\ / | ----- /\ | \ / |== |== | / | \ / Week 38 \ / | | / \ | \ /\ / | | |/ | \ / Number 95 \/ | | / \ |--- \/ \/ |__ |__ |\ |__ | CARL MICHAEL VON HAUSSWOLFF - TO MAKE THINGS HAPPEN IN THE BUNKER VIA THE MICRO WAY (CD by Fire Inc.) >From the nice Icelandic people who are now temporarily residing around the corner, I got this new CD of a composer who is a conceptualist in the purest sense of the word. Hausswolff's titles are poetic, yet accurate descriptions of the material you are hearing. In most cases he just amplifies electrical events, machine hum, motor hum etc. 'Spirit Folio Lite Detector' could have been Rioji Ikeda remixing Panasonic and is strong pulsating track. This track is remixed on this CD, but is then called 'A Quite Faster Spirit - indeed a faster version. Much of Hausswolff's music is very minimal - and that's were it gets its power from. Minimal changes which require close hearing (or you better play this at a low volume) are the creaming on top of this. (FdW) Address: BRUNO MOREIGNE - BRUITS, SONS, PAROLES ET SILENCES DE LA FORET (CD by Kaon) Bruno is one of those 'sound-hunters' (now that's a word not comonly used and dates back to the days when Philips brought cheap reel to reel tapedecks). This particular work of Bruno Moreigne deals with all noise and sound coming from the forest: ranging from wood to stones to the inhabitants of the forest, birds and insects. Each track amplifies a specific field of sound. All the animal sounds can be found in 'Animal' and man's activities in the woods can be heard in 'Gestes' (including ritual sounds). By placing these various sounds into seperate tracks (rather then putting it together in a long collage form), Bruno creates an original view on the material. If you are into sound scaping without the addition of sound effects, then you may find this of special interest. (FdW) Address: 5 Impasse des Moineaux - 87100 Limoges - France ROBERT HENKE - FLOATING POINT (CD by Imbalance) At long last the fourth CD on Imbalance (a label closely connected to many of Berlin techno labels such as Chain Reaction and Basic Channel). Like the three previous releases, this has nothing to do with techno music. Or? You can regard this CD as one long, floating, piece of computerized pulses and washes of synth as a serious academic work. But like in 'Cyrus Canyon' there is low end droning bass who could be mistaken for a slowed down beat. In general this is a particular strong ambient work which is more daring then many others and goes beyond the ordinary. Address: MERZBOW/LADYBIRD - BALANCE (CD by Human Wreckords) Many many years ago I bought a nice overpriced record by John Duncan and Chris & Cosey. I was struck by the simple yet genious concept: one artist was on the left channel and the other on the right channel. This ment that by playing the record stereo you would hear both at the same time, and they fitted well together. I still cherish that record. I wonder if I will do the same with this CD with exactely the same concept. No doubt true Merzbow devotees (and I am one!) will want this, but they will, just like me, be confused (to avoid the word irritated) by this band Ladybird. I am not sure what their sense of humour is, but their wacky pop music is not really of interest for me. I played this once stereo, but I think I will turn off the right channel as of now. I have no clue why these 2 are on the same CD. (FdW) Address: PRODUKT - STRETCH (CD by Rastermusic) Rastermusic is rapidely expanding into armchair techno listening. They mostly release CD's, rather then vinyl, and this makes home listening much easier. Rastermusic deals with two labels, each of with a distinct quality in music and consistent packaging. One is the 'clear' series with releases by ø, Noto and Goem and the other is the standard packaging series. This new CD by Produkt, aka Frank Bretschneider. The first track is a jam with the other people of the label, and is just a great slow going techno piece. Minimal changes, but with a bass line that sticks into your mind. After each track there are short pieces, announced as >1, >2 etc which fade over into the next 'real' track. Musically Produkt stays close to armchair techo listening with it's usual ingredients. If this was on Warp you would have known about it already, but now we have to pray that you will know about it. And why not? It's a great CD! (FdW) Address: <100522.3536@compuserve.com> Compilation "Aube, Katsumi, Kosakai, Monde Bruits" (CD byJapan Overseas) It's a damn shame that so many musicians think "ambient" is synonomous with "long and uneventful". When the only idea a musician has is playing quietly, it shouldn't be surprising that he produces music which meanders around that one idea for a very long time. The concept behind this disc is noise guys doing "ambient" (just quoting the back of the spine-card here), and it really highlights the limitations and compositional ability of the artists involved. Aube's track is first. He uses brainwaves as his source material, which means he has three basically unaffected loops which he plays simultaneously for ten minutes, then turns them off. Uneventful is not ambient. Maybe Aube was trying for a Steve Reich-ish effect, waiting for the loops to go out of phase, but they never really doing anything other than hang around for too long. Katsumi Sugahara is the most successful. The liner notes credit him as a new member of Solmania, but here he delivers an almost new-age mantra, complete with pretty melody (shock!), actual chord changes (horror!), even direction and apparant structure (lawdy!). The biggest dissapointment is Fumio Kosakai's track. As a member of one of my favorite bands, Incapacitants, he always delivers the goods. Here, he has three samples (analogue-synth whoosh, metal ploink, and, er, another analogue-synth whoosh) which he plays over and over for fifteen minutes through lots of delay (in order to sound "spacey", I guess). I get the feeling that, like Aube, if given a full 70 minutes, he would use them all. Monde Bruits' track is, thankfully, short, only 6 1/2 minutes. He lets some sparse synth bloops play off of each other, with effective use of silence to create a real tension, the one element lacking from the tracks before this. Still, the whole disc can't escape sounding contrived, and there is no hint of passion or inspiration. (Stelzer) Augst&Beck - Sprech-Einsatz (12" by Multi.Trudi 0.001) Augst and Beck are two noise-musicians from Frankfurt. They both play in a 'never practice' - 'no agreements' live band called: "Freundschaft". Together they also have done a great number of live radio-shows all over Europe. They always use a lot of vocals; text recitation, and noise. This new 12 inch is very good. On side one a noisy techno track of 9 mins; the club-version as the label says. Distorted beats building up to an excellent climax. Side two beholds a 20 mins. remix. They themselves call this side 'the vocal only mix' but it is very noisy! For all over Europe Also soon; Freundschaft: Bazaar CD contact: +49(0)69-7410210 or www.thing.de/multitrudi. Vital Weekly is published by Frans de Waard and submitted for free to anybody with an e-mail address. If you don't wish to receive this, then let us know. Any feedback is welcome . Forward to your allies. Snail mail: Frans de Waard - P.O.Box 11453 - 1001 GL Amsterdam - The Netherlands All written by Frans de Waard (FdW), The Square Root Of Sub (MP), Ching-Chong Jing-Jong (CP), Radboud Mens (RM), Sister Clika (RTH), BAraka[H], (BAR), Howard Stelzer, webpage: www.staalplaat.com -- Vital Weekly is published by Frans de Waard and submitted for free to anybody with an e-mail address. If you don't wish to receive this, then let us know. Any feedback is welcome . Forward to your allies. Snail mail: Vital Weekly/Frans de Waard -P.O.Box 11453 - 1001 GL Amsterdam - The Netherlands All written by Frans de Waard (FdW), The Square Root Of Sub (MP, ), Heimir Bjorgulfsson (HB), Dolf Mulder (DM), Meelkop Roel (MR), Brian Lavelle (BL, ), Gerald Schwartz (GS), Niels Mark Pedersen (NMP), Henry Schneider (SH), Jeff Surak (JS), TJ Norris (TJN), Gregg Kowlaksky (GK) and others on a less regular basis. 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