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The first surprise comesbefore you've even played the second Silo album - Swim have launchedtheir first illuminated 'digipack'. I have well over half the CD'sColin Newman and Malka Spigel have released on their label since theyrealised back in the early 90's that they could do a better job ofgetting Malka's 'Rosh Ballata' album to the ears of those who wanted tolisten than anyone else, and this is the first 'digipack' I've seen. Imuch prefer them to brittle 'jewel cases' and the cover photo of rowsof glowing light bulbs resting on green grass is well served bycardboard.
The second surprise is the cover. Although it looks like a JonWozencroft design, the light bulbs were captured by the lens of MikkelTjellesen and layout is credited to Christine Cato. It looksquintessentially Swim though; at first glance I thought the lights weresunkenly illuminating a sea bed.
The image is so perfectly matched to these three Danes' slowlyunfurling beatscapes that one hardly needs the clue of the title - analloy being a mix of metals to create a new, more useful or resilientmetal. The musical adventures of Soren Dahlgaard, Frederik Ammitzbolland Mikel Bender are all mixed up into something which doesn't soundquite like anything else. The closest comparison I could field would beGerman avant-pop synth trio Kreidler, but Silo employ heavier beatswhich seem to slide almost imperceptibly across diagonally rather thanforward. Much has been said about the absence of 4/4 beats in this'Alloy'.
Once the CD was in the CD player, the first track wasn't such asurprise. 'Bulk' had already appeared as work in progress closing the'Swim Team 1' sampler and suggested that Silo might be pursuing theextended hypnotic elements of their debut 'In Star'. They've polishedup the 'Bulk' with some melodic additions, but maybe because the titleseems to suggest it, it seems to have the feel of a large ship cuttingslowly through calm waters. And the hypnotic elements are certainly onboard from fore to aft. There's an all-time great segue into the faster'Prime Movers'. A lot of thought appears to have gone into the tracksequence, so that the album flows in an addictive mesmeric stream ofoff-beats and techno informed slow rock. It's 'real head nod shit'according to Colin Newman. I couldn't guarantee any lasting laxativeeffect, but it may well move you!
The nine tracks often give the impression that they've been worked onconcurrently and elements from one seem to reappear as echoes inanother. Vocals are sparing and atmospheric and the only one wordsticks in my mind after repeated spins but is a lyric which seems oddlyapt and descriptive: 'Structure'.
The last couple of tracks break away from the rest of the albumsomewhat but still sound of a piece. 'Those adopted by people' is thefastest and probably most danceable track, sounding almost likeImmersion. 'Repose' closes 'Alloy' with a deep bass drone and revolvinghigher pitched (guitar?) sample, and proves that Silo don't need a beatto hypnotise. It'd be nice if its four minute lifespan was increasedthreefold.
Silo have surpassed themselves with an essentially unique beat-drivenmix that sounds at once organic and machine chrome tough. - Graeme Rowland
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- Alex Krieger
- Albums and Singles
Describing the way Autechre sounds hasn't been easy since theirmind-blowing 1995 release, "Tri Repetae." As far as anyone can figure,the closest Autechre get to occupying a genre is probably electro ordetroit techno. But Autechre have a seemingly bottomless bag of trickswhen it comes to sonic manipulation: blender-style waves of distortion,sliced-and-diced vocal gibberish, bursts of deafening static, too-fastspidery percussion, low-pitched hums and thumps — and occasionaldelicate, lucid-dreaming melodies made from synths or strings.
There's one of these right at the start of the 9-minute "Gelk," thefirst of four tracks on "Peel Sessions 2." Accompanied by a tentativetapping, it grips you by the hair and pulls you all the way down thescale into a pair of earth-shaking bass tones, then repeats itself, andafter a few seconds of this everything starts echoing in the mostinteresting way. It's classic Autechre, straight off of "ChiasticSlide" or "LP5" — but then, three minutes in, the song shifts without ahitch into what sounds like a lunatic plucking at a detuned grandpiano, those thick hums stuttering and twisting as the pace slows, doesa pirouette, and turns itself into a blunted breakbeat. At the sevenminute mark, the beat disappears, gongs ringing as a totally differentmelody is eked from the high strings.
Irritatingly, this masterpiece is followed up by "Bifil," a juddering,thumping juggernaut of a song improved only by the eventual inclusionof an alien whimpering and babbling behind all the noise. Hit fastforward and save yourself the mental effort of trying to make sense ofit. Next comes "Gaekwad," which demonstrates Autechre's unique abilityto fashion a groove out of the sound of a bag of marbles dumped outonto a glass tabletop. Synthetic chimes and bells ring in thebackground while the beats skitter all over the place, speeding up andslowing down, growing louder and softer at random. The track gets acreepy edge as warped samples of dogs barking and laughter filter intowards the end. Lastly there's "19 Headaches," another bit ofunfathomable, or perhaps improvisational ("Quick! We need another trackto round out the set!") Autechre jitteriness. Lots of finger-walking upand down keyboards and weird, shuffling percussion, completely bizarreand almost unlistenable.
