Monday, June 8, 2009

Cyclic Defrost Magazine

Cyclic Defrost Magazine
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Production Unit – Half Of A Hole (Highpoint Lowlife)

Posted: 08 Jun 2009 06:41 AM PDT

Production Unit - Half Of A Hole

Another great release from the Highpoint Lowlife label, this time by Production Unit, which has something to do with Marcia Blaine School For Girls, or so I'm told. So we expect some forward thinking electronica, and that's what we get, achieved by looking back to the UK's rich electronic history.

The opening track A Little Hope immediately reminds me of Greater Than One, at a time when they shed their industrial/experimental and embraced electronic dance music, coming up fresh with heavily processes vocal samples. Dem Sirens takes us to more dub territory, with an engaging loping beat, two note guitar loop and modulating electronic tones, simple, yet mesmerizing.

Highpoint Lowlife continue to deliver the fresh sounds, a great two track EP.

Wayne Stronell

Ras G – Brotha From Anotha Planet (Brainfeeder/Alpha Pup)

Posted: 08 Jun 2009 06:37 AM PDT

Ras G - Brotha From Anotha Planet

Ras G has become quite prolific, happy to let our ears enjoy what seem to be a bunch of ideas, unused tracks that were emitted from the album, but I'll take what I can get, loving his quite unique style of skewed dub beats. Ras G does pull his sounds from so many different sources, and you can hear this emerge in his music, whether it be dub from the bottomless vaults in Jamaica, or channeling the ghost of Sun Ra with disparate jazz stylings, verging on the incomprehensible, to his ultra modern take on beat oriented music.

For castoffs the 13 tracks contained here cover a lot of ground, pulling all his influences into just about every track. The ambient stylings of Dishwater, with the obvious Prefuse 73 influence open the album. Earthly Matters turns the bass up, showcasing Ras G's use of pure tones as an instrument. Shinelight melds sluggish yet rushed drum rolls with Detroit style chords. Astrohood breaks out a dancehall chant, buried in a soup of air horns and reverse electronics. In Coming has more akin to Joker or Jamie Vex'd, drudge beats and menacing synthesizer chords, but taking us quickly to exotica with a Martin Denny style outro. Return From The Great Unknown portrays a b-grade 50's sci-fi movie, wow, flutter and hiss included in the mix.

Theres a lot of meat hear, even though only three tracks clock in at over 3 minutes, it's a cosmic journey, so don't forget your space suit.

Wayne Stronell

Tamaru - Figure (Trumn)

Posted: 08 Jun 2009 02:36 AM PDT

Vignette #1 - I’ve had the same headache in my right temple for 8 days straight (too many football grand finals in Europe at odd hours mixed with late nights for music). Most sounds just hurt my head. But my preferred method of falling asleep involves headphones and music. Figure is a warm, treacly soother to both my sore head and desire to sleep.

Vignette #2 - I’m walking home from work with my headphones on. The sky is grey. As I walk, appearing before me is the full 180˚ arc of a rainbow. To anybody who, like me, has lived in Sydney for the last month and is used to much more regularly blue skies, you will understand the joyous feelings that such a sight might trigger. Figure is my brooding soundtrack which always hints at quiet joy and peaceful satisfaction.

Tamaru has created a contemplative drone work from a setup of bass guitar, volume pedal and delay pedal. The work is majestically beautiful as its simple constructs drag you through a range of of emotional states without seemingly doing very much at all. The bass notes tend to form sinewave sounds which, through subtle shifts in the delay time, are pushed into brief microtonal harmonies. Each track is given time to sink in and envelope. Each is inviting and full of warmth.

Put it down to the weather. Put it down to my health. Whatever it is, Figure is one of the finest releases I’ve heard for a while and will be returning to my playlist regularly top accompany any of a wide range of moods.

Adrian Elmer

Yvat – Gliae (+g6pd)

Posted: 08 Jun 2009 02:36 AM PDT

Yvat

Bucharest, Romania-based electronic producer Yvat currently runs his own professional sound design company, a day job he’s managed to balance against a seriously prolific work rate in recent years. After first emerging in 2004 with his debut ‘Analog Orchestra’ album on UK label Experimental Seafood Records, Yvat’s gone on to release a dizzying amount of 3" CD releases, collaborative DVDs alongside Romanian art designers Alex Popescu and Paul Dersidan, and no less than three albums under his parallel Robotii Nu Se Pot Ruga alias alongside Justin Wiggan. This latest album ‘Gliae’ follows on from 2006’s ‘Chroma’, Yvat’s first album for Israeli label +g6pd and sees him picking up from the stylistic threads laid down by that preceding record, particularly its increasing shift towards more rhythmically complex contemporary IDM influences. While opening track ‘Crus’ at first suggests a glitch-hop flavoured journey ahead with its fusion of crunching headnod IDM beats and refracted-sounding phased synth pads, many of the tracks that follow such as the vaguely electro-funk tinged ‘Tactum’ and ‘Caudate’ call to mind more ‘Tri Repetae’-era Autechre, the main focus being percussive reverberation as melodic tones tumble gamelan-like beneath a rattling backdrop of contorted IDM rhythms. While there are certainly immediate comparisons to be made with classic era Warp Records here however, in this case it’s Yvat’s immense attention to production detail and the sheer sense of icily cerebral atmosphere atmosphere generated here that places ‘Gliae’ miles ahead of most of the other IDM soundalikes. It also comes with some of the classiest packaging I’ve seen in a while, the CDR being held between two engraved plates of tough as hell translucent Stiplex plastic.

Schuster - The Brutal Arc 7″ (Adeptsound)

Posted: 08 Jun 2009 01:33 AM PDT

schuster-cover

Englishman Tim Bayes has been involved in various projects in the industrial/noise underground for over 25 years now. This lathe-cut clear vinyl 7″ on new Perth label Adeptsound is his first release as Schuster. Apparently the prime source for the sounds on this release is a recording of an oxyacetylene torch in action.

‘The Brutal Arc’ is delicately sculpted and manipulated noise, although still maintaining a slightly aggressive edge to it. The use of loops creates odd rhythms, and almost subliminal melodies take shape as one listens. It even sounds as if there are ghost voices in there, but of course it’s an aural illusion. On the flip side ‘Cosmosis’ is reminiscent of Cluster ‘71 or side 2 of Klaus Schulze’s Irrlicht - it’s a kind of kosmische/industrial/dark ambient hybrid, which is very pleasing to the ears.

[NB This 7" release is limited to just 30 copies, but is also available to buy in MP3 format. For ordering info contact Adeptsound here.]

Ewan Burke

at 5:59 PM