Being thankful for an earful.
Brand new music by Marie Davidson, Niecy Blues (feat. Joy Guidry), CEL, Marisa Anderson and Luke Schneider, Stina Stjern, Carmen Villain, Murcof, A Lily, and Far Golden Pavilions, with music from the vaults by Tomaga, Ozzobia, Jan Jelinek.
Sushi photo by Lindsay.
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Geir Jenssen lives in a different world. From his Artic Circle perchthe man called Biosphere is building a body of work as iconoclastic asAphex Twin, with as much eerie remove and accidental influence. Albumslike Patashnik and Substrataare landmarks in ambient music not because they spawned a millionrip-offs but because they work within a recognizable stylisticblueprint to create absolutely alien music, threatening total immersionto even the most cautious of "background" listeners. Jenssen's last,2002's Shenzhou found him treading further towards alienatingextremes, something like a pitch-black homage to Debussy, withorchestra samples stretched thin and opaque across an ocean of icy,crevice-filled ambience (in other words, what we all wished Drukqs had been). Autour,commissioned by French radio last year, not only rejects anything closeto a wide "radio" audience, but it is by far the most trying Biosphererelease thus far, with Jenssen moving past the beat-less transparenciesbegun with Substrata and into a harsh meditation on deep-space,a 74-minute confined drift that begins well into the air-less upperregions and does not conclude until positioned hopelessly within adimensionless dump-off on the darker side of some heavenly body.Occupying a third of the disc's length, the opening "Translation" actslike the final kiss-off to Earth and the earthen sounds that often finda place in Biosphere music. A rebus of plastic tones, entwined withenough care to erase all human touch, becomes a sky-like ceiling withwhich groaning engine sounds and whining drones struggle in a pitilessslipping, past the threshold and into the heart of Autour. Apart from a track or two based around a few distorted samples from a 60s radio dramatization of Jules Verne's De la Terre à la Lune(the "focus" of the 2003 commission) and actual recordings of MIRastronauts, the majority of the disc develops a vacuous, unsettlingatmosphere made up of seriously subsonic bass frequencies and shrill,synthetic tones dividing and encasing the deliberate arcs and hiddentextures of each of the nine "movements." By the sixth track,"Circulaire," the trip has arrived at a false ending of sorts, anoff-putting climax where the piece grounds out to two dissentingsounds, one a near-inaudible below-bass pulse and the other thesinister calm of a solid flatline. From this remote place, more Onkyothan Eno, Jenssen really has nowhere to drift except slowly backtowards the beginning, to the lush plasticities of "Trombant," almostcoming full circle on the opening track but stopping short, allowingmelody and lush texture enough footing only to remind us of what hasbeen left behind. Melodies emerge, like the aimless cosmonaut voicesamples, as if beamed from a great distance, light years into theblack, like ghosts of a human presence long since abandoned. Autouris not easy listening, and if it doesn't stand as the most returnableplace in the Biosphere catalog, it's only because Jenssen has neversounded so remote and thoroughly haunting.
Empress has always been fond of devilishly deliberate songs, The Sounds They Madeis no different. Each tune is plucked and sung and crafted with utterconcentration, though without anything so technical which might requiresuch concentration. The obvious question is, "Why work with suchslowness?", or, "Why plod through songs through which even the mostrudimentary musician should be able to sprint?" The most convincinganswer I came up with was that the deliberateness prolongs thesensation and experience of the soft-spoken beauty of these songs. In"The Worry and the Wine," the initial melody sounds like the second daysessions of a self-taught guitarist just learning how to piece togethermusical sentences (such a guitar-wielding autodidact will stutter andstop and start again on some newfound melody, all the while clinging tothe elegance found within this newly discovered progression of sounds).The space between the notes becomes just as long (and as musical) asthe notes themselves. Each anticipatory moment between the notes hasthat air of potential mistake, where a sharp or flat tone could causethe song to fall apart or at least break down briefly. Yet the melodyhardly falters, and soon Nicola Hodgkinson's lovely vocals fade in andblanket the melody with a perfect complement. The effect is ratherstunning, like being witness to genesis of a modern indie lullaby. Theentire album is a collection of lullabies: hushed and soft-spokenvocals like windblown wisps of snow and guitars supplying notes onlywhere there is the barest of need. The novelty Empress adds to theirlullabies is a slight twist of electronics (echoey clicks and reverbswoop in between notes and swirl around playfully). "For Trains" has ajittery stop and start which sounds like the skipping of a CD (I wasquite convinced that my CD player's laser was doing quite a jig on thesurface of the CD) but then the crystalline and unwavering vocalsconfirm that it is pure artifice and not a surface scratch or faultydisc. The song itself (jittery music with smooth vocals) is an abrasivelisten and provides the hardest lullaby to listen to on the album. Itis not unpleasant exactly, but rather it is not the song to fall asleepto. Amidst the more fleshed-out numbers on the album are sometwo-minute spacers, songs in their barest form, skeletons almost. Theysubdivide the album with simple repeated themes, bringing the entiretimbre down to an even more narcotic level. Empress can sometimes beelusive with their quietude, so be careful that the few songs on thealbum which demand a more alert listen do not pass by too softly.
