BOOMKAT NEWSLETTER 27/06/2008

This release follows up on Haswell's release eight years ago of the first Live Salvage album, which compiled live recordings made between 1997 and 2000. Since then, Haswell has released collaborative works with Merzbow (on Warp's Satanstornade) and Florian Hecker - the Gilbert to his George, the Eric (or indeed Burt) to his Ernie. Fortunately, Haswell has also been playing live extensively, amassing a new cache of live recordings to throw our way. At this stage, it would probably be worth pointing out to those of you who have not yet guessed it, that Russell Haswell is a noise musician, one who straddles both the cerebral noise world of the eMego camp and the more brutish, DIY, Japanese-inspired aesthetic. The range of terrifying timbres on show during Second Live Salvage is headspinning: there are recordings that sound like a swarm of giant bees let loose in a cathedral, others that resemble the sound of a dentist's drill as heard through the vibrations in your own jawbone, and of course, plenty of moments in which you feel compelled to check that you are in fact listening to a record and not, instead, being run over by a train. There are plenty of noise artists out there who know how to play with the extremities of sound, but it takes someone as talented as Haswell to make it a truly transcendent experience. While so many musicians just throw feedback and distortion in your face, this one makes noise sound like an entity unto itself - not a by-product of some aggressive signal processing or merely something that's too loud - this doesn't sound like music that's the product of distortion pedals and so forth: Russell Haswell gives birth to noise, as if it was never anything other than noise. It's absolute, tyrannical and annihilatingly powerful. Unbelievably good - a massive recommendation.

THE WIRE, JULY 2008

Reclaimed live reordings take computer music out of its academic ghetto and subject it to gale force extremes. By Nick Cain

You can understand why Russell Haswell uses the term salvage, with its connotations of risk and danger. 'Second Live Salvage' comprises of recordings of live performances dating from 2000 to 2007, which Haswell defines as salvage recordings because he didn't record them himself. Like those collected on 'Live Salvage 1997->2000', his 2001 solo debut, they were all made by audience members, then either given to or tracked down by Haswell. He undertook 'premastering salvage' work on them, with the aim of bringing closer to his memories of the event and the acoustics of the venue in which it took place. Given the distinctly variable quality of the recordings in their released state, recovery would be the more accurate term.
Haswell insists that, rather being a deliberate conceptual strategy, his notion of salvage arises out of more prosaic realities - he didn't have the proper recording eqiupment at the time, or was too busy preparing and performing the music to arrange for it to be recorded professionally. Nonetheless, by ceding authorial control in this way, Haswell gives the album a conceptual context, addressing it by default to issues of representation: his salvages become subjective thirdhand reconstructions of imperfect secondhand representations. His emphasis on the method of production is by default a form of process music.
Haswell's focus on process is echoed in his use of technology. As he explains in his liner notes, all the recordings 'document my attempt at filling space with something physical and intense using Computer Music softwares as my only tool'. Haswell is very particular about what he does and doesn't classify as computer music software. He favours GENDYN stochastic software pioneered by Iannis Xenakis, which he uses alongside specialised, academically developed programs, eschewing mass market applications. His liner notes list software used to create each track, and by doing so highlight the contrast which underpins the album - between the sophistication of the tehcnology Haswell used during the performances, and the compromised quality of the recordings which represent them.
Haswell uses the software as a tool for real-time improvisation, and both his solo albums illustrate his finely calibrated noise sensibility. 'Second Live Salvage', however, focuese more exclusively on the kinds of sound relationships one associates with the vocabulary of computer music and its attendant idioms. '10:53.82, 2002, Färgfabriken, Stockholm' is an exercise in oscillation of tones, multiplied and amplified to gale force levels. '08:12.14, 2000, Engine Rooms, Brighton' illustrate Haswell's trademark rapid shredding and recombination of sounds, producing probing swarms which abrade each other in erratic, pulsing rhythms.
The textures which reult are finely serrated, seething with granular detail and pockmarked with flurries of pitch manipulation. '05:08.62, 2006, Point Éphémère, Paris' even ends with spiralling, solarised frequency, the closest Haswell has ever come to good old fashioned ring modualtion. The album concludes with a suitably oversaturated collaboration with Incapacitants' Toshiji Mikawa, but 'Live Salvage's debt to Japanese noise has mostly worked off. Where 'Live Salvage' documented gigs in small, packed venues, its successor's performances took place in larger, emptier spaces. Consequently the sound is thinner and more fibrous, concentrated within a narrower dynanmic bandwidth, with less mid-range density.
Interviewed in The Wire 285, Haswell explained that his music is in part a search for extremities of sound, motivated by the deisre to provide its listeners wiht new exepriences. '16:02.84, 2002, Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt' gets closest to realising this goal, kneading jagged fragments into oppresive stuttering percussive patterns, an impressively unpleasant barrage. But to frame the music in this context locks the interpretative experience is a closed loop, as well as obsuring Haswell's abilty as an improvisor. He is undoubtedly aware of the pitfalls of such a mindset, though his liner notes he does describe a couple of tracks as 'chaotic-noise-generation', which is true, in a strictly literal sense. But if 'Second Live Salvage' is to be thought of as noise, then its a dissenting variant, one which allies Haswell with the mercurial, restless spirits lurking at the genre's fringes: Kevin Drumm, Joe Colley, Lasse Marhaug, John Wiese.
The album is more accurately considered alongside two of 2007's most potent (and overlooked) recordings, Marcus Schmickler's 'Altars Of Science' and his collaboration with Peter Rehberg as R/S, '(One) Snow Mud Rain'. Like 'Second Live Salvage' both endevavour to transplant computer music from its culturally stratified academic ghetto into a new, less stable context. Equally strong parallels can be drawn with volatile experiments which light up computer music's early period of development: James Tenney's early 60s digital synthesis software compositions, mid-60s to early 70s Pietro Grossi works like 'Collage' and 'Computer Music', and Gottfried Michael Koenig's 'Klangfiguren II' and his abrasively brilliant late 60s 'Funktionen' works. Haswell shares with them an idealistic yet singleminded sense of exploration and an unfettered determination to explore the limits of computer software, as well as a penchant for using software to produce raw sound.
In Haswell's case the sound quality is at least partially due to the comprimised nature of the recordings he is working with. Because their fidelity fails to fully convey the level of detail and information Haswell is working with, 'Second Live Salvage' can only yield clues to his real abilities. He's currently working on a large scale studio construction, which should offer a more accurate representation. Regardless, viewed as a document of a process rather than a polished, finished product, 'Second Live Salvage' is an impressive piece of work.

