LOCRIAN - drenched lands

(CD, small doses / at war with false noise)

The Chicago adepts of dark urban heaviness have made themselves quite a name in the sombre, bass-filled and drone-affine corners of the fringe music universe, but "drenched lands" is their first real, full release. I know, there have been some more in the meantime, and they have registered quite some good reviews, but this one is nevertheless still worth a lot. And I don't mean money. No, their mix of dark droning basses and synthie harmonies has been called "an alien beauty" for a reason. Because it is able to suck you into its bleak dystopia of urban landscapes and human despair. And even though a lot of people like to connect such images with coming times, apocalypse or the future, I do believe all of this is already here. Anyway, it is monolithic and dark, and sounds like something big burning in the distance, coming closer. When the vocals set in, you already feel doomed. Don't ask what these lands are drenched with. This CD also contains the hitherto only available as LP "greyfield shrines". Good music to read "The Road" by Cormac MacCarthy to.

www.small-doses.com

www.atwarwithfalsenoise.com

SLOWCREAM - and

(CD, nonine)

Me Raabenstein, the mastermind behind Slowcream and Nonine Records, has moved a long way musically in the last year with his projects. While the first Slowcream album I had the pleasure to listen to, "live long and prosper" was still somewhere in the regions of deep electronics or ambient, the new one here, entitled "and" is something completely different. In the beginning it sounds like modern composition with string sections (some of them done by Greg Haines) and muted horn sections, something only heard a few times a year on public, classical radio (because only big public stations have the funds to stage something like this). And then a jazzy, lonely night-time saxophone sets in. And that is only the beginning. "And" is always a connector, a something signifying something else and in this respect itself not meaning anything semantically apart from the connection of two other meanings, therefore only three letters but of big importance. The five tracks on "and" are named after kinds of perceptions, such as "pressure", "temperature", "vibration", "moisture" and "texture". Maybe it is these kinds of things that are being connected here. On the other hand, all the tracks sounds like lonely walks through a nighttime city, with the streets still wet from the rain and the air cool and fresh. The time of night when anything at all is possible. It is a hunch, but it might turn out true, that Raabensteins work as compiler of the "XVI reflections on classical music" CD, that was all about the connections between modern electronics and classical music, was a milestone in his own progress as an artist.

www.nonine.com

SNAKE FIGURES ARKESTRA - cooks & devils

(3"CD, Zangimusic)

This little CD contains twenty minutes of the finest of electroacoustic improvisation I have heard this year. Snake Figures Arkestra (2009 definitely was the year that the term "arkestra" gained a global reach...) is Ignaz Schick (also known from Perlonex or Black Snakes and many many collaborations ) on turntables, objects, organ pipes, bows and other electronics and Marcel Türkowsky (also known from Datashock and projects and collaborations) on a modified walkmen, realia objects, memory box and tapes. The piece was recorded live in Göttingen in June 2008 and meanders, warbles, ebbs and flows with ease through a variety of noises, sounds and frequencies. There is never a second that would leave the impression of something being repeated, at points rather reaching the chaotic and incontrollable (without ever totally losing control, this is not uninhibited noise) and leaving the meditative and trance-like way behind. Even when there is a moment of simple percussive noise, it is not at all spiritual. Within the art context this recording never loses the on the spot recording atmosphere. Therefore the sounds are sometimes very unpolished, the recording open and direct. But that is just the way it happens with live recordings right. 

www.zangimusic.de

V4W.ENKO - harmonic ratio

(CD, Kvitnu)

More noise, but this one is different as it is selfproducing. Eugene Vashchenko programs algorithms that take influence on real time processes; simple particles that closely interrelate with each other. He uses those data packages to construct sounds and visuals in a true multimedia fashion. The disc contains about two dozen short pieces of mostly quite static noise in all kinds of different frequencies and then some extra data. Judging from this limited information it must be great to see V4W.ENKO perform live. The music on the CD is sometimes subtle, glitchy noises, sometimes aberrant, distorted noise. Most of the time the aesthetics are very static and firm, like concrete forms pressed into something more condensed. The main factor for the aesthetics seems to be precision, though, and that is something that, within all the freak noise and wild chaotic destruction, is often forgotten, but definitely worth to meditate on for a little while. 

www.kvitnu.com

GREG HEADLY - fragments of the dream machine

(CD, 28angles)