With their tenth album, this Portland collective manages to release awildly organic mix of electronics and jazz that blends both avant-gardetendencies with more traditional song structures. Behind the Barberstartsoff with the introductory percussion rhythms and building electronic,string, and brass chaos of "Do The Slim Jim" before launching into thethe sprawling 16-minute "Slits Aranda." The track starts off with mutedbrass chords and shimmering cymbals that would not have been out ofplace on Miles Davis's Sketches of Spain before moving into apropulsive jazz sketch complete with female vocals and bellowingsaxophone courtesy of Jackie-O Motherfucker's Jeff Brown. The trackthen slides into a stew of horns and improvisational reeds beforepicking up again in the final three minutes with the original thumpingbass, percussion, and saxophone for a return to the track's main theme.While "Slits Aranda" shows Rollerball at their best, mixing traditionalstructure with avant-grade notions, other tracks highlight the band'sability to collaborate with guest artists. On "Burning Light," Portlandelectronic artist Nudge molds the band's sound in a way thatdeconstructs the various percussive and melodic elements, mixing eachinstrument (vocals included) to produce a cohesive blend that allowseach sound to retain its individual timbre. In the final three tracksof the album, Rollerball shifts into experimental mode, tinkering withgenres ranging from dub to free-form jazz. Behind the Barber'sfinal track, "Fake Tan," dissolves into a mix of a electronic chaos andmystical chants with a slow and chilling fade that ends the album on amore subtle note. 
This four-track, 16-minute CD marks the first collaboration between twoof the prime movers of experimental sound. The brevity of the albummakes it somewhat difficult to get a handle on. Over the years, I'vecome to expect long-form, immersive soundscapes from both of theseartists - whether the long, shape-shifting textural drones of Organumor the multiple-part conceptual movements of Z'ev. At about fourminutes each, each of these tracks seem oddly truncated, resolvingthemselves just as they begin to become interesting. With artists asintelligent and purposeful as these, I'm not ready to assume that thiswas a miscalculation or just plain laziness. Rather, the brevity of Tinnitus Vumay be a reflection of its theme, which in this case appears to behearing loss. Tinnitus is an affliction of hearing in which thesufferer hears persistent buzzing, high-pitched ringing, televisionstatic or wind noise. David Jackman and Stefan Weisser both apparentlysuffer from intermittent tinnitus, and this work can be seen as anattempt to accurately reflect the experience of this hearing disorderto the unafflicted listener. Each piece begins and ends with a few barsof piano, but in between is an electronic storm of thought-cancelingwhite noise, curling metallic drones, and undifferentiated swarms ofwhat sound like tiny robotic gnats. The effect is quite brilliant atmoments, especially towards the end of the third track, when for amoment I thought that my hearing actually had dropped out for a moment,as sometimes happens the day after a particularly loud concert. Thiswas merely an auditory illusion borne of the cleverly renderedproduction of the track. There is none of Z'ev's trademark percussionin the mix, at least not in any recognizable form, so the album ends upcloser in sound to Organum's work, which is not a bad thing. In theend, I was left wanting more from this collaboration, and it looks likeI may get my wish soon, as a full-length collaboration is planned forrelease soon on Die Stadt. 
