This came out at the high-point of what I am, rather facilely, going to refer to as Raster-Noton’s clicks’n’bass period, released in the same month as Alva Noto’s univrs. Following in the pattern of 2010’s Death Of A Typographer, Byetone continues to represent the poppier side of the label, as far as it goes, with […]
Category: Music
This soundtrack to the indie body horror film of the same name is an accomplished bit of glitch-inflected modern classical. As an album, it is a qualified success. Shorn of their context, I find some of the more dramatic moments a little over-cooked (though I imagine they could be very effective in the movie). But on the […]
This is 55 minutes constructed out of “Original environmental recordings done at multiple underwater and abovewater [sic] locations in the Panamá and Paraguay rivers”. He even made it in his mobile studio on a boat. The effect is a detailed and immersive soundscape. It’s not all whale-song, though: there are spooky cavern-like episodes, all drips […]
There is a strangely determined, and determinedly strange, brilliance to this. The sleeve sums it up: a man (presumably Joel Danell himself) in a flamboyant suit with a light-entertainment grin poses awkwardly behind a cheap-looking synthesizer and in front of a soft-focus backdrop — but his eyes are demoniacally glowing white stars. The music is largely Bontempi-style […]
These 12 pieces of melodic modern classical are charming, melodic, and expertly arranged. Somehow, the record as a whole is a little underwhelming, and I think there’s a clue in its title: it feels rather like Ryan Teague has been on a field trip around half a decade of music, and come back with a […]
The last time we encountered master architects Villalobos and Loderbauer in reshaping and remodelling mode, they were tackling ECM’s back catalogue, and the results were a reductio ad absurdum of abstraction (which, incidentally, I love more now than when I wrote that). This time, they’re working their magic with Conrad Schnitzler’s Zug (itself a vinyl reissue of 1973’s […]
Categories
Grouper: A I A (2CD, Kranky, April 2012)
I’d never quite got Grouper (aka Liz Harris) before. I remember the fuss about 2008’s Dragging A Dead Deer Up A Hill, and at the time I didn’t quite see the attraction. After taking the plunge with this double album, though, I’m a fully paid-up fan. Let’s start with the more conventional half, Alien Observer: […]
This is seriously deconstructed dub techno, picking up (in album terms) where Tummaa left off. (The move from Leaf to Raster-Noton doesn’t appear to have had a massive effect.) Again, the dominant elements are all recognizable genre staples, but the structure is something quite different. This outing feels possibly less meandering. This is most obvious […]
Categories
Mohn: Mohn (2CD, Kompakt, April 2012)
Wolfgang Voigt and Jörg Burger’s debut album is very much in the spirit of Kompakt’s Pop Ambient series: this is big, chewy, elastic, in-your-face ambient, full of big crashing noises and dubby swooshes, atmospheric but with as much sense of fun as darkness… it borders on the perky in places. It even has a reasonably […]
Categories
Orbital: Wonky (2CD, ACP, April 2012)
So, here’s the thing: I have a history with Orbital. 1996’s In Sides appeared early on in my conversion to electronic music, and I was blown away by it. My favourite track was the astonishing 24-minute closing double track Out There Somewhere[1], in which simple little loops are introduced and slowly built up into an intricately […]
dogrando writes about some records 