say that this is poppy in the slightest. If anything, the constraints placed on the music by the clear and propulsive rhythms serve as markers that Jones variously avoids, dabbles over and treads across with samples galore.
Take "Satsuma Tablet" for example. This looping rhythm features no lyrics at all, instead riding along the rhythm with blips and blurts as an Arabesque melodic fragment is repeated into oblivion. On the other hand, the following "Arabs Improved Zpain" features a four-four beat straight out of an NWA track. Underneath, reversed strings and a female vocal dance amongst each other, diverging, interlocking and generally keeping things interesting despite the miniscule amount of material being utilized.
If anything, that may have been Jones' greatest strength. Each track here makes the most out of only a few spare parts—it is the way they are combined, recombined, sampled and treated that shapes the movement. The result is a nearly vertical sonic consideration unheard of in this sort of rhythmic setting. Tracks like "North Africa is Not So Far Away" don't proceed so much as they morph, bending a fragment guitar line, a steady bass groove, a rhythm track and a vocal sample into a dub groove that could last long enough to accompany a Saharan trek.
Other displays of his depth can be seen on tracks like "Straps Sticks of Dynamite Around Her Body," a gentle and moody piece whose intimate Arabic string gestures and spare beat exude just the kind of grim scene that the title suggests without providing answers to its questions. It is this attention to detail and, above all else, the works themselves and what they say that keep nearly all of Muslimgauze's works interesting. This one is no different which is great on the one hand. On the other, it's no different, and could just as easily be lost in the shuffle of the 18 other Muslimgauze albums you've already managed to get your hands on.
samples:
Read More
- Administrator
- Albums and Singles
While the Iliac Suite is not included on this release, it does contain three key works from the period of 1963 to 1974, very fertile years for the composer, who continued to pursue his creative vision unabated by the negative press that attended the world’s first computer aided composition. The three pieces exhibited show off his interest in the use of information theory and ability and comfort in writing for multiple forms such as studio prepared magnetic tape with vocalists, chamber ensemble with computer, and string quartet.
The title of the collection refers to Hiller’s working procedure, best stated in his own words: “I certainly use tonal methods, serial methods, of course, chance methods, charts, mathematical formulas like Fibonnaci series, eye music –you name it. And all of this with or without computers and electronics. But again I say that I try all of them in what you might call a total matrix of possibilities.”
“Computer Cantata” is split into five sections and starts off with a bang of rackety meandering percussion, like a drum corps on nitrous oxide. Eventually petering out into mainframe blips, bleeps, and fuzz, a soprano’s wavering voice emerges in the middle, acting as a focal point as the drums fade back in and vacuum-tube tones zigzag back and forth between the speakers. All the while horns and violins dance around with each other playfully and chaotic. The third section begins and ends with unaccompanied computer noise, what I imagine it must have sounded like in the old Ma Bell telephone switching stations.
“Quartet No. 6 for Strings” is an exuberant affair and perhaps the most accessible on the disc to the casual listener. The three sections of the quartet are based on environmental sound patterns he took notes on and then categorized: commercial district and industrial sounds; placid and peaceful sounds; and cheerful sounds such as children playing or those from Saturday morning cartoons. He then further defined them by applying a whole slew of chance processes and then imposing various constraints regarding pitch and other elements.“A Portfolio for Diverse Performers and Tape” is by far the most esoteric piece collected here. Commissioned by Polskie Radio in Warsaw the eight-channel tape features children’s songs sung by his daughter and son, making it at times eerie and scary. If the operatic singing were deleted from the mix it would come very close to a Nurse With Wound piece. It would be very appropriate to play on Halloween, sitting on the porch passing out candy to kids. It also contains sounds that are comical and sourced from who knows where. Trilling kazoos emerge from a resonant abyss.
