Friday, August 28, 2009

Cyclic Defrost Magazine

Cyclic Defrost Magazine

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Andy Wheddon & Friends – self titled (Concrete Plastic)

Posted: 28 Aug 2009 07:16 AM PDT

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'My Confession' opens this 6 track ep, a doom cyber confession, ominous undertone on scratched out bleak ambient percussive skittering. If this is the tone setting and I had the mindset for bleakness it would totally take me, but it comes across as a sort of playful cartoon. The whole doom apocalypse tendency, from the old (read ancient) masters of this genre, know just how to pull the strings well, if you are going to write in this mode you have heavy weight contenders to challenge for that poisoned chalice.

Good try Wheddon, who then veers into cello, static and minimal drum and bass sweetness in 'Jointed and Freestanding', the erratic broken down dreams of drum and bass continue in 'Thin Skin', moving all over without settling, opening up scapes of gamer tones, dry staccato rhythms and warm tones briefly interjecting. 'Jungle Farm’ is an uninspiring take on the jungle mode, almost better left unlistened or unwritten.

However the last two tracks on the ep are worth the price of admission, idiosyncratic and strange is ‘Codemasters Blues’ that forges warped dreams of a blues piano late night smokey session into a crazed broken free jazz electronic dystopia. It has just enough of a semblance to order that enhances the chaotic delight of tight and purposeful mutation. 'Porters Piano' uses the old trick of record static to age it's wares, a cyclical piano riff, introduction of noise, hiss, warped out plays and counter played melodic touches, a touch this technique and that and you have a treated piano track that acts as a neat exit device to this debut ep.

Innerversitysound

Polwechsel with John Tilbury: Field (HatArt)

Posted: 27 Aug 2009 10:47 PM PDT

For Polwechsel’s sixth album the reductionist ensemble are joined by John Tilbury, former AMM member and renowned Morton Feldman interpreter, an obvious decision, sure, but one that yields jaw-dropping results. ‘Field’ continues the group’s research into post-digital improvisation, and the fluctuating ensemble is again all acoustic: pianist Tilbury alongside saxophonist John Butcher, cellist Michael Moser, bassist Werner Defeldecker and percussionists Burkhard Beins and Martin Brandlmayr. As fans of the group will be aware, however, categories such as ‘electronic’ and ‘acoustic’ matter little, as the intense focus which these musicians invest into exploring their instrument’s extra-musical potentials results in sounds from which their source is frequently impossible to determine.

The two twenty+ minute tracks of ‘Field’ explore contrary approaches. Moser’s ‘Place / Replace / Represent’ is concerned with punctuating space with sparse, individual gestures, and it’s here that Tilbury’s input is most clearly felt. He coaxes dampened, treated sounds from his instrument, relishing the piano’s wooden shell as much as the strings, and when clear notes are allowed to resound they are gorgeous. If this piece resembles the pointillistic Feldman of ‘Triadic Memories’ and ‘For John Cage’, Dafeldecker’s ‘Field’ is Coptic Light, creaks, groans and scrapes smeared into a restless drone. Footsteps, bird calls and Jeck-hiss suddenly expands into a cloud of Deathprod-esque bass, concluding with the sound of bombs falling into peaceful space. This is improvisation of the most involved and involving kind, and music of the most engaging.

Joshua Meggitt

Sublamp – Breathletters (Dragon’s Eye Recordings)

Posted: 27 Aug 2009 10:46 PM PDT

Sublamp is Ryan Connor, an LA-based musician whose ‘Breathletters’ attempts to explore, through the electronic processing of various instruments and sources, the concept of sound as a pre-language form of communication. Thus Connor treats guitars, violin, glockenspiel and electric bass in a ‘pre-musical’ manner, allowing tones and extra-musical sounds to gently, haphazardly unfold, arranging them subsequently into pleasant digital streams and pairing them with abstract field recordings. It sits comfortably on Yann Novak’s Dragon’s Eye Recordings label alongside artists Celer and Son of Rose, and is firmly part of the growing field of post clicks n’ cuts producers mixing acoustic sound sources with digital frippery.

The crunch of what sounds like snow underfoot in ‘Echolalic’ is an evocative introduction, and the warm yet creepy subterranean rumblings on ‘Dust Lessons’ recalls Eno’s ‘On Land’, but much of ‘Breathletters’ fails to make an impression. That of course could be the point: the album’s 39 minutes drift effortlessly by, and the lack of demands placed on the listener is often just what’s wanted.

Joshua Meggitt

at 5:08 PM