JOHN HEGRE & MAJA RATKJE - ballads
(CD, Dekorder)
If you have ever talked to John Hegre you will know that he has the uncanny
ability to concentrate on various things at the same time, making it hard to
follow him at times, especially when he lets his imagination run on, but
nevertheless he is able to focus closely at whatever it is before him at the
time. Expansion and concentration is also the centre of this collaboration
with fellow Norwegian Maja Ratkje whose result might come as a surprise to
listeners used to Hegre’s more noisier side of music (from his solowork to
whatever Jazkamer is doing at the moment, like that “metal machine
music” album). But then again, as I have mentioned, nothing should ever
surprise you.
“Ballads” for the two exceptional artists means
slow songs as in stripped to the bare essentials and then set together a new
and does not necessarily mean singing as in vocals. By de(con)structing
songs to their basic cores and laying bare their innermost structures as
well as sounds, Hegre and Ratkje go further than most other artists have
gone in this field, without losing the song-like basis. Even if all that is
left is a touch point of felt imagination of sound. There are vocals on
here, sometimes hidden, sometimes more openly, but always deconstructed as
well to their most basic and inner atom, which – as it turns out – is
breath (“binoculars and traces”). An interesting point to remember is,
though, that whatever instrument you use to get into the atomic structure of
things will leave their mark and influence the result. As in an EEG of the
brain or an electromicroscopic picture of whatever, the result you get into
your hands is interesting, mesmerizing even, but it is stil just a
reproduction of the real thing and therefore an interpretation.
The variety is also sharp and distinctive. From the
beginning “autumn leaves” which has Derek Bailey-like acoustic guitar
plucking meet some household equipments (scissors? Fotographic camera) as
percussions, to the transcending, luminizing “hammock moods” at the end
of the album, the sounds are sparse but well picked and set to an atmosphere
of exploration into the microscopic aspects of sounds as well as songs. Here
and there droning noise or piercing interferences will hit your ears but
overall the atmosphere is not as much concerned about the noise but about
the spaces in between and the way that single sounds influences them. The
sounds instruments make that are not part of their intended spectrum (and
usually tried to be erased with complicated and elaborate computer software)
are mixed into the foreground as are some bitparts and leftovers of dialogue
and field recordings. The latter intentionally spritzed over the record as
if left in the master tapes by accident – only that the track
“hesitating interruptions” gives it away, by being nothing but leftovers
with silence in between.
