Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Cyclic Defrost Magazine

Cyclic Defrost Magazine

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Ludovic Beier – Django Brasil (Le Chant Du Monde/ Select Audio Visual)

Posted: 17 Jun 2009 05:49 AM PDT

http://www.chantdumonde.com/Publish/album/412/resize_alb_image_Mini_2741733.jpg

Musical translation is a rarely considered art form. Not exactly a cover version, it’s more of a reconsideration of the tune in a different context, such as Nirvana tunes as elevator muzak or Senor Coconut’s Latin take on Kraftwerk’s oeuvre. In this light why not legendary gypsy jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt’s music as light and breezy Brazilian inflected Bossa Nova tunes? Admittedly Django Brasil is not as knowingly kitsch as the aforementioned examples but there is an unmistakable element of playfulness here. Though also artistry. Frenchman Ludovic Beier is a maestro of the button accordion and he also plays the acordina – a harmonica with buttons. He’s incredibly adept at Django style swing jazz, playing with many of the current purveyors of the genre, though also at many Django Reinhardt tribute festivals. Yet there’s also another side to him, his own jazz quartet finds him playing cool and Latin influenced french jazz. So perhaps it’s not such a stretch to find his interests also extend to Brazilian music. He’s joined here by guitarist Samson Schmitt, himself a regular performer in the Manouche gypsy jazz scene, who somehow manages to wrap himself around some of Django’s more complex solos. Thierry Moncheny offers a more rhythm style guitar – some of the more overtly Brazilian influenced work here, and of course percussionist Matthieu Guillemant spends more time with shakers than anything else. Whilst Schmitt and Beier engage in a little baton swapping, just the very presence of the accordionist in the mix seems to alter everything for the better. Arrangements are changed, the music is slowed down a little at times, yet in this quartet’s hands there really is this unmistakable link between the worlds. For many taking to Django to Brazil is sacrilege, yet it’s done so lovingly here and by such great and reverential musicians that not only is the music not dumbed down, it actually elevates Django’s immortal songs, demonstrating their power and ability to breathe life into whichever genre you decide to throw them at.

Bob Baker Fish

Austin Benjamin Trio – Unraveled, Rewoven (HellosQuarerecordings)

Posted: 17 Jun 2009 05:49 AM PDT

austin-benjamin

This discrete ep is as much exercise in the immaculate choice of remixers as it is anything else. For as a vehicle for the ambitions of The Austin Benjamin Trio it refers to their content and form, re-imagines it outside the live form of the jazz trio's arena and acts as base material for some extraordinary talents to manipulate. The Remote Viewer remakes The Double thinkers into, a glitch laden ride that holds intact looped sections of the original and sampled interplay, breaking out into reconstructed movements built on the recognisable foundations of the origins. Mapstation’s view on Resonance as a Colour is more a 'remixer as artist' piece in that it takes only elements of the original as hints within an electronic form that is idiosyncratic of Stefan Schneider's ourve than it is of the trio's. Andrew Pekler holds closer to the origins and reworks them radically without a dimension loss, but with a ventured sonic experimentation that enhances the original without the need to remove identity. The spacious take on Mantra for Napolean by C.S.K.A. with its play of sonic tension and its rich listening environment is an introduction to new Australian talent whose debut Tapesong is a indication of a future among the company kept within the space of this ep.

In that HellosQuarerecordings and The Austin Benjamin Trio made wise choices this ep stands as a work by itself, rather than a mere tool. Conversely this makes it more effective. It could have gone down the 'Nu-Jazz' path or sought a 'jazz groove' feel that would have laid a café society wasteland to their works but given considerable openings for wide 'audience appreciation'. Selecting this ep for its adventurous spirit and keen ear to a contemporary musical landscape is as much a recommendation for it as the evident talent on display.

Innerversitysound

Reggie Watts at the Sydney Opera House, Luminous Festival 2009

Posted: 17 Jun 2009 04:41 AM PDT

Photo of Reggie Watts

Reggie Watts enters the stage and it's his hair that greets first, a gravity defying bouncy afro hello. Cue the lights as he positions himself in front of a simple setup of synthesisers and loop machines. First he takes the microphone to his mouth and lays down some heavy beats, adds a bass and melody line and some deep sleazy nonsensical utterances to get the audience in the mood, to laugh that is.

With his four and a half octave range he's quite the talented beat-boxer and it becomes very clear as the performance unfolds that there is not much that he can't achieve with those vocal chords. But that's just the beginning. I wasn't prepared for the interjections between beat-boxing sessions which, though hard to define, could be described as absurd stream of consciousness rants or mostly improvised bollocks. He specialises in the art of dis-information, that is, absolute total lies but very funny lies nonetheless. Tonight he chooses to share his (un)scientific deductions about why certain Australian mammals bounce rather than walk, well the ground here is very hot no? Then he seamlessly blends his dialogue from one character impersonation to another, fictional or otherwise inspired by cultural references and prominent figures past and present. If he uses his 'natural' speaking voice on stage it would be impossible to tell as he comfortably traverses ye olde English accents, American teenager lingo and the unique languages of political spin, bureauocracy and arts criticism. So who is the real Reggie Watts? Maybe only his mother can answer that one.

My favourite part of the act was actually a rehearsed version of his now famous (on Youtube at least) 'fuck shit stack' song. Here he takes a stab at MTV-style gansta hip hoppers for their chauvinistic representation of women, general machismo posturing and the use of various expletives in place of inventive of lyrics. At this point he surprises the crowd with an unusual kind of shout-out,

"Yo, where's my gerunds at? Word. Adjective. Pronoun!"