OX, JUNE 2008

FUCK! FUCK! FUCK! - Das ist das Geilste an purem Noise, was mir seit langem untergekommen ist! Genau so und nicht anders muß es klingen, wenn man kompromisslos und ohne Rücksicht auf Verluste frei loslärmt! Es knarzt, dröhnt, quietscht und bollert aus allen Rohren und die Boxen werden in Brand geschossen. Menschen flüchten panisch ins Freie und halten sich dann trotz geschlossenen Türen noch die Ohren zu. Zufällig vorbeikommende Lebewesen schauen verwirrt zum Himmel hinauf, weil sie denken gleich beginnt die Apokalypse. - Nur ein paar ganz Verrückte stehen vor der Bühne, zucken wie in Trance, die Fäuste in die die Luft gestreckt und schreien gegen dieses Inferno bis zur Bewusstlosigkeit an. Willkommen im Noise-Nirvana! (10/10)
Carsten Vollmer

SPEX, JUNE 2008

Obwohl Russell Haswell stets dem Elektronishcen verbunden bleibt, produziert er doch eine Musik, die sich ästhetisch nicht nur am naheliegenden Noise-Sound aus Japan und Europa, sondern zudem an der Fäuste ballenden Art extremer Rock-Spielarten speist. Die Compilation 'Second Live Salvage' präsentiert Haswell in mehreren sehr unterschiedlichen Episoden seinen Erschütterungswut, die er zuweilen mit so viel rostiger Substanz überlädt, dass er sine eigenes Equipment einer wahren Belastungsprobe unterzieht. Interessant ist, dass die vorliegenden Aufnahmen erst in Nachhinein und oftmals gar aus zweiter Hand zusammengetragen wurden: Im Mastering-Prozess hat Haswell versucht, aus dem Gedächtnis die Atmosphäre des jeweiligen Auftritts zu rekonstruieren. Das Ergebnis schließlich hat was von einem ruppigen, liebevollen Bootleg, wird aber leider nur zu Promozwecken ganz angemessen im anachronistischen Tape-Format herausgegeben. Die offizielle Variante erscheint auf Vinyl.
Kai Ginkel

ROCKERILLE, APRIL 2008

Dopo essere stato fuori catalogo per oltre cinque anni, ecco tornare alla ribalta un grande album del catalogo Mego, per l'occasione rimasterizzato, impacchettato in una lussuoso digipack e arricchito con tre tracce extra. Come ormai noto, dietro il moniker di Pita si cela Peter Rehberg, eccezionale compositore oltre che fondatore della grande label austriaca: in 'Get Out' il compositore elettronico mette in riga i grandi della 'glitch generation', gli autarchici rumoristi ed i maestri del minimalismo da laptop, elevando questa prova ai livelli dell 'Heroin' di Mathieu ed Ehlers. I bonus estrati da un 12" realizzato con Kevin Drumm, folli come nelle migliori apsettative, chiudono il cerchio di un disco memorabile ed extraterrestre. 9/10
Michele Casella

Re-issue aktion from KTL's Peter Rehberg, 'Get Out' (Pita's second LP), was originally realised as the nineties began to curl up and die. Lauded at the time of its release, and since popular within and without electronic music circles, 'Get Out' has been described as the electronic equivalent of Jimi Hendrix's 'Are You Experienced'. Out of print for over 5-years now, this edition comes in a purple 6-panel digipack. Challenging yet intrinsically serene, Pita is the maxi-priest of minimalism, and 'Get Out' is as good a place to start as any!
Jean Encoule

FAILME. 17.05.2008

A welcome reissue from one of the originators of mind-bending computer music. Peter Rehberg's 1999 release seems to have been influential in the sphere of modern electronic composition. Especially with regards to the use of the laptop as a creation and performance tool. Despite the occasional ear-scraping bursts of digital noise, this doesn't come close to the harsher end of the Mego spectrum. Certainly doesn't use software as a device for sonic violence or wanton aggression. It also hasn't dated one iota....
'3' is the track that you'll remember this album for: the jarring introduction of uplifting, almost euphoric strings that slowly descend into overdriven distortion still sounds great. '6' is gigabit data passing through an echo chamber, '9' takes harsh source material and moulds it into hypnotic drone. The three extra new tracks which previously appeared over a split release with Kevin Drumm extend the scope of the original work with distinctive, thematic excursions: feminine glitch ('ce3'), unreliable connections ('pe2') and distressed radio frequencies ('tr1')
Sheikh Ahmed