I would have liked to seen more photographs in the liner notes, of Hiller, of the various performers, of the computers and studios where the works were created, and of the notebooks in which the ideas were sketched out. Perhaps those who put this together did not have access to them, or maybe their budget didn’t allow for them to be included. On many of the other archival releases from New World Records such images have been included. Hopefully though, what this release will have done is to take a step towards restoring Lejaren Hiller’s place in the history of music; from that of a footnote in books on ambient and computer music to a place of honor for his unique prolific genius.
samples:
Read More
- Administrator
- Albums and Singles
Although split across some 20 tracks, the album consists mostly of "suites" of songs that are separated into smaller bite-sized pieces. Bookended by two variations of processed static ("Weisses Rauschen", or "white noise"), the pieces in between combine the usual selection of digitally manipulated sounds, but by way of 1960s early electronic composers, and even a bit of classical musical structures. The four parts of "Wellen und Felder" mix bass pulses and simplistic rhythms and tones, with orchestral like string tones giving the entire piece a classical vibe, even with the sub bass thumps and stuttering electronics.
On "Funksignal" a basic bleep/bloop rhythm and GameBoy snare skitters over cut up fragments of voice and MSP static crunch algorithms. The rhythm never really gets locked in though, and instead scurries about the track, which carires over into "Interferenz 1", which throws the now-overwrought sounds of wireless phone interference that gets boxed into a rhythmic structure, and the occasional piano stab cobbles it all together into some bizarre take on house music.
The series of "Mittlere Composition" tracks vary from violent noise blasts and random electronic noises on the first, to the organ like tones and arpeggiated synths, before ending with fake xylophone ascending/descending rhythms that could be pulled off of some 1970s middle school film strip. The closing cycle of "Weisses Rauschen" tracks puts the emphasis back on the classical elements, with the first piece showing a waltz-like pace and synthetic harp sounds alongside shrill insect calls that eventually adds in another series of GameBoy beats, the evil computer voice at the onset goes from growling to almost singing by the end.
This sinister computer voice is actually that of Kraftwerk's Florian Schneider, which gives the tracks on which he appears a sense of menace, like the all-powerful master computer growling out in clear, yet forceful German. The whole of this album though just doesn’t match its parts. It never feels like it takes off, but seems like a series of musical sketches that are not quite finished. There are good ideas here, but it resembles a collection of tracks more than a fully fleshed out album.
samples:
Read More
- Administrator
- Albums and Singles
With a slew of instruments at his disposal, Micka has the means to create haunting and unusual sonic combinations throughout the album, a trait that sets him apart from so many of the do-it-yourself electronic explorers out there. Chimes, oscillators, guitars, toy pianos and Jonah Sacks' cello are among the plethora of noise makers fed and looped through large dosages of reverb and delay. Never one to let the effects speak for themselves though, Micka proves himself an able craftsmen, and any effect here is used as an endorsement of and contributor to the greater structure of the work.
The lengthy "His Belly Burst" is a fitting example. Sacks' nimble cello line opens with a line evocative of a Japanese folk melody. Building off of that mood, the piece is crafted upward as lines overlap and loop into an electronic wash of blissful tonalities. Soon interspersed with glitching electronics and, eventually, thudding, militaristic power chords and careening drum lines, the work grows into a textural bath of tone and sharp, staccato punctuation before settling back into its beginnings. That the piece manages to incorporate so many elements in its 17 minutes without ever feeling superfluous is impressive enough, but Micka manages to guide the work into something far greater than the sum of its parts.
Each work here presents itself with a similar ear for dramatic lines and structural buildup. On "...and ever," a Neu!-like drum pulse leads to slinking guitar lines, thudding bass and, ultimately, a propulsive brand of head-bangable psychedelic riffage. While Micka's ability to extrapolate on these tiny musical cells and turn them into full scale works is no small accomplishment, and he does it with aplomb every time, the result does dabble toward slightly sterile terrain due mostly in part to its consistance. Even when lyrics slip in to the album for the first time halfway through "...and ever," it fits in so neatly among the other gadgety rhythms around it that the resultant feel is perhaps less surprising than intended.