This gap-filler disc from Murcof is Leaf's way to buy time and keep the name fresh before the release of the next proper Murcof album, but it's no less inspired, all the same. Beginning with a 10 minute epic of film score orchestration and minimal techno thump, Utopia establishes early on that Murcof is dealing with a larger scope and a more developed tone than many of his contemporaries. Jan Jelenik's clicky, jazz-spliced remix of "Maiz" is the perfect groovy counterpoint to the album's creeping, moody opener. Sutekh gives "Memoria" a tweaked techno workout with plenty of glitches and squiggles that pop out over the monotone bassline and piano chord. "Utano" blends dark cello and brass timbres with twinkling electronic percussion for a while, then drops out the techno trappings for a more experimental approach to the cinematic loops and swells that other artists tend to leave in the background. It's refreshing for someone working with beats not to make the beats the primary focus for a change, and Murcof is able to bend and arrange sounds with a composer's rather than dj's ear. The remaining remixes are mostly placid and unremarkable; not an affront to the source material but certainly not as clever as they'd like to be or as necessary. "Una," the second to last of the un-remixed tracks takes symphonic and operatic fragments and glues them to a stuttering dsp-laden beat that is just short of club-friendly, but not so overblown as to draw unneccessary attention to itself. The "Colleen Mix" of "Muim" could easily figure in a Chris Nolen film as its all backwards pianos and heavy string passages that conjure up the grimy noir of "Memento" and the slick isolation of "Insomnia" equally. The remixes are all solid, sometimes taking an ambient detour that's welcome amidst the electrobeats, but Murcof's originals clearly stand out as the best tracks here. If nothing else, Utopia performs its role by making a case for watching for the forthcoming album and possibly for picking up the back catalog. 
Mnemosyne's debut album builds slowly with a solid if sleepy foundation of guitar, bass, and drums that wouldn't sound out of place in the Kranky or Constellation stables. The Toronto trio is fronted (if that's really the right word) by experimental guitarist Aidan Baker, whose voice on the title track rises just barely above a whisper in a style reminiscent of early Labradford. But from there, Mnemosyne depart from the somnambulant formula of muted minimalism by swelling guitars up with distortion and kicking in drums and crashing cymbals. The result is a bit darker, more psychadelic, and more varied than their post-rock forebares, but it also results in something that probably has a much wider appeal. It wouldn't be far off to imagine my stoner friends from High School who went to Pink Floyd laser light shows getting seriously into Mnemosyne's hypnotic twirls of guitar and dubbed-out percussion, but recovering goths will also appreciate the atmosphere of tracks like "Dark Grove" and "Unreal Space." Thankfully, Mnemosyne seem less concerned with whether they are impressing the weepy Projekt crowd or the Drag City chin strokers, and they carry on making moody, genre-hopping space rock. Occassionally, as on the 12 minute album closer "Aqualisp," the instrumentation gets a bit too dry and literal, causing the psyche-improv to drift uncomfortably close to jam-band territory where it feels like every instrument needs room for a solo. Luckily, Rodin Columb's straightforward bass holds everything together just long enough for the band to get back on track as they rip into the loudest creshendo (saved somewhat predictably for the end). Though they never really achieve all out ROCK, they do manage to crank the volume, distortion, and delay on everything to give the album's trip a final dose of hash-fueled paranoia. Alhough Mnemosyne can easily be seen as a confluence of influences that have done this sort of thing before, their own take on a soundtrack for that bad-acid trip is well worth exploring. It somehow manages to be both familiar and disorienting at the same time which is kind of creepy, but good. 
Having listened to and zoned out on this release at least half a dozen times, it should be obvious what it is that is so compelling about [sic]'s compositions of dusty long drones, deep ambient spaces and bump-in-the-night tension, but it's not. On the one hand, this is difficult listening: all uneasy sounds and dischordant timbres rubbing up against one another to create an ambiguous feeling of dread. On the other hand, for those familiar with the work of like-minded artists like those featured on the quasi-legendary "Isolationism" compilation, [sic] fits perfectly into a already-defined niche of dark, brooding ambient characterized more by its claustrophobia than by its use reflection of space as an expanse. I could tell you that Gorilla Masking Tape is a beautiful, haunting record, or that it's alpha-wave inducing at the right volume, or that it's a perfectly quiet record for people who lead unquiet lives, but none of that really captures the force that these tracks embody. Perhaps the record's most defining characteristic is that it is indeed so malleable that it can be both loud and quiet, both serene and disturbed, both beautiful and terrifying and that it does all of this effortlessly. I often wonder what more can be said about music like this that is both barely there and a force of nature all at once, depending on your volume knob. I always think that it will be impossible for someone to release yet another essential dark ambient disc in a world where artists who do this sort of thing tend to have voluminous discographies of equally affecting work already. I think that, and then I hear a record like Gorilla Masking Tape and it suddenly all sounds fresh and important and essential again and I'm left wanting more. It doesn't get much better than that.