GONZO CIRCUS, 02.06.2008

Collega (pds), die in rustiger tijden de schijfjes van Pita en zijn labelgenoten in handen krijgt om er fijne recensies over te schrijven, kampte deze keer met tijdsgebrek. Sinds we naar het landelijke Kortrijk verhuisden (na vijfentwintig jaar Gent) wonen we bij elkaar om de hoek en pds gaf me de kans om een paar woorden vuil te maken aan de heruitgave van 'Get Out', een cd die oorspronkelijk in 1999 verscheen. 'Get Out' van Pita (aka Peter Rehberg) is inmiddels uitgegroeid tot een klassieker in het genre. Gebruik makend van een Apple Powerbook 1400cs/133 componeerde Pita een aantal stukken. Op deze heruitgave staan de negen oorspronkelijke stukken, weliswaar volledig geremasterd, aangevuld met de drie stukken die eerder verschenen op de split twelve inch uit 2000 (BOXmedia) met Kevin Drumm. Rehberg zou zichzelf niet zijn natuurlijk als die drie stukken netjes achter de stukken van 'Get Out' zouden komen te staan. Twee ervan wel, eentje heeft hij gewoon tussen de andere titelloze stukken gegooid. Niet dat het, voor onze oren toch, veel verschil maakt. Echte songs staan er op dit plaatje toch niet. De nummers spelen met toonhoogte en flarden melodie en lopen eigenlijk allemaal gewoon in elkaar over. 'Get Out', de tweede cd die Pita uitbracht (na het debuut 'Seven Tons For Free') is eigenlijk het eerste belangrijke album met laptopmuziek dat uitkwam. De plaat was al jaren niet meer te verkrijgen, maar daar is nu dus verandering in gekomen. Essentiële piepmuziek waar lange slapers aan ontsnappen. Onze huisgenoten krijgen namelijk de kriebels van dit soort intrigerende albums en wij zijn hier de vroege vogel.

GOON, 27.05.2008

'Get Out' von Pita ist ein kleines Meisterwerk der elektronischen Musik. Eine erweiterte Neuauflage ruft uns seine Faszination wieder ins Gedächtnis

Peter Rehberg: in Wien ansässiger Komponist elektronischer Musik, neben Christian Fennesz vielleicht der international bekannteste dort; Mitbetreiber von Mego, 'one of the most important and influential electronic music labels of the last decade' (Edwin Pouncey, The Wire), dass nun nach seinem Ende von 2005 unter dem Namen editionsMego das vorzügliche Repertoire wieder veröffentlicht. Die neueste Kostbarkeit ist das inzwischen zum Klassiker avancierte Album 'Get Out' von Pita selbst. Schon bei der Veröffentlichung 1999 war dieses eine Offenbarung; eine Zerreißprobe zwischen den ausgereizten Polen von An- und Entspannung. 'Get Out' beginnt mit einer Aneinanderreihung von Tonhöhen, welche die Aufnahmefähigkeit des Gehörs auf die Probe stellen und einen Hund artig apportieren lassen. Wer diese drei Minuten Störfunk übersteht, dem wird einerseits Einlass gewährt in die akustische Welt von Pita, der sieht sich andererseits allerdings auch mit den elementaren Fragen der Tonkunst konfrontiert: Was ist eigentlich Musik? Inwiefern verändert die elektronische Manipulation von Klängen die Hörgewohnheiten? Geräusche, Noten, Töne werden in ihre kleinsten, selbständigen Teile zerlegt, ohne vordergründig logischen Zusammenhang, ohne unbedingte innere Kohärenz. Die Klänge sind vom Ort ihres Entstehens entbunden. 'Get Out' ist so ein Aufbegehren gegen jegliche Autorität. Die Kompositionen von Peter Rehberg bleiben immateriell. Die neun Tracks wollen uns anfassen, ohne zu berühren. Es ist, als wolle Pita beweisen, dass die elektronische Musik nun in der Lage sei, unser bisheriges Verständnis von Musik mit leichter Hand zu unterminieren. 'We Don't Need No Music', wie folgerichtig der Titel des ersten Tracks auf der im Jahre 2002 folgenden LP 'Get Down' lautete. Dennoch ist es nicht so, als würde hier die bloße Willkür regieren, dahinter steckt ein System. Es war hier nicht umsonst von Kompositionen die Rede. So tauchen immer wieder auch konventionelle Tonfolgen auf und es wird mit Intensität, Dichte, Lautstärke gespielt: Ein ständiges Anschwellen und Abschwellen hinein in die Dekonstruktion.
Sebastian Hinz

OCTOPUS, 21.05.2008*

Poursuivant sa campagne de réédition, Mego redonne une deuxième jeunesse au Get Out de Peter Rehberg, deuxième album du fondateur du label, initialement paru en 1999 et complété dans cette version 2008 des trois titres paru sur le BOXmedia de 2000, un 12" partagé à l'époque avec le complice bruitiste Kevin Drumm. Comme le laisse entendre la longue pièce N°3 - aucun morceau n'a de titres -, Get Out propose une quintessence supposée des musiques digitales d'avant-garde telles qu'on pouvait les aborder à l'époque, quelque part entre les teintes grésillantes des matières musicales industrielles, les abstractions sensitives des musiques acousmatiques, les colorations harmoniques d'une sensualité techno prise à rebrousse-poil et les strates soniques d'une noise musique électrifiée dans sa tension maximale. Un disque unificateur et presque zélateur d'une culture musicale électronique au sens large, et qui garde aujourd'hui une identité et un pouvoir de séduction fort.
Laurent Catala