Over the last years Greg Headly has been evolving as an audio artist and modern composer in several ways and it was always interesting to listen to his latest endeavours, be they experimental compositional structures, ephemeral spheres of sound or a reworking of Gustav Holst's symphony about the planets. Therefore, what a suprise when I put in "fragments of the dream machine" for the first time. Angry, sometimes chaotic and wild noise filled my head. Something is going wrong, I thought. Releasing on his own label to his own time and needs, Headly could have been regarded as a recluse from the distance (I don't know him personally, but you know the way you think you know people when you for some reason have followed their lives for some time), but this here didn't sound so good. Aesthetically it sounds good, but if somebody who cared for wholeness, precision, harmony and balance in his earlier compositions suddenly drives distortion home with a hammer and makes you experience bits and parts falling apart and breaking down in his music, you start to wonder. The reason is: Headly used this chaotic, dense and sparse fractures of tracks as a creative valve to get out of a phase where he seemed stuck himself. And it seemed to have worked, so great! Makes it possible for me to lean back and enjoy the tribulations of a troubled mind.

www.28angles.com

PAUL DVIJAK - money

(12", konkord)

2009 was the year that dance music really bugged me. From the explosion of Lady Gaga to Christina Aguilera fame to the one millionth rehash of minimal techno to the mindpiercing stupidity and dumbness of Pitbull's "I want you". Hell, I needed some beers to finally understand the beauty of the Eighties beat of La Roux' "bulletproof", but I am experienced enough to know that given enough alcohol I start to like almost every kind of music. And now this: Paul Dvijak takes the most openly direct track of his latest album, hands it over to some pals and friends in the Viennese dance / electronic scene and voila! here is another EP with music demanding to be listened to. Only that this is somewhat good fun (I am not drunk yet!) , especially the hacked up electronica mix by Hans Platzgumer called "E:Money" that deconstructs the whole scheme behind the idea. Other remixers include I-Wolf (with a cool, echoy dub version), Tunakan and B. Fleischmann. Mastering was done by Patrick Pulsinger. So, everything the cool hipster needs for some credit points. Currently, I prefer to listen to Seventies Disco Music, the real stuff, but I do understand why this works well in the right surrounding.

www.konkord.org

MERKER.TV - jet.reset

(12", konkord)

Austria's most deserving of fame yet unexplainably living without world fame disco and funk collective Merker.TV from Linz have given some of their tracks from their last album "Set Jet" away to remixers to mangle and mutilate them. B. Fleischmann gave the track "deepness" some more, well, deepness. Dokta_GC totally lived out his disco ambitions, twice (and by the way, it is not that hard to guess behind the pseudonym even for a non-disco / clubbing personality like me...) Next on TNT Jackson go deep into Eighties Pop that I can't remember to have heard on the album itself. And finally Merker.TV member DJ Durmek takes "supa" way deeper than it was. But what is most important in between all of this remixing and scenester-stardom: it is still fun. The music, the party, the dancefloor, the fun. Okay, that last remark was redundant, but then, what is great disco music and funk about if not redundancy. Ask James Brown, he will tell you as well. There are two videos on top on the CD of this release (comes with the vinyl as well), and I bet you will never see them on television in regular programmes.

www.konkord.org

LIVING ORNAMENTS - korrels

(CD, narrominded)

Living Ornaments is Lars Meijer and Coen Polack, the masterminds also behind narrominded label and their first album under the moniker Living Ornaments "vlokken" has rightfully recieved praise from around the world. On "korrels" they have taken a different, more direct approach. Gone are the minimal subtleties and the dynamic structures. Everything seems to be much more on the foreground now, clearer, more direct and more fixed in structure. And most obviously, keyboards and big synthesizer sounds have taken over the field. Of course, here and there are some moments of pristine beauty and of time standing still, but mostly the music on the album marches on with reckless abandon, to its own big marching music made of synthie sounds. Well, then I wanted to write some more clever things about the music, but then it played "Two and a half men" on tv and Charlie Sheen was funny, but somehow also depressed me, so I couldn't. Sounds like something life couldn't make up on its own, right?

www.narrominded.com

BOUTROS BUBBA - national anthems

(CD, narrominded)

The first full length of Dutch rock band Boutros Bubba keeps all the promises their single "How I wrote the Star Spangled Banner" and their first CD-EP "hearing voicst in a beer commercial makes me wanna get drunk" made. The dense rock, the blues and country influences, but most of all the relentless heaviness and weirdness makes "national anthems" a great alternative rock record in the vein of all those albums when alternative rock was still something good and did not mean washed down, produced for music television pseudo bands. No, here you can hear and feel three people in the basic power group set up making great guitar based underground rock music. Guitars and vocals by the way are provided by Spoelstra, who recently also released an interesting EP called "I got issues the shape of Italy" on narrominded, where he lays out the tracks that come here as basic and structured in an even more freakazoid fashion. Next to all the street credibility, the honesty and the authenticity of the music (and the people behind it), there is only one thing you should remember about Boutros Bubba: don't believe a word they tell you.