I'm getting quite sick of hearing this familiar thread in music: somonedecides to write a melody, throw some neat effects over it, add asplattering of acoustic instrumentation in and call it a great songthat borders on the experimental. The truth is, music like Enik's isbecoming more and more predictable all of the time. There's nothingcourageous or creative about changing the sonic template of rock musicby adding cabaret elements and electronic palettes of noise. When theshit hits the fan, the only thing that can save a record like this oneis good song-writing. Enik has an obviously enormous range ofinfluences that cover a spectrum from classical and jazz music to thestuttering and sick beat-heavy compositions of electronic music. Theproblem with this six-song EP is that it never leaves its influencesbehind and strikes new ground; it never does anything but try toemulate something far too familiar. This fact leaves Without a Barkfeeling flashy and without substance. "Chaos the Drug" is a goodexample of how bad metaphor, melodrama, and overproduction can kill asong. Forget that Enik is actively trying to combine a near-metal vocaltendency with dramatic washes of erratic percussion, typically brokenkeyboards, and something like a bass guitar stuck on two or three notesand way overplayed; the whole of this song sounds half-assed. It's asthough the vocals were meant to be deep and meaningful, but they comeaway feeling as badly performed as some of Alec Baldwin's earlyattempts at being an actor. There's passion in Enik's voice, but hisdelivery doesn't exactly match up with the music. "Tired Heads" suffersfrom a similar problem. There's a bare piano part being rolled alongeasily undernearth a toy drum machine sound while Enik croons away likehe's talking to a child that's asleep in its baby carriage anyways. Ifeel like I'm being lied to when I listen to this. Quite frankly Idon't believe in whatever whimsical notions Enik might have and that'senough to spoil these 24 minutes of music for me. Without a Barkis most predictable in its attitude and arrangement: Enik wants to bedifferent, so he employs a wide array of musical styles to hide thefact that he doesn't really have any ideas that haven't been used upbefore. Predictable in its diversity, painfully derivative, and lackingaltogether in some appeal that exists beyond its influences, Enik haswritten an album that will appeal to a lot of people stuck on badradio, bad television, and bad soundtracks, but there's nothing aboutit that makes it stand out from the sea of releases already doing thesame damn thing.
If they are to be believed, Thad Calabrese and Justin Foley met at acamp for wayward young men that was meant to treat feelings ofhomosexuality and to eliminate them. Rather than use this as the basisfor so much melodrama and angst to crash their prom a la Saved!,the two went on to forge anthems of fury and naked aggression, set tothe punishing sounds of a full volume drum machine that seems to borrowall its sounds from old Slayer and Heathen records. The two have analmost easy connection, playing bass and guitar over the snare smacksand cymbal crashes in a kind of symbiotic synchronization. Then, Foleysings, or tries to sing, and his voice cracks trying to sustainit all, singing about unfulfilled prophecies, disease, and otherunrelated and thrown together nonsense. It surely is not meant to be asfunny as it is, and there is a genuine passion to the inflections overthe fairly standard guitar buzz and bass-through-weak-amp tomfoolery.Unfortunately, the band lacks direction, letting their epics sprawl outpast a nine-minute mark that they should never see, and more phrasesthat don't connect. The songs use the exact same drum, guitar, and basssounds, like they were never moved or experimented with during therecording of this EP, and share the exact same tempo. Foley, for allthe passion he exudes, merely comes off like Blaise Bailey Finneganwith less taste in plagarizing. There's spaces where there shouldn'tbe, and long passages of the same notes played for far too long, likethe duo are searching for an idea while they play. They find a few, butnone of them are really noteworthy or even all that good. Maybe it'sthe age of the recordings and they've advanced a lot, but I doubt it.They kind of know their limitations, or so the lyrics seem to suggest,as Foley howls "I knew this ride would never last" and other fatalistremarks. They're probably right if they continue on like this, asthere's very little in these songs to latch on to for more than a fewseconds.samples:
