Utterly riveting modernist composition by NWW’s Andrew Liles, twisting influence from original ‘50s and ‘60s avant garde pioneers into a conceptual suite concerned with “the impotence of the masses living in the shadow of military, economic and political institutions”, and suitably sleeved in pictures of Tony and Cherie Blair before make-up (or after the mob gets ‘em).
Using a range of sonic signifiers for power, oppression and gloom such as church bells, blackened minor key baroque themes and deflated, limpid choral discord, each diffused and smeared across the stern field in a toxic miasma, Liles conjures a feeling of deep, pensive unease that strongly resonates with his conceptual intent in The Power Elite.
In typical NWW or Liles fashion, the suite proceeds seamlessly thru the gloom with scarcely any handrails to guide the way, and the ones that do appear tend to dissolve with warning, leaving his spectrally diaphanous, morphing projections as the only source of light to cling onto.
With discomfiting effect, he queasily emulates a state of submission and helplessness, allowing sounds to wash over the listener in a stilted, curdling flow of disjointed information, perhaps requiring the listener to act as non-passive impedance or resistance in order to properly process his aesthetic as rhetoric.
-via Boomkat
More information about Andrew Liles can be found here.