BAD ALCHEMY, 05.2008

PITAs Get Out (eMEGO 029) bezieht seinen Titel von Aleister Crowleys Eight Lectures On Yoga: Sit Still. Stop Thinking. Shut Up. Get Out. Scheiß Double-binds. Scheiß Yoga. Was nun als Wiederveröffentlichung vorliegt, gilt längst als Powerbook-Pioniertat. Vexierend zwischen scharfem Noise und verzerrten Musiksamples, explizierte Peter Rehberg 1999 die neuen Lustpotentiale digitaler Reize. The same old Industrial- und Avantshit, aber mit der coolen Power von Apple keimfrei gemacht, der Lack zerkratzt zu Metahochglanz mit der sarkastischen Nonchalance von Cyberpunk. Der Londoner hatte seine Coolness schon in Kollaborationen mit General Magic und mit Bauer gezeigt und konnte sie im selben Jahr mit FennO'Berg und als Prix Ars Electronica-Gewinner noch steigern. Rehberg ließ Melodien selig in Weißem Rauschen versinken und machte Dekonstruktion zu einer sinnlichen Erfahrung. Er fuhr aber nicht nur noisig die Krallen aus, er schusserte auch mit unrund kullernden Glasmurmeln und konnte sich dabei in ihre schlierigen Farben, ihr nahezu psychedelisches Glitchen und Clicken verlieren. Abrupt aber folgten wieder nervöse Zuckungen, Laserbeschuss der Synapsen, die beflippert wurden mit zwitschernden Frequenzen. Der Dancefloor mit seinen Stahlgewittern wurde quasi eng geführt zum Teilchendetektor, in dem akustische Partikel kollidieren. Jeder der namenlosen Tracks war eine Vivisektion der Grauen Masse. Es folgten Get Down (Mego, 2000) und Get Off (Häpna, 2004). Hier ist dieser Electronica-Klassiker, den David Keenan als mit Are You Experienced vergleichbares Paradigma würdigt, erweitert mit drei Tracks von Pitas 12"-Split mit Kevin Drumm (BOXmedia, 2000).

THE WIRE, MAY 2008

This is one of the crucial documents of the laptop era's first phase. Even now, nine years after the original release of 'Get Out', the record stands as one of Peter Rehberg's most compelling statements - its coruscating blaze and udulating lyricism cast idelible light and colour over everything that had followed. Rehberg's second fully fledged solo album wastes no time in setting out its visionary parameters. The first 3 tracks (titled '1', '2' and '3') move in a fluid arc from abrasive, ultra-processed howls, through staccato ersatz atmospheres and into languid, melodic sweep of breathtaking sonority and beauty. The sheer redemptive grace of the crumbling swoon of '3' gains all the more impact from the stark hostility of its surroundings; Rehberg is a master of shock tactics who understands that violence alone is a limited resource. And so, like his illustrious Viennese antecedent Arnold Schoenberg, Pita moves easily from limpid, plangent tone clusters to strident lashes of dissonant sound, adding twitching, pointillist excursions and a thounsand iredescent shades of white noise along the way. Technology may have moved n since it was crafter back in 1998, but 'Get Out' remains a testament to the untrammelled potency - in the right hands - of the Apple Powerbook.
Chris Sharp

BRAINWASHED, 23.03.2008

The first few minutes of Aguire – The Wrath Of God are amongst the most extraordinary in cinema. It is Christmas Day 1560, and after annihilating the Incan Empire, an army of Conquistadors cross the Andes and descend through the clouds in pursuit of El Dorado, the City of Gold. Popol Vuh's extraordinarily beautiful "Aguirre I" imbues the sequence with foreboding, spirituality, and an ethnographic authenticity that is at once fake but totally convincing. Their ethereal music is a vital contrast to the tale that will unfold and is best heard in its cinematic context. Haswell & Hecker's remix, also extraordinary, has an unwelcome incision of digital din at around the four minute mark that unnecessarily echoes the eventual violence and destruction of the film. The Conquistadors' mission, if ever truly a pure evangelical sojourn, becomes engulfed in a lust for gold and fame, dehydration, cannibalism, murder, suicide, hallucination, delusions of purity, incestuous desire and madness.
Klaus Kinski features in Aguirrre, and his cinematic presence carries a potent threat. Mostly he just stares, leans to the right, sways, plots, and orders violence. By the end of the journey he is surrounded by corpses, adrift on a raft; ranting that he will conquer all of South America, marry his own daughter, become immortal and such like. The descent into madness begins to emerge when a native plays the pan pipes as Kinski turns his back to the camera and squirms uncomfortably. Maybe I was projecting a hatred of pan piping but the scene gave me the feeling that Kinski was pretty close to actually beheading the musician in order to cut off the Peruvian pollution at its immediate source. Amen.
Werner Herzog based Cobra Verde on The Viceroy of Ouidah, by novelist Bruce Chatwin but, as usual, disregarded the source material at will. Mika Vainio's version of Popol Vuh's music fluctuates between sudden metallic surges, cracking pauses, hypnotic waves of static, and silence. Again, the unsettling, scintillating piece probably matches the film’s trek into morally ambiguous territory, led by an increasingly dubious tour guide. Cobra Verde was the last collaboration between Herzog and Klaus Kinski who told his director: "We can not go further. I am no more." Four years later, Kinski was dead.
This splendid release is pressed on red vinyl and packaged in a plastic sleeve with a golden sticker.
Duncan Edwards

