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Vital Weekly 523

  Tobias

MACHINEFABRIEK - MARIJN (CD by Lampse)
The CDR as testing ground worked pretty well for Machinefabriek, our almost local hero Rutger Zuydervelt. He released about fifteen or so 3"CDR privately, which gained interest from all around. Lampse won the battle to release his first 'real' CD and we can finally hear which direction he chooses. His private releases went in all sorts of directions, from downright noise to almost electronic pop-songs and anything in between. And perhaps of course the next Machinefabriek will be entirely different, you never know for sure with Rutger. But for his debut he made a good choice. Playing around with both musique concrete electro-acoustics, as-well as computer processed sounds, in combination with a real piano, he crafted together six new tracks which play all more or less a melancholically card. All six pieces are in the darker corner of the musical spectrum. Sometimes I thought this was very good micro-sounding material, but Machinefabriek certainly adds much more to the roster.  The touching of objects in the opening piece 'Kreukeltape' or the piano playing in the closing 'Lawine', in which the electronically processed sounds slowly take over, which then start to move towards a big crescendo. Both the noise and the popsong are far away, if not completly wiped off the planet. This planet that is. An excellent new start, or perhaps his big bang: I am sure much more delights will follow. (FdW)
Address: http://www.lampse.com

PATERAS/BAXTER/BROWN - GAUTICLE (CD by Synaesthesia)
In Vital Weekly 427 I was lyrical about the CD 'Ataxia' by Anthony Pateras (prepared piano), Sean Baxter (percussion) and David Brown (prepared guitar) and regretted that they didn't stop in my area when they were promoting their CD. On the tour they did they recorded various shows, but apparently two were stand out shows: the one in Vienna and the one in London. Excerpts of both appear on their new CD 'Gauticle'. This is highly acoustic music, without any electronics in sight. 'Ataxia' was a strongly vivid CD, bouncing up and down all along, and I must say that is less the case on 'Gauticle'. They still play around with the notions of electro-acoustic music, improvisation and even free jazz, but it's less of surprise than 'Ataxia'. They have set their own boundaries in improvising with the material they have and they still do it well. Actually very well. The onkyo part of improvisation is something that they entirely ignore and they have sound going all the time. 'Ataxia' was a blow away release, Gauticle is very good follow up. If ever there would be a next time around to see them play live, I would still grab my coat and go to witness them. (FdW)
Address: http://www.synrecords.com

AGNÈS PALIER & OLIVER TOULEMONDE - ROCCA (CD by Creative Sources)
WADE MATHEWS & INGAR ZACH - MORKE-LYS (CD by Creative Sources)
Singer Agnès Palier moved from classical music, chanson to jazz. In the last few years she concentrates on singing in a free improvised context, which is the case on this new CDCD 'Rocca'. For this occasion she is accompanied by Oliver Toulemonde on electroacoustic set. Toulemonde may be known as one of the founding members of the Collectif Ishtar.
Palier screams, yells, murmurs, growls, etc with her voice in a way one aspects from vocal artists like her. Toulemonde creates a great diversity of sounds, textures, etc. with his electro-acoustic set. The noises he produces are the perfect company for Palier's voice: the same in atmosphere, color, intensity, etc. I can't detect exactly what Toulemonde is doing on his so called 'electroacoustic set', but he seems to use all kind of objects. They are played and used by him in a very physical, lively and elegant way. Another reason that makes Toulemonde and Palier an interesting duo. Their improvisations play at at a highly abstract level. But on the other hand their sound poetry stays 'on the floor': its dramatic and dynamic, and very human. Their explorations evolve within a wide range of sounds and musical possibilities. I never had a dull moment with this one.
'Morke-lys' is another impressive duo-effort, albeit of a totally different kind. Wade Matthews and Ingar Zach plus some other musicians made already another CD for Creative Sources, called 'Dining Music'. Ingar Zach is percussionist from Norway. American Wade Matthews (winds, electro-acoustic instruments) lives in Madrid. He released a CD on a sub-label of Sofa Records, that was co-founded by Zach. Mathews has a special interest in bringing improvisation and electro-acoustic music together. On their collaboration 'Morke-lys' Matthews (electronic synthesis) and Zach (percussion) succeed in creating a music of great penetrative and imaginative power. If you want to be at the frontier of improvised and electro-acoustic music, this is the place to be! (Dolf Mulder)
Address: http://www.creativesources.com/