www.narrominded.com

PULIDO FENNESZ SIEWERT STANGL - a girl & a gun

(7", interstellar)

I feel especially bad about not having gotten round to giving this little seven inch the praise it deserves, because it is such an endearing and exciting endeavour and really a highlight in many lonely evening, when I put on my headphones and looked for some light and pleasure, or at least some common despair. And the voice of Lucia Pulido on the two tracks on here reaches back so far, so far into the world of painful folklore and mourning songs, it drives me almost to tears. Her voice quivers and shakes with all the emotion you usually only hear in Bulgarian or Portugese mourning songs, with a slight hint at the song of the muezzin or other arabian traditions. Yes, these are traditionals, but not in the traditional sense. The arrangements are sparse: some piano chords, some electronic wizardry, very subtle and drawn into the back on "Canto de Zafra", then the same with an electric guitar on "Canto de Velerio". There is a good reason, that both sides of this seven inch are labelled with an "A", because it would be hard to say, which one is not an a-side. Originally, these two tracks were meant as a soundtrack for the movie "film ist: a girl & a gun" by Gustav Deutsch, but I don't even know if I ever want to see it. It might spoil the epic movie the songs made in my head.

www.interstellarrecords.com

BENJAMIN  FINGER - woods of broccoli

(CD, how is annie)

The mix of electronics with acoustic (guitar) songwriting has come far and also, unfortunately, a sort of household trick in the last year. Ever since Fennesz took up the guitar to re-introduce the notion of song in a new way into electronic experimental music, this idea has gone from new to interesting to household very quickly. Like these things will do nowadays. Anyway, Benjamin Finger has what it takes to keep it interesting still, which is: compositorial knowledge and instinct, a feel for textures that cling to the skin with organic warmth and an idea about emotions and how to transfer them. Everything on here glistens and glitters like the sea on an early spring morning when the sky is clear and the horizon seems to stretch a little farther than usual. Lush piano textures filled with glitches and noises and angelic voices that rather soothe the soul than disrupt it. I find it amazing, how disharmonic frequencies can be used to calm down the tonality of a track. Great for lazy sunday afternoons as well as late night chill hours.

www.howisannierecords.com

8ROLEK - fat pigs

(CD, warsztat)

Dance music, baby, but not of the bland, dumb and meaningless David Guetta-style (I think I watch too much music television), but of the harsh, defty, direct and urban style. 8rolek hails from Poland and usually does more refined music than this banging and clanging IDM for machos tracks. Everything on "fat pigs" is based in a distorted 4/4 beat, around which a herd of mangled beats and samples revolves that all aim for bringing the house down. In its directness I can only compare this to Pitbull's "You know I want you" (now I know I watch too much music television) but if Foetus would cover it. As direct as raw meat and therefore the perfect dinner for your rave excess night.

www.warsztat8r.pl

ROSENSPRUNG - zelluläre automaten

(CD, blauschacht)

There are two layers to this album, and I am afraid it is only taking the two together will make the record really enjoyable. The one is progressive rock-music that is mixing electronic noises into a rather traditional approach of homemade rockmusic in the big maelstrom left behind by Radiohead, right down to the whining vocals at points. Though Rosensprung is way more straight and less artsy than Radiohead the music is nevertheless good and interesting. The other layer are the german lyrics, which are introspective, self-referencing word-art in the best sense, but only understandable and enjoyable if you have a very good grasp of the german language. So there, that is it. But is it really something that makes this record worse, if you are not able to understand the words being sung on it? Within the Cracked pages records in a multitude of languages have been favorably reviewed and moreover there is always the strategy to regard the vocals as another musical element, another instrument. I mean, there is so much instrumental music on here, this really shouldn't make any difference. So, full two thumbs up for the Post-Prog-Experimental-Rockband (self-definition!) rosensprung.

www.blauschacht.at

THE INFANT CYCLE - Secret hidden message (7", drone)

THE INFANT CYCLE - a mysterious disc (3", theceiling)