BOOMKAT NEWSLETTER, 21.03.2008

It's been a real joy to see the Mego/Editions Mego empire going from strength to strength in recent months. It wasn't too long since the original Mego label lay dormant; once a colossus within the European avant-garde community and one of the key institutions in the shaping of how we define modern computer music, only to suddenly vanish. Well, the label has since been reborn and currently enjoys a blistering display of form. This mini LP underlines that perfectly, bringing together contemporary innovators Florian Hecker, Russell Haswell and Mika Vainio for a look back at the pioneering ambient works of Popol Vuh, one of the great bands of the krautrock era and regular collaborators with filmmaker Werner Herzog. Excerpts from their soundtrack to Aguirre, The Wrath Of God are used in the Haswell & Hecker re-composition featured here, which finds the synthetic choral ambience of the 1972 original respectfully warped and devoured by the advanced machinations of these two titans in the field of cutting edge electronics. Plumes of digital tone rupture the warmth and surface tension established by the source material, arcing and pitchshifting with extravagant, fluid trajectories, and ultimately casting a beautiful algorithmic scrawl over the original. Mika Vainio's reworking of 'Nachts: Schnee' is equally successful, distilling a profound, frost-coated ambience reminiscent of the auditory deep-freeze of Thomas Koner's chilliest productions. Vainio's subtle, textured modulations sculpt some sort of narrative order, but without sabotaging the overwhelming sense of stillness that presides over the composition. Two indispensable sides of bright red vinyl, all but guaranteed to bewitch any follower of experimental electronic music, both old and new. A massive recommendation.

PITCHFORK, 18.03.08

I wasn't sure how this would play out: a remix of Popol Vuh's brilliant theme for Werner Herzog's Aguirre by Haswell & Hecker. The original is one of the most beautiful pieces of music I know, and once you've seen the film, the opening images it accompanies will stay with you forever (thank you, YouTube). Haswell & Hecker, on the other hand, are in part about ugliness. An artful ugliness, to be sure; their work deals in extreme sonics even if it's not exactly noise. To me, it seems like electronic music about electricity itself, amplifying hums and feedback and leakage and assorted grating tones to a volume that could shake a room. But they do right by Florian Fricke's original here, extending the ghostly chords of the Mellotron-like "choir organ" and having them hover in place, lying in wait for the videogame-like blasters that intrude about halfway through. The blips gradually leading back to more placid waters before erupting again in a final section that's all about disorienting contrast, making for a satisfying eight-minute journey into a very peculiar valley. The flipside of the red vinyl contains an equally good remix of the Popol Vuh's Cobra Verde theme by Pan Sonic's Mika Vainio.
Mark Richardson

D-SIDE, 03/08

Compositeur légendaire das années 70, Florian Fricke, l'âme de Popol Vuh, restere sans doute à jamais dans les espirits pour les bandes orginales réalisées pour les films de Werner Herzog, 'Aguirre' et 'Cobra Verde', épopées halluncinéesau service de la folie d'un acteur de génie: Klaus Kinski. C'est donc à traveurs des "remixes" de ces deux œuvres majeures de la musique de film que Mika Vainio d'un côté et Haswell & Hecker de l'autre ont décidé de lui rendre hommage. Evidemment, il n'est guère èvident de retrouver les orginaux, tant les relectures sont ici radicales. Ainsi, Mika Vainio, qui transforme un 'Nachts: Schnee' extrait de 'Cobra Verde' en une longue pièce ambiente et fluide, tout juste traversée de réminiscences de la musique de Popol Vuh, qui évoque souvent, dans son déroulement, le meilleur des titres de Fennesz. Plus aériens encore, Haswell & Hecker gèlent le thème d''Aguirre' pout le faire s'élever dans uns ciel chargé de nuages électroniques et de cloches. Deux superbes hommages, qui donnent de plus envie de revoir les films ausquels ils font référence.
Jean-François Micard

ROCKDELUX, 03/08

Bandas sonoras de Popol Vuh para Werner Herzog en versiones de Mika Vainio y Haswell & Hecker. El primero hace una catedral etérea con 'Nachts: Schnee', de 'Cobra Verde' (1987), mientras que los segundos convierten 'Aguirre I' de 'Aguirre, la cólera des Dios' (1972), en nu score de ciencia-ficción apocaliptica.

THE WIRE, APRIL 2008

On the face of it, the hardcore digitalia of Editions Mego and the Aquarian Krautrock of Popol Vuh ought to make for a pretty grisly and incongrous soundclash. However, these two tracks, both taken from Popol Vuh's soundtrack work, are surprisingly congenial. 'Nahchts: Schnee' sees Vainio reverentially unfurling their twisted, Gothic sheets of quasi-orchestral noise, restricting himself the odd, discreet digital incision. Haswell & Hecker mete out similary respectful treatment to 'Aguirre I' - using vintage digital delays and freeze effect units, they pierce the wrahful, Dark Ambient stormclouds with surgical stabs of muntant acid squiggle, lending the exercise the air of some post-apocalyptic rave. A gentle introduction this, to Mego's dungeon of delights.
David Stubbs