Yes, he's not the usual kind of act, but a happy union of stand up comedy and human beat-box. If you ever get the chance to see him, do it. Just remember not to take him too seriously or it might mess with your head, that's all.

Renae Mason.

Seaworthy – 1897 (12K)

Posted: 17 Jun 2009 04:39 AM PDT

Seaworthy 1497

When the time arrives to bunker down, when the insides are under threat from the outsides, here sit I, ears tweaked to the luminescence within. A constant companion in this space for the last few weeks has been the second album, 1897, from Seaworthy, the outfit headed by Cameron Webb and including Greg Bird and Sam Shinazzi. Webb spent a number of months as 'artist in residence' with the Sydney Olympic Park Authority's Arts program during which "Webb undertook a series of improvisations, compositions and field recordings within the bunkers and surrounding natural environment"

To be more precise to the material consists of predominately guitar driven sonic effects built into ambient drone environments. The pieces show an intimacy with the space created, building sonic resonance within, and treating the domain as intricate to the recording. A seeming naïve presentation disguises the wrought frame of a fastidious construction which reveals both the play of the spatial and sonic depth being examined. The final track ventures beyond the confines of the structure and includes a greater degree of field recordings, in the ‘pastoral sense’, which tends to indicate a destination found, or resolution.

Placing this in perspective with Webb's work in 'field based ecological research', it is seemingly difficult to separate the life of the seaworthy from their acts, seeing all aspects as some sort of intimately welded act. What is conveyed in 1897 is more than a few sketches upon a place, being the decommissioned ammunitions bunker, that was built in 1897. To labor an obscurity to the task at hand, the album starts with the track Inside and through a number of tracks Ammunition 1-6, Installation 1-3 before arriving at the end, Outside.

It held a sort of narrative progression that spoke of the self of the journey inside, a radical act that places the self in separation to the world, wherein which the absent story of the ammunition of this place, the material of the separation as conflict and its cavernous dry echo is finally resolved in the movement to the outside. Where the idea of nature is formative base for material, and the idea of technology as an extension of nature, changed in form folding back on itself in description. The seeming deep irony of the idea of an ammunition bunker being the protector of the wetlands from encroaching development, in that it encapsulates the manifest aggressive tendency of human nature yet provides the necessary conditions for a natural habitat to thrive.

1897 is quite a listening experience, which description can hardly do justice, it opens up a scope of contemplation beyond its structural content and invites the mind to a greater scope of the idea of the environment beyond the romantic pastoral.

Innerversity Sound

B6 – Post Haze (Guava)

Posted: 17 Jun 2009 04:39 AM PDT

B6

Shanghai-based techno producer Lou Nani has cultivated a reputation as a name to watch in his native country over the last several years, both as a graphic designer and DJ / musician, playing as both a member of synth-pop band IGO and releasing his own solo techno-oriented productions as B6 (apparently a reference to both classic UK IDM / techno duo B12 and his favourite choice of artist’s pencil). While Nani’s certainly been prolific over the last few years however (witness last year’s self-released 6 CD ‘B6 Box’), this latest album ‘Post Haze’, released through Chinese electronic label Guava in many senses represents his first easily available commercial release. As you’d expect from a graphic designer, the ten tracks collected here see Nani practising a meticulous approach to fine detail and sound designer, resulting in a collection that beautifully merges elements of minimalist ‘listening’ techno ala Isolee and Luomo with a more visceral sense of muscular dancefloor groove.

This hybrid works particularly beautifully on tracks such as ‘Take You With A Sigh’ and the decidedly peaktime focused ‘Night On Earth’ – while the snares and hi-hats may at times be little more than sparse, cut-up breath textures and hisses of white noise, the surrounding architecture threads in a thick, almost creamy analogue electro bassline and the sorts of funky retroid synths you could almost imagine Thomas Bangalter reaching for. There’s also a tangible sense of progression through an actual club night as later tracks such as ‘The Blind Leading The Blessed’ see the mood sifting towards more hypnotic, gliding early morning grooves – something that’s conceptually backed up by the ‘11:30 PM’ and ‘4.30 AM’ ambient sound segues that bookend this disc. In the end, you’re left with one of the more accomplished and satisfying techno albums of recent memory, and one that’s likely to appeal equally to club kids and more armchair-oriented ‘listening’ techno fans.

Louderbach – Autumn (Minus/Inertia)

Posted: 17 Jun 2009 02:28 AM PDT

I have to confess that, with it’s mock gothic cover photo, the first few minutes of synthetic atmosphere, then second track ‘Seems Like Static’ with Gibby Miller’s warbling vocals, I quickly wrote Louderbach off as the latest in a long line of Joy Division worshippers repackaging their heroes’ moves. But a small amount of patience was rewarded and the self-consciousness of the opening to Autumn was given context and made great sense.

In spite of initial neo-goth appearances, the album is a deep, diverse, sincere and rewarding experience. Musically, the duo use a heavy, dark form of minimal house as the basic template, but stray into other paths liberally while maintaining a great focus and weight. At times, most notably on ‘Nothing More Than A White Poison’, the sound is firmly rooted to early 90s Detroit style techno-futurism, all pulsing bottom end, pitch shifted vocal samples and brooding synths. ‘Sunspots’ show there’s always room for 808 drum samples if used well. Album closer ‘Shine’ reintroduces the early Bernard Sumner vocal stylings, but by this stage any thoughts of 80s retro-ism have well and truly been dispelled.

It’s an interesting mix of influences, but a mix which the duo make seamless. Their dual locations of Berlin and Los Angeles also make perfect sense. Any initial reservations I had are completely removed now – Louderbach’s dark, pulsing, melodic blend has definitely won me over.

Adrian Elmer

at 5:49 PM