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THE SUN IS AN ORANGE COOKIE - MY HEART OF SUGAR (CDR by Chloe Recordings)
Now that's an odd band name: The Sun Is An Orange Cookie is one Linda Gale Aubry, of whom I never heard before. Her CDR comes in hand-stichted bags, each being entirely different and limited to 36 copies only. The seven pieces were recorded over the course of several weeks, using a synthesizer, sampler and an ipod. On the latter she stored a bunch of field recordings, which she samples away and colors the picture further with synthetic sounds. The music is not like some of the other Chloe releases, which all had their share in improvised and electro-acoustic music, but The Sun Is An Orange Cookie is highly synthetic music, even when perhaps some of it is made through methods of improvisation. It's very upfront stuff that is made with a sort of sense for naivety. Arpeggio synths, minimal samplings. It all sounds quite alright but never too brilliant or too new, with some of pieces being an updated version of the Germanic cosmic music tradition. A bit unstructured here and there, but in the end it's thumbs up for this. (FdW)
Address: http://www.chloechloe.cc

MITTELSFÄR - M1 - M6 (3"CDR by Mussigganger)
VED - DEMIS ROUSSOS INTERNAL (3"CDR by Mussigganger)
PRAKT - GINNIPIGGU (3"CDR by Mussigganger)
PÄR THÖRN - NOW HOW RANDOM IS RANDOM (3"CDR by Mussigganger)
The english version of the website for this label is not yet online, and my swedish isn't what it never was, so I just go by what I (barely) read on the cover. Mittelsfär is Matthias Nihlen on prepared electric guitar and Henrik Kihlberg on a small portable gramophone. They offer six short tracks of really lo-fi improvised music of themselves scraping the guitar, some field recordings. It's all a bit too lo-fi and easy for me.
No instruments are listed for Ved. Not even a name. Just Ved as the artist and 'Demis Roussos Internal' as the title. This one is a bit harder to describe really: I think it's made of samples and sounds, certainly at the beginning, a bit lo-fi pop like. But then it moves into a lengthy drone like piece with piano playing. It's a kind of curious release that is not bad at all.
Behind Prakt is Henrik Kihlberg, who runs the Mussigganger label. His 'Ginipiggu' (that probably translates as guinea pig) release is a 'reworking of various field recordings'. The funny thing is that he doesn't transform the usual blend of water and rain sounds, like so many other do, but he stuck his microphone in a birdcage and works his way around with the birdcalls. Somewhere along the line he feeds his birds into a wall of droning electronics and scraps along the metal of the cage. Not exactly a peaceful affair, but it sounds quite intense and dense.
Pär Thörn offers a conceptual work. The title means 'concept of randomness and
dice throwing'. Lots of layered voices, feeding through an echo unit, or perhaps natural in the process of phase shifting. I was going to write a bit like blackhumour, but is there anyone out-there who has a clue what I am talking about? Let's say, a bit like Steve Reich's 'Come Out', but with a lesser intensity. As far as concepts go, it's alright. (FdW)
Address: http://www.mussigganger.tk

HUMAN FLESH - SONGS FOR THE VICTIMS (FROM A DECAYING COUNTRY) (CD by EE Tapes)
A long, long time ago, in 1985 I took the train to Belgium, to Nivelles, not far away from Waterloo and met a very sympathetic couple: Alain Neffe and Nadine Bal. Together they were Bene Gesserit, they'd run Insane Music, and Alain was also in Pseudo Code, I Scream, Cortex and Human Flesh. They were my heroes and I saw their collection of tapes, records and in the basement their studio, which impressed me a lot. Years after I followed whatever they released, but in the nineties things seemed to have stopped and it was hard to find information on their music on the internet. These days Alain Neffe is back, re-mastered some of his cassettes and made them available on CDR. In each of his musical projects, Neffe did put something specific: Pseudo Code was sort of industrial, I Scream floating synthesizer ambience and Human Flesh was a group that wasn't a group. Recordings were made on an eight track recorder, where Alain Neffe played other musicians that came to his studio or he would dub in recordings send by people. It was more about the concept of music making, than that it has a strict musical concept of it's own. It borrows elements from his projects. When the recordings are made, Neffe leaves the tracks and starts mixing them much later, when he forgot what it sounded like and in a more or less improvised way. On this CD there are fifteen tracks, recorded in the period 1985-1995 and one long bonus track built with elements from the last twenty three years. Participating artists are people who are perhaps lesser known these days, such as Daniel Malempre (aka MAL), Cor Gout (Tresspassers W), Hessel Veldman (Y Create), Deborah Jaffe (Master/Slave Relationship), Xavier S (Pseudo Code, and the track he appears on, sounds very much like Pseudo Code), Lydia Tomkiw (Algreba Suicide) and the for me unknown Magali Cupak, Darline Victor and Judy Timpa. Human Flesh plays music that is best described as a cross-over between pop-music and experimental music, with a strong sense of the darker, atmospherical edges. Highly moody, with a strong emphasis on text, synthesizers and guitars. Like the title indicates, this is not exactly songs about love and happiness, but rather of desolation, loneliness and introspection. Perhaps the music sounds by now a bit dated, but it's nevertheless well made and certainly needs a lot of attention. Then, perhaps, the entire catalogue of Neffe's works should be made to proper CDR releases. Anyone cares to step in? (FdW)
Address: http://www.eetapes.be

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