TAZ, 13.03.2008

Dunkle Tiefkühltruhentöne.
Sunn O)))-Gitarrist Stephen O'Malley und der ungarische Death-Metal-Sänger Attila Csihar (ehemals Mayhem) haben für eine Ausstellung des Bildhauers Banks Violette eine achtstündige Surroundsoundinstallation entworfen, die für die CD-Version nun auf 40 Minuten eingedampft wurde, wobei sich O'Malley vornehmlich um das Gedärm seines Verstärkers kümmert. Von da holt er zwei Morton-Feldman-artige Tiefkühltruhentöne ans Dämmerlicht. Einen hohen, fiependen und einen subsonischen Brummton. Man denkt noch, wie kläglich, dann haben sie sich schon ins Gedächtnis geairbrusht.
In einer Tabelle im Booklet sind die Frequenzen der beiden Monster exakt berechnet. Dass sich O'Malley dann doch zu einem Druckwelle-Riff erweichen lässt, hat nichts mit dem Einsatz von Attila Csihar zu tun, der "Toten-Aufwecker" als Berufsbezeichnung angibt. Die Vocals hat er im Keller seines Schlosses bei Budapest aufgenommen. Der Hall dort ist so sinfonisch wie die Luft sauerstoffarm, was Csihars Schwarze-Messe-Stimme gewisse Dringlichkeit verleiht. Ungarisch ist nun nicht als Rock-'n'-Roll-Sprache bekannt, und was Csihar angeht, soll sie es auch nicht werden. "Belépünk a végtelen téren át/A véges idon túlra", ("Wir durchschreiten den Weltraum / Weit entfernt vom Jenseits").

D-SIDE, 03/08

Parti du métal, le Californien Stephen O'Malley, membre de Sunn O))), est depuis quelques années devenu un habitué des musiques pour spectackes et installations sonores, en particulier avec le projet KTL dont il est la moitié le plus présente. C'est dans ce contexte qu'il entretient une relation créative suivie avec le sculpteur américain Banks Violette, pour qui il a réalisé diverses compositions, dont ce '6°FSkyquake' dont les bases ont été posées en 2001. Très lent et grondant, '6°FSkyquake' est le témoignage d'une pièce de plus de huit heures créée pour des systèmes mulitcanaux, et a donc dû être considérablement retravaillé pour les besoins du CD. Dominé tout entier par la voix d'Attila Csihar, qui se livre, pendant plus d'une demi-heure, à un travail oscillant entre le chant grégorien, l'incantation paienne et la glossolalie, '6°FSkyquake' se veut sans doute une expression d'un certain mysticisme catastrophiste, mais finit finalment par agacer, tant cette voix, trop forte et trop en avant, masque le détails du travail d'O'Malley, transformant ce qui aurait dû être und grande pièce d'art sonore en un cliché pour ados pseudo-satanistes. Une belle occasion manquée.
Jean-François Micard

SONIC SEDUCER, 04/08

An dem, was die Herren O'Malley und Csihar auf '6°Skyquake' zu Gehör bringen, werden sich vermutlich die Geister scheiden. Eine gute halbe Stunde lang gibt's hier eine durchgängigen Pfeifton in bester frühe-Whitehouse-Tradition plus das extrem verhallte Wehklagen Csihars - und zwar ausschleßlich diese beiden Elemente. Je nach Erwartungshaltung wird man dies extrem konsequent oder extrem lanweilig finden, der Schreiber dieser Zeilen tendiert jefoch eindeutig zu ersterem. Denn eins sollte klar sein - auch wenn O'Malleys Erben bereits in den Startlöchern stehen, so ist er nach wie vor einer der ganz wenigen Akteure auf der musikalischen Bühne, denen der Spagat zwischen Festhalten am Düsterästhetik und der Suche nach frischen Ausdrucksformen gelingt - und dies sogar mit mehr als nur sporadiiscchen Augenzwinkern.
Sascha Bertoncin

VITAL WEEKLY 614

I read the text that came with the CD by O'Malley and Csihar, but I am not sure if I understand it well. There were two shows at two different galleries by american sculptor Banks Violette. The music was produced at one gallery but later on also to be heard at the other and lasted eight hours and thirty-five minutes. What is on this CD is only a small portion, with, again if understood right, tape voice material Csihar. O'Malley plays 'HP 200CD & Travis Bean / Fender Twin Reverb'. I must admit I have no idea who Csihar is or how the art of Banks Violette looks like, but this CD gives me some clue. The overtone like singing/chanting sounds very much like the voice of a man alone, a contemplative recording of solitude and despair. O'Malley creates a sonic texture of likewise sonic isolation. It's all dark and grim, as well as empty. I can imagine that this lasts eight hours and that it creates more an environment than a piece by itself. The darker undercurrents may not be spend that well on me, but every now and then a bit of depression, is nice too. (FdW)

BOOMKAT NEWSLETTER, 01/02/2008

The third release in the eMego Demand series finds label boss Peter Rehberg calling upon his KTL cohort Stephen O'Malley for a contribution. The SunnO))) and Southern Lord head boy teamed up with Hungarian vocalist & lyricist Attila Csihar as part of a soundtrack to a gallery work by sculptor Banks Violette, producing the composition 6°Fskyquake, which in total runs to a whopping eight hours and thirty-five minutes, though you'll be relieved to hear that this disc only represents a portion of that duration (only just exceeding the half-hour mark). This disc is a site recording of the installation, focusing on the idea of sound as a physical presence. This was manifested in the gallery by eighteen-inch subwoofers pumping out pressurized, oppressive sound waves while Csihar suppliedd a more human component, bolstered by occasional outbreaks of guitar erupting from the otherwise still, unwavering tonal landscape. To get the most out of this droning monolith of a piece, you'd be advised to crank the bottom end as far as possible, and as tends to be the case with O'Malley-related projects, ceremonial robes are optional but preferred for optimized listening. Limited to just 500 copies, and very highly recommended...