Paul Dickow is submerged in the hazy underworld of drugs, secrets, andfailing memory. His music is a borderline between narcotic dreams andreality; there is no certainty in the melodies and beats that flowsteadily through these seven songs, but rhythms do emerge and gasprecognizably without fail. Strategy's newest release is march towardscontradiction. There are dub rhythms bobbing back and forth throughoutthe watery synthesizers and echoed noises, but they never seem to headanywhere. All the while, without giving notice, they morph and changewith the highlighted melodies and uneasy motions of the music. Dickowhas played with Fontanelle, Nudge, and Emergency, as well as remixedmaterial for Stars As Eyes, and this material sounds at as uniquecompared to the rest of his work. Despite the title of the CD, there'snothing Max Roach or Bill Bruford about these songs; they're all asteady flow of not quite intelligible words, sounds, and heartbeats. Attimes, like on "Drumsolo's Delight," the drums play a more noticablerole than on the rest of the record, but they always seem like they'rebeing choked underneath a mass of effects and late nighthallucinations. Nothing moves quickly enough to escape my ears, butnone of the sounds rest on a firm ground; this gives Drumsolo's Delightan uneasy delivery. At times the slow motion eruptions and naturaldevelopments are appealing and at other times they are painfully slowand do nothing for me. Sleeping music this might be, something to beplayed in the background, but it rarely moves or evolves in a way thatmakes active listening a joy. There are exceptions to this rule,however, as other parts of the record are compelling in their aquaticsway. "The Jazzy Drumsolo" is an excellent merging or steady rhythms,repetitive melodies, and noise-driven tangents. As various sounds seepout of the background, the rhythms and melodies shift and becomesomething entirely different. When some element of the track wears itswelcome away, another piece of the picture slides into view andcontinues to carry the music away in a floating drift. I'm not usuallya fan of something this direct. All the sounds are quite obviouslylaptop or keyboard-oriented and there's little to no variation in thedirection of any of the songs (they all sound like perpetual chillmotors made for slowing the heart down), but Drumsolo's Delightkept me strangely interested. I never moved to change the songshalf-way through their duration and I never once stopped and thought tomyself, "I hope this ends soon." I could deal with a bit more diversityor at least some surprising changes because the nature of this recordlends itself towards the obvious and simple. The whole album soundslike the color blue and that color never really changes from track totrack. Everything marches steadily on into infinity, until Dickowdecides to shut everything down. This record has its good moments, butthere's nothing fantastic about it that makes me want to listen to itagain and again. -
This gap-filler disc from Murcof is Leaf's way to buy time and keep thename fresh before the release of the next proper Murcof album, but it'sno less inspired, all the same. Beginning with a 10 minute epic of filmscore orchestration and minimal techno thump, Utopiaestablishes early on that Murcof is dealing with a larger scope and amore developed tone than many of his contemporaries. Jan Jelenik'sclicky, jazz-spliced remix of "Maiz" is the perfect groovy counterpointto the album's creeping, moody opener. Sutekh gives "Memoria" a tweakedtechno workout with plenty of glitches and squiggles that pop out overthe monotone bassline and piano chord. "Utano" blends dark cello andbrass timbres with twinkling electronic percussion for a while, thendrops out the techno trappings for a more experimental approach to thecinematic loops and swells that other artists tend to leave in thebackground. It's refreshing for someone working with beats not to makethe beats the primary focus for a change, and Murcof is able to bendand arrange sounds with a composer's rather than dj's ear. Theremaining remixes are mostly placid and unremarkable; not an affront tothe source material but certainly not as clever as they'd like to be oras necessary. "Una," the second to last of the un-remixed tracks takessymphonic and operatic fragments and glues them to a stutteringdsp-laden beat that is just short of club-friendly, but not sooverblown as to draw unneccessary attention to itself. The "ColleenMix" of "Muim" could easily figure in a Chris Nolen film as its allbackwards pianos and heavy string passages that conjure up the grimynoir of "Memento" and the slick isolation of "Insomnia" equally. Theremixes are all solid, sometimes taking an ambient detour that'swelcome amidst the electrobeats, but Murcof's originals clearly standout as the best tracks here. If nothing else, Utopia performs its role by making a case for watching for the forthcoming album and possibly for picking up the back catalog.
