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David Jackman, "Verhalte Dich Ruhig"
A perfect assemblage of absurd clichés has been collected here by Organum's David Jackman. The cover and title both suggest something of both the dark and sinister mindsets: 'Verhalte Dich Ruhig' translates to English literally as 'Keep yourself calm,' but more aggressively could be referred to as 'Duck and cover'. The picture, on the other hand, may have been taken in an abandoned concentration camp or some completely harmless old house in Germany, but you'll never know for sure.
The old tactics of anti-information are omnipresent here: artist, title, catalogue number, label name and that's it. Everything else is grey aside from the picture (which gets repeated in the inlet once more in case you've accidently spilt your cup of coffee or your young niece made it look nicer with the addition of crayon-drawn flowers). Unsurprisingly, the disc is limited and the total playing time (of just about 30 minutes) is properly split in two parts of equal length. (This could have been perfect for a multi-color 10" vinyl release, but the value-for-money question arises once more. But is it only the length that counts?) At first I thought the music was some fooling around with neo-classical recordings but after listening more closely, I'm pretty sure it's taken completely of some of Hollywood's Golden Era. Perhaps it could be Alfred Hitchcock, perhaps something completely different - I can't tell exactly. All the kitsch, the pathetic over-emotional glory, drama and the unreal passion is displayed for the sake of entertainment and it actually works as a quite comforting soundtrack to various daily duties as any good pop music should do. The same music packed in some nice baby pink and light blue artwork with some lighthearted design of 1940's girls or movie scenario would have made more sense. However, this is probably his special sense of humor which isn't meant to reach everyone at first, or, as I said above, he just wants to point his finger on the current avant-garde cliché and have a laugh on his own.
 
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