If you don't like drone records, you obviously don't like drones. For years now they have released the most relentless and consequential drone seven inches and if you think that drone and a short format don't go together so well, you better think again. Actually, the question arising is, if "secret hidden message" is not too dynamic, too diverse in outset to really qualify as a pure drone. But then again, who cares. The Infant Cycle, in its more than one and a half decade of experimental music making never has for sure. It is what it is and it is exactly what it feels like. The three tracks on the seven inch are made from a variety of objects (guitar, marimba, bird cage, wind chimes, electric organ, trombone, and so on) but manipulated to an extent you won't recognise. There is less information on the music on the 3" CD that has been released on The Infant Cycle's own home imprint The Ceiling. Nice additions to an ever growing output of likewise mysterious but enchanting rhythmless grooves. 

www.theceiling.ca

THE USE OF ASHES - white nights: the hand of Tzafkiel

(CD, tonefloat)

This is the first part to the planned trilogy "white nights" by folk/psychedelic weirdos The Use Of Ashes. The second part "glowing lights" has been reviewed extensively and in most ways what has been said there is true for the first part as well: a mix of folklore world music with trance aspects. The third part still awaits release. And as it has been said before, if you really want to enjoy a story that runs over three parts of whatever medium, you have to get all three ingested before having the full story, even if one part alone is cool as well.

www.tonefloat.com

RED THE PLANEEET!!! / LES TRUCS - split

(7", sic)

Lo-Fi homerecording collective living room pop music comes and goes, but it seems there are always (young?!) people out there getting to making music with whatever is at their hands and not caring except for the fun and heck of it. Nowadays, though, with all the computer software and sounds database at hand on the internet the results are usually much more convincing and professional than, let's say, in the Eighties. Anyway, Red The Planeeet!! rock it out in best electric guitar meets harmonica meets samples from old movies fashion. Heavy and noisy, they could be great on any rock clubs stage in front of thirty to onehundred people giving everybody a good time, screaming and banging. Les trucs stick three songs onto the small length of their side of this single, and one of them is called "Scheitern als Chanson" (transl: failure as a chanson). Perfect description. Jangly, idiosyncratic lofi pop, with a lot of fun and just the right amount of verve and will to experiment to keep it going. Wonderfully retro-craziness and looking into the future at the same time. 

www.antenna.nl/sicrec

EMDY / CIRQULAR - split

(7", gracetone)

Gracetone on the other hind is one of the finest imprints from Greece (not that I would know so many...) and that is with only three split seven inches and a CD (by Vokal Idiot) on their list. Quite remarkable. This little slab is a strange bastard. On side one Emdy aka Anastasios Kokkinidis mixes various kinds of noises from instruments, field recordings, manipulated noises and from one or more cats and calls it "Catshag 22". Then towards the end a guitar and a saxophone first emulate the shrieks of the cat, then the frustrated anguish of it. Better not notice animal care on this one. On the other side cirqular aka Go Muroiwa and Takayuki Horiuchi from Japan mixes field recordings and manipulated noise with sparse, melancholic ramblings on the piano accompanied by soothing intereference noises. Much more sympathetic and warm than "catshag22" but also with a certain amount of distress and distortion effects in the mix. The mixture is what keeps things interesting.  

www.gracetonerecordings.com

VARIOUS ARTISTS - 1,2,3 whiteout

(DVD+CD, zeromoon)

"the future is lo-fi" it says on the label and that should be true for avant-noise experiments as well? Rounding up the 2009 leftover round up is the soundtrack to a movie called "1,2,3 whiteout - the end of the light age" in which in a blindingly bright future a woman named Veronique (played by Karine Adrover) and an inventor (played by Lou Castel) join forces to struggle against the reign of man-made light. I liked the film, but I am no movie critic, so I stick to writing about the soundtrack. And this consists of dense noise drones ranging from earsplitting high frequencies to brooming bass noises and then some inbetween like field recordings and whatnot. Most interesting I find "Dark Matter" by Elmapi which is based on magnetic traces from degaussed 16mm magnetic stock, because of its brooding, dark atmosphere. Other tracks come from Richard Harrison (of Spaceheads) and Michael J. Schumacher. (Unfortunately, the soundtrack on the movie itself has more by Notchnoi Prospect aka Alexei Borisov and by AE (with Andrew Sharpley) which is not on that CD, but we shall not complain so much, right?) Moreover, the soundtrack CD and the movie are two different things, with the CD having remixes and reworkings of the soundscapes from the movie. It would be interesting to check the effect, if you listen to the music first and then watch to movie versus the vice versa, but alas, time cannot be undone and there is only one choice you can make. Such is life.

www.zeromoon.com