THE WIRE, APRIL 2008

The Editions Mego label has a reputation for producing CDs of whiz-bang abstract electronics with a strong visceral appeal, veering towards noise but rarely forsaking structural integrity for noise's rawness and abandon. In many respects, Gert-Jan Prins' mini-album (14 tracks in 24 minutes) 'Break Before Make' seems a typical Mego release - well crafted, exciting, wide ranging in its sounds and opaque as to its intentions. What Prins may have broken, other than electronic circuits and components, isn't clear, but what he's made of the breakages is an audio collage in the musique concrete tradition, short on repose but long on invention.
The more one listens to his CD, the more there seems to be to hear, though mostly the sounds are no sooner presented than they're snatched away, to be replaced by something equally tantalising and shortlived. A change of pace and volume occurs on 'Timpani Basso Ritmo', on which he strokes the skins of a timpani with a wet fingertip (at least thats what it sounds like) to produce hollow-sounding low frequency groans, and on 'Rockassymmetrico' he sets up a lumbering rhythm that gets increasingly fractured and distorted in its later stages. 'Longraspgroobve', with which the CD concludes, grooves the way that only machines can groove, ie stiffly, free of swing. I said earlier that 'Break Before Make' seems like a typical Mego release, and thats correct up to a point, but Prins' sound materials aren't selected from a menu offered by readily available music software, they're homemade, very much his own, and the music is all the better for it.
Brian Marley

VITAL WEEKLY 614

Over the years Gert-Jan Prins has established himself as a solid figure in the world of improvisation. The first time I ever heard his name was in 1984 when he played drums on music by band called Y Create. Many people don't realize this, but Prins started out as a drummer. On his new CD he throws in some timpani, and even some voice, but none of that is easily be recognized. Today Prins is perhaps more regarded as a noise head, but if you listen closely to his work you will acknowledge the fact that he is a percussionist. A percussionist of broken electronics. The wires of his instruments - open boxes with the circuits exposed - are all connected and buzz, hiss and peep, while the fingers of Prins make the connections come alive. Fourteen tracks in just under twenty-five minutes. No doubt Prins has plundered his archive of recordings (both live and studio) to select tiny fragments, which he feels best represent what he stands for. Breaking down circuits, bending circuits, all in a rhythmic and noise based manner. This is the true noise and by someone who knows how to break things in order to create new things. Not a second too long, or too short. This is Prins at his best.(FdW)

BOOMKAT NEWSLETTER, 01/02/2008

Another limited edition in eMego's Demand series, this time from Dutch electronics maestro Gert-Jan Prins, who returns to the forefront of analogue noise with more experiments in customised circuitry - even throwing in some timpani, that most underused of instruments within noise music circles. With a runtime of just 24 minutes this disc certainly doesn't outstay its welcome. The glossy noise and fizz of Prins' circuit experiments is ideally suited to this sort of presentation though: it's an intense, concise outburst of ruptured electronics that sounds both primitive and timeless, cramming a wealth of ideas and modulations into short-form pieces, charged with energy and dynamism. Fans of Carlos Giffoni and his No Fun cohorts should check this out without delay: seldom do you get to hear such a finely sculpted, refined racket. Limited to just 500 copies!

THE WIRE, APRIL 2008

Demand is an Editions Mego sub-label specialising in limited editions, and of its first three releases, Viennese laptoppers Silvia Fässler & Billy Roisz's 'Skylla' is preferable to Stephen O'Malley and Attila Csihars's dreary '6°F Skyquake', although it can't match Gert-Jan Prins's blistering 'Break Before Make'. Fässler is a new name, but Roisz has contributed video and sonud to electroacoustic Improv outfit Efzeg's three albums, and works with Toshimaru Nakamura in audiovisual duo AVVA-
'Skylla's splintered digital surfaces are contiguous with the lineage of laptop music one associates with the period when Editions Mego was known as Mego. Brittle crackles fray at the edges, sibilant tones are burned and splintered, crackles and hums meshed, decayed and rebuilt. But as the artwork - topographical maps cut and folded into scalene forms - would imply, Fässler and Roisz are surveying this lineage from another angle.
The duo flirt with ananlogue texture: Fässler is credited with guitar, which appears in disguised form on one track, and Roisz with turntable, which is responsible for the undulating loops which periodically surface, adding a structural element to latch onto. A handful of tracks' frantic cut-ups and noise torrents approach the sensory overload, but the activity levels and pace of chaneg are generally kept in check. The two are happy to explore passages of calm or near-stasis, aiding the album's digestibility; tracks like 'Megrim' also hint at an impish playfulness.
Indebted rather than beholden to the Mego back catalogue, Fässler and Roisz succeed in reassessing its idioms from a different perspective. A few of 'Skylla's passages may have you flashing back to 2002, but on the whole its an enjoyable and nicely executed piece of work.
Nick Cain