For folks who already like the duo, this bargain-priced EP is worth itjust for "Gelk" — fanatics on the other hand would probably somethingmore from the other tracks as well. Those new to Autechre, "LP5" andthe insane masterpiece that is "Tri Repetae" are waiting for you — buyone of them instead and save yourself the trouble of sitting throughthe filler.
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samples:
- Loop Finder General - Shave My Head
- Bo Square - Numbers
- DHS - House of God (Jack Dangers Remix)
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- Diane Lewis
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- Mark Weddle
- Albums and Singles
German Jan Jelinek has recorded since 1998, also as Farben and Gramm, and this is his debut album for Stefan Betke's (aka Pole) ~scape label. According to the press release Jelinek feeds '60s and '70s jazz records into his sampler to glean single seconds for source material. These micro loops are then cut and pasted into a sonic collage with aid of the sampler's modulation wheel. The result is not so much jazz but something similar to Chain Reaction styled wash techno and, not surprisingly, the minimized glitch dub of Pole. In fact, if it weren't for the press release, I would not have known that jazz was involved in this at all. Jelinek's ear for melody and depth is verily apparent in that he shapes the appropriated warm and fuzzy digital bits into eight pleasant 5 to 8 minute head nodders. "Moiré (Piano & Organ)" and "Moiré (Strings) create the shimmering pattern for which they're named through, apparently, piano, organ and string notes. "Rock in the Video Age" and "Tendency" are the most dance oriented tracks. That's about all I can say. Nice stuff. Oh yes, the digipack is a lovely shade of peach.
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- Mark Weddle
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"Iron" is the third full length from COH, aka Ivan Pavlov, follow-up proper to 1998's "Enter Tinnitus" and the second release from his own Wavetrap Records. It comes in a thin foldup with cover art created by hot iron pressed to media, the 'wavetrap' logo inside beneath the disc curiously misspelled 'wavecrap'. Past COH albums have been presented as 'pop' and 'disco' while this one is literally dedicated to 'heavy metal fans all over the world'. How serious are we to take this? Some track titles are obvious tongue in cheek takes on various 'classic' metal tunes: "Love Mites" ("Love Bites" by Judas Priest), "For Whom the Dell Falls" ("For Whom the Bell Tolls" by Metallica) and "Rubbing Free" ("Running Free" by Iron Maiden). Others seem to reference other things: "Annum Per Annum [Pärt 2]" pays homage, at least in title, to the organ work of Estonian composer Arvo Pärt while "Now! [4'19" into 2000]" serves as sequel/reaction to the raster-noton "20' to 2000" series which COH took part in. Obviously Pavlov's wry sense of humor and irony (pun intended) are, as always, at play here too. Regardless, I do think that much of this is indeed influenced by metal music. The 8 tracks are within the 4 to 7 minute range and are undoubtedly songs with refined structures. Layers of computer derived clean/distorted tones, drones, static, squiggles, pops and plunks replace guitars and double bass drums with buzz saw vibrations and rhythmic pulsations. It certainly sounds and feels more like COH than Slayer ... quiet and playful in some places and quite ominous and 'heavy' in others. The joke may be on me, but either way I love it. Pavlov is currently expanding "Netmörk" from the "emre [dark matter]" compilation into a full length album to be released by souRce research recordings later this year .
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- Jessica Tibbits
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While browsing the website of a local record store, I happened to come across a soundfile clip of Ladytron's song "Discotraxx." This 90 second fragment was so impressive that I didn't hesitate to run out and pick up the Liverpool quartet's debut full-length, '604'. Slick, sexy, and well-produced tracks chock-full of synths and drum machines dominate the album, replete with absurdly contagious hooks. '604' opens with the erotic dissonance of sleazy instrumental "Mu-tron" and subsequently provides club anthems for the ebony-haired, black-clad sombre youths straight out of the Saturday Night Live skit "Sprockets." The vocals lend a dark side to the unadulterated electronic bliss: the icy, detatched lyrics, Ladytron's tongue-in-cheek salute to 80s materialism, are sung by the two female members of the group; one with a sugary-sweet voice which serves as an excellent contrast to the lyrics, and the other with a heavy Bulgarian accent contributing to the album's pervasive mock-Eurotrash aesthetic. '604' runs the gamut from Morodor-esque disco in tracks such as the brilliant "Playgirl" to the stripped-down pop sensibilities of Kraftwerk (Ladytron's "He Took Her To a Movie" bears a suspicious resemblance to "The Model"), yet manages add more unusual elements like bongos and a squeaky violin sporadically on various tracks. Despite all its marvelous melodies and decadent basslines, the one small disappointment of '604' is its anti-climactic finish: the two weakest and least interesting tracks on the album are the ones to close it out. Nevertheless, after it's all said and done, Ladytron does not fail to deliver a quite delicious release that hasn't left my CD player since I bought it.
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