This is by no means a deterrent against his approaches however. Some of these tracks reach truly unexpected heights while never straying too far from a certain breed of electronic-rock loop craftsmanship. Think Caribou but with a more proggy and less literal psychedelic sound. Micka also has the smarts to follow up his epic works with paired-down ones, and these provide smooth and necessary transitions between the three lengthy centerpieces of the album. The gently lilting guitar and wordless vocal melodies of "A Safe Place" rest atop an odd synthesized beat that manages to succeed in effect without shoving it down your throat.
The closing title track fittingly displays Micka's talents at their height, as low-end cello rumble, fragile guitar lines and panning clicks grow into a synthesized soup of gooey loop manipulations and Eno-esque ambiance. It all works beautifully, if it seems as though Micka could do this in his sleep. Sterilizing though that may be, the sincerity, skill and vision on display is exciting in a day when few manage to walk the line between experimental attitudes and near pop approachability with so finely attuned a vision.
samples:
Read More
- Administrator
- Albums and Singles
Pierre-Yves Macé has had a fairly atypical career for a contemporary classical composer. Despite his youth (he was born in 1980), he has already released three albums of electro-acoustic ensemble works (his debut album was released by John Zorn's Tzadik) and has opened for decidedly non-classical artists such as Matmos. He is currently working on a PhD in musicology with a specific interest on field recording. I suspect Passagenweg was conceptually birthed during those studies, but it does not seem especially sterile or academic.
The album opens in strange, yet some somewhat promising fashion. "Angelus Novus" gradually fades in with a dull, hobbling snare rhythm that is gradually eclipsed by the engulfing roar of a crackling and wavering sustained chord. Then the chord disappears, leaving a haunting, dreamlike waltz loop in its place.
After that, the album becomes very collage-y and difficult to discern where one track ends and another begins without staring unblinkingly at my CD player. A few tracks stand out as particularly enjoyable and coherent, however. "Il Principe il Ranocchio, 1" sustains a hazy ambience of schmaltzy strings and a churchbell that is intermittently encroached upon by field recordings and an exuberant antique piano recording. Eventually the schmaltzy strings seem to overpower the interloping elements, but then the loop is stretched and mangled before being abruptly cut out altogether. The following track is made up some submerged and seemingly understated glitchery, but then the track after that ("Ranocchio, 2") revisits the same string theme. It is unclear what it all means or how the glitch interlude is related. I suspect it isn't, but perhaps Macé's vision is simply too complex and enigmatic for me to grasp. Later, "Nocturnorama" essentially condenses the entire album into a 15 minute microcosm, shifting endlessly between scratchy big band recordings, radio dial-turning randomness, crackling melodramatic strings, and pastoral Eno/Budd ambience.
Passagenweg is a bit of complex and challenging listen, as a whole. It never achieves what I would call "beauty", but often attains a sort of creepy, otherworldly and bittersweet nostalgia. Lamentably, this mood is always quite fleeting, as the album is packed full of harsh juxtapositions, noise, and violent cut-ups. On the other hand, annoying repeating loops and unpleasant dissonance often unexpectedly transform into something shimmering, compelling, or unexpected. Surprises abound, both positive and otherwise.
The obvious peril with utilizing exotic source material for a sound-collaging is that listeners will find the raw materials more interesting than what you have done with them. Passagenweg does not entirely avoid this peril: there were many moments on the album where I dearly wished that Macé would stop chaotically mutilating and combining gramophone snippets and/or applying watery, insubstantial reverbed piano or strings and let the source material unfold without him. But, alas, that would not be Art. I'm afraid my sensibility clashes somewhat with Macé's, but there are a lot of unique textures and flashes of surreal inspiration here. Also, while Macé does an excellent job concealing his formal classical training, Passagenweg lacks the humor and perverseness that make vaguely similar forays by Nurse With Wound and The Caretaker so enjoyable. Someday this may grow on me more, but for now I think Passagenweg is an inspired near-miss.
samples:
Read More