CD Feature/ Rostiges Riesenrad/N.Strahl.N: "Rostrausch/Des Zwielichts letztes Glühen"

The underground really lives on this release, with all of its extremes and dark love. Packed to the max with almost exactly 80 minutes of music, packaged in an atmospheric DIN A5 book-cover (similar to the ones used by Canadian Dark Ambient outfit Cyclic Law on which  Riesenrad-mastermind “Eisen” is set to release in the very near future) and featuring two projects at the brink of breakthrough, this is a split-CD tailor-made for anyone with an inclination for the obscure – and the wonderous.

It is not an obvious combination, in any case. Rostiges Riesenrad has always been a sort of an internal cross-over project for Eisen, dealing just as much with the noisy and silent side of his personality and delving into beats, while allowing for dreamy moods and dulcet nightmares. N. Strahl N., on the other hand, has reinvigorated the notion that Industrial music can mean a lot more than just cranking up the distortion pedal, emphasizing a critical view of the world, not a nihilistic one. His method is abstraction, his technique very organic, which puts him in direct contrast with the Riesenrad output, which leans clearly on concrete sounds and  technoid structures, always more machinal than human. And yet their respective styles have more in common than one might assume at the outset: Both eschew simple repetition in favour of constant evolution and both regard manipulating the aural characteristics of their sounds as the main focus of their compositions. The results may not always reval this right away, but there really is a direct relation between the maddening eighteen minutes of the Riesenrad epic “Aus Wahn wird Wonne”, which sees a fluently hypnotic space bass act as the basis for a flow of sample analytics, and the first part of the N. Strahl N. Suite “Des Zwielichts letztes Glühen”, on which Mario Löhr (the man behind the project) takes a soft crackling to a piercing beam of noise while transforming gentle mobile-like acoustics into a harsh metallic environment. On the other hand, the differences are part of the charm of this release as well: Löhrs sophisticated arrangements duelling with the adrenalin-infused poundings of “Down” or the bizarre spoken word horror trip of “Bobby”.

What binds the polarities together is a shared agreement that nonconformity is not a sign of an anti-social stance, but of an open mind and individuality. No-one expects to make any money from this and none of the contributions can even faintly hope for any kind of radio play, yet their creators are rightly confident enough to believe that some things need to be released regardless. This absolute will to create is what lies at the heart of the underground and of this release as well.

By Tobias Fischer

Homepage: Rostiges Riesenrad at MySpace
Homepage: N.Strahl.N at MySpafe