VITAL WEEKLY 613

Maybe you encountered the name Billy Roisz before? That might very well be possible, as he is part of Efzeg, the Viennese group in which he started as the man of the visuals, but also started playing music. Here, on his first release with Silvia Fässler (who has 'various curatorial roles' in the Viennese subculture', which is all the information we get thrown), Roisz plays computer and turntable, no doubt in this order, judging by the music. Fässler plays computer, electronics and guitar, also no doubt in this order. The computer seems for both the most important instrument. And this is on Editions Mego, so we are not spared for noise. Things bounce off towards all corners of the room, in a quick cut up style. Guitar and turntable are used, but merely to generate sound; the building blocks for this computerized form of noise. Eleven tracks ranging from seventeen second to eight plus minutes, this captures the feel of noise, or punk even, but with a strong sense of improvisation.
Moving in between those parameters, this is quite a nice release, simply because it's not tied to a certain genre, but takes the best of all, and make something of their own in a crude as well as gentle way. (FdW)

BOOMKAT NEWSLETTER, 01/02/2008

The first in Editions Mego's new limited edition series 'Demand', this release is a collaboration between Viennese artists Silvia Fässler and Billy Roisz who go head to head with their laptops blazing, summoning up the kind of digitised din that made the Mego label in its original incarnation such an important outlet for cutting edge computer music. Despite sounding challenging and very much a record of the present, there is something about the album that harks back to that old Mego roster, largely because it succeeds at being both experimental and oddly, rather fun too. After a nineteen second intro comes 'Pink Umbrella', a warm bath of interference and crackle, laced with more tangible, analogue sounding artefacts (guitar and turntable are both credited as sound sources), only for the beautiful 'Megrim' to fire up next, sounding thin and raspy, but somehow cinematic, embracing the beautiful crispness of its brittle digital sound sources. This is noise music that opts for detail and sophistication over brute force, so you won't find yourself fatigued by overblown distortion or twittering modulations. Instead, you can expect an album of adventurous, impeccably engineered sound that harkens back to a golden age of laptop music, while still thinking ahead. Very highly recommended, but limited to just 500 copies....

XLR8R, 04.08

Drone-metal takes anotehr bloody-footed hike across a paved-over desert on 'Kalmukia'. The trio of expats from Pan sonic, Scheider TM, and Lost In Hildurness crafts parched, murmuring tones that burn leisurely into one'e subconsicous. After a weak start of flat metal riffs on "Bones In The Sand", Angel picks up tension in the title track, where brooding strings gradually collapse into digital debris. The group later recalls composer Krysztof Penderecki's darkest moments on "Effect Of Discovery". where siren-like wails mimic an auto-collision victim's numb shock. Sadly, 'Kalmukia' ends with a joyous cliché; "Aftermath: The Mutation" ascends to St. Peter's gate with jangling, shoegazer guitar riffs. It's a moment that makes one miss the nightmares.
Cameron Macdonald

D-SIDE, 03/08

Nouveau changement d'orientation pour Angel, le projet parallèle du Finlandais Ilpo Väisänen (Pan sonic) et de l'Allemand Dirk Dresselhaus (Schneider TM) qui, après s'être associé sur le long terme avec la violoncelliste islandaise Hildur Gudnadottir, devenue membre à part entière du groupe, et avoir laissé ses cordes prendre le devant, décide cette fois-ci d'intégrer à 'Kalmukia' des guitares rugissantes dont émanentde s mini-riffs écrasants, guitare et violoncelle se partageant alors logiquement le premier rôle, et rivalisant de pesanteur crispante. Nettement plus en retrait, les machines se contentent d'habiller de drones leurs concurrents organiques au fil des quatre titres, des quatre mouvements de ce voyage épique et imaginaire en Kalmoukie (une république mongole perdue au sud-ouest de la Russie). Sinistre, l'arrivée cède le pas à des explorations plus profondes, avant que ne se rélèle enfin la lumière, qui nimbe "Aftermath: The Mutation" et clôt l'album et le voyage sur une note presque joyeuse. Une mutation en tous les cas magnifiquement assumée par Angel, qui prend ici une ampleur et une richesse à laquelle on ne s'attendait guère.
Jean-François Micard

ROCKDELUX, 03/08

Lleno frio, pero abrigado por el entusiasmo caluroso de Peter Rehberg (editor) y Stephen O'Malley (illustrador). 'Kalmukia' acaba de sacar punta a las aventuras en el pais mágico de los drones de Ilpo Väisänen, Dirk Dresselhaus, ambos liberados del uniforme de trabajo (el primero con logo Pan sonic y el segundo con el de Schneider TM) bajo la bandera de Angel, un proyecto de apariciones más bien espasmódicas. La islandesa Hildur Gudnadottir (Lost In Hildurness, múm) es la clave en este giro maestro y majestuoso: su violonchelo, sereno, paciente, dilatado, encaja como anillo al dedo en las exploraciones a ratos cósmicas, otras dubitativas, pero siempre enfocadas a la recreación del drone y la experimentación meditativa de este dúo ya convertido en trio. Como obliga el género. 'Kalmukia' no sólo no teme al vacio, sino que lo explota siempre que puede, como muy bien evidencia "Bones In The Sand", que finaliza su preciosa letania a lo Earth con un fundido a negro con el silencio como un elemento más. A su brillante apertura le siguen tres cortes más al servicio del paisaje sonoro en suspensión constante.
Anna Ramos

BAD ALCHEMY, 02.2008

Der Wechsel von Dirk Dresselhaus, Hildur Gudnadottir & Ilpo Väisänen von Oral, wo 2006 der Lievmitschnitt 'In Transmediale' erschienen ist, zu Mego leuchtet ein. Denn Mego ist spätestens mit KTL eine der ersten Adressen für dