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Asmus Tietchens, "FT+"
Crouton
FT is for Folktales, a series of three sets of three 3"CDs that Crouton has released over recent years, each disc devoted to asingle artist of electroacoustic, experimental electronic, or impovorientation. For a finale, this full-length disc finds Tietchens'remixing all three triptychs, producing nine individual tracks, each apredictably drastic reinterpretation of its source disc. While the "+"might suggest a thickening of each track into the kind of throbbing,gray industro-ambiance that made Tietchens' name the mark of quality ontoo many lost cassette comps from decades past, his approach here ismuch more subtractive, closer to the brutally minimal, ascetictechnique begun somewhere around the more recent Menge series.The new mixes reduce nearly every track to a widely-scattered array ofsound fragments, never slipping into glitch-like impressionism, ratherworking through a pensive, reserved process of manipulation, eachcompressed or bloated bit of sound dust given ample, isolated space.Tietchens seems intent on discovering (or creating), in each piece,those moments which stare blankly back from the disc's digital sheen,which appear absent of any relation to the whole yet arrive with acryptic, almost mocking air. The artist has always kept his dark, wilysense of humor in the background of his releases (often highlighted bya E.M. Cioran aphorism or two), and this disc is no exception. The jokehere, for me at least, is that Tietchens is, more than ever, toyingwith the idea of creating music where human touch has absolutely nosignificance. The punch line comes with the realization that Tietchensis remixing others' compositions, making his job necessarily harder. Each disc in the original Folktalesseries was conceptualized around the idea of narrative, with thevarious artists essentially telling stories through sound, makingTietchens accomplishment, though idiosyncratic itself, an effectiveerasure of the others' storytelling. His reconstructions could not bemore remote; I'm even wary of using an adjective like "cold" for fearof suggesting that anything atmospheric emerges. The minisculecrunches, warped thuds, and deadened hums that become windows into theoriginal recordings do allow for glimpses into the unique flowand sonorous quality of each, however Tietchens displays a tested skillfor introducing shards of melody or motion while almost simultaneouslyenacting their disappearance. It's as if wrapped up in each stuntedswell, each vestige of previous creator and previous completion, isevidence of a fundamental insubstantiality. The artist's talents aremost remarkable when applied to the coarse saxophone and violincompositions from Bhob Rainey and Dan Warburton. Tietchens is able toretain the distinctiveness of each instrument, even allowing for a fewmelodic intervals to take shape, but he completely rejects any of thepersonality that comes with such age-old devices, turning them on anangle that emphasizes only their existence as machines, simpleconveyances of empty sound. While on paper the artist's modus operandihas all the charm of a night spent sleeping on a board, rest assuredthat Tietchens does not let the potential for enjoyment slip throughthe cracks. He understands the audacity of his place within the littlecharade he's created and takes care to make the results more appealingthan FT+'s faux-laboratory chart cover would indicate. This ismerely Tietchens as E.M. Cioran's fatalistic hero, playing theinvisible hand of time, sweeping the folklore to the hens with a smileon his face.
FT is for Folktales, a series of three sets of three 3"CDs that Crouton has released over recent years, each disc devoted to asingle artist of electroacoustic, experimental electronic, or impovorientation. For a finale, this full-length disc finds Tietchens'remixing all three triptychs, producing nine individual tracks, each apredictably drastic reinterpretation of its source disc. While the "+"might suggest a thickening of each track into the kind of throbbing,gray industro-ambiance that made Tietchens' name the mark of quality ontoo many lost cassette comps from decades past, his approach here ismuch more subtractive, closer to the brutally minimal, ascetictechnique begun somewhere around the more recent Menge series.The new mixes reduce nearly every track to a widely-scattered array ofsound fragments, never slipping into glitch-like impressionism, ratherworking through a pensive, reserved process of manipulation, eachcompressed or bloated bit of sound dust given ample, isolated space.Tietchens seems intent on discovering (or creating), in each piece,those moments which stare blankly back from the disc's digital sheen,which appear absent of any relation to the whole yet arrive with acryptic, almost mocking air. The artist has always kept his dark, wilysense of humor in the background of his releases (often highlighted bya E.M. Cioran aphorism or two), and this disc is no exception. The jokehere, for me at least, is that Tietchens is, more than ever, toyingwith the idea of creating music where human touch has absolutely nosignificance. The punch line comes with the realization that Tietchensis remixing others' compositions, making his job necessarily harder. Each disc in the original Folktalesseries was conceptualized around the idea of narrative, with thevarious artists essentially telling stories through sound, makingTietchens accomplishment, though idiosyncratic itself, an effectiveerasure of the others' storytelling. His reconstructions could not bemore remote; I'm even wary of using an adjective like "cold" for fearof suggesting that anything atmospheric emerges. The minisculecrunches, warped thuds, and deadened hums that become windows into theoriginal recordings do allow for glimpses into the unique flowand sonorous quality of each, however Tietchens displays a tested skillfor introducing shards of melody or motion while almost simultaneouslyenacting their disappearance. It's as if wrapped up in each stuntedswell, each vestige of previous creator and previous completion, isevidence of a fundamental insubstantiality. The artist's talents aremost remarkable when applied to the coarse saxophone and violincompositions from Bhob Rainey and Dan Warburton. Tietchens is able toretain the distinctiveness of each instrument, even allowing for a fewmelodic intervals to take shape, but he completely rejects any of thepersonality that comes with such age-old devices, turning them on anangle that emphasizes only their existence as machines, simpleconveyances of empty sound. While on paper the artist's modus operandihas all the charm of a night spent sleeping on a board, rest assuredthat Tietchens does not let the potential for enjoyment slip throughthe cracks. He understands the audacity of his place within the littlecharade he's created and takes care to make the results more appealingthan FT+'s faux-laboratory chart cover would indicate. This ismerely Tietchens as E.M. Cioran's fatalistic hero, playing theinvisible hand of time, sweeping the folklore to the hens with a smileon his face.
