INCAPACITANTS
– burning orange
(CD,
Pica)
Another month, another great release on picadisk,
another legendary Japanese Noise outfit: the Incapacitants, who are Fumio
Kosakai and T. Mikawa and who should really need no introduction, because
they have been around for so long doing their thing so uncompromisingly,
that their cult status is safely cemented within the rounds of noise freaks
globally. It is also safe to say that Lasse Marhaug uses the All Ears Festival to lure
all his favorite acts on a stage, where he then can direct collaborations
and obtain recordings of their sets, which – having fully grasped the idea
of synergy and value chains – he than may use to fuel his new label
Picadisk. All for the greater good of mankind, of course. No, though that
might sound cynic, at this point I am totally serious. The Incapacitants
have only been to Europe to play shows once in the last 25 years, so thanks
and thanks again for this event and the documentary of it. Also check the
release for Hijokaidan,
which measures the same sentiments.
The Incapacitants played one half hour set on January
tweltfth 2007 and it is really hard to describe. The duo produces an
impressive two-layer noise stream – each one of them on his own set of
noise machinery – with some distorted screaming on top. It is a chaotic,
ever changing, harsh and encompassing wall – or several walls – of noise
that seem to be moving into all directions at once, and even though there is
such a high dynamic within these noise floods, after several minutes of
exposure the whole thing starts to sound, or rather feel because the sensory
system will have changed to purely subconscious experiencing by then, very
compact and dense. Either because the Incapacitants have started to fill all
the holes and settled for a narrower range of frequencies than in the very
open beginning, or because your brain has already melted down. Or a bit of
both. The frenetically jumping and changing frequencies within the floods of
power noise are a unique feature of the sound of the Incapacitants, and
their task seems less like producing the music but rather trying to control
or tame it.
On January thirteenth 2007 Tommi Keränen from Testicle
Hazard (what a name, makes me cringe on reading already…) joined the
Incapacitants on stage under the project disguise of Fumio Tommikawa – a
moniker only the best versed visitors of the festival would have been able
to decipher without closer help of the organizers. The roughly twenty minute
set is also available on this disk in its full length. Its title, “out of
schnaps”, ma give you a hint at the direction – it is like
Incapacitants, but with another, just as harsh and uncompromising layer of
noise. Due to a different recording technique, the sound is somewhat
different on the two sets, but actually it doesn’t make much difference.
Fumio Tommikawa start with about 30 to 60 seconds of low bass freak noises
before getting a full blast on for almost twentyfive minutes. This set is
probably more towards the bass end of frequencies, has less of the yelping,
frantic high frequencies and seems more compact and dense white noise
overall, but it is just as energetic, all-encompassing, no holds barred
noise power as there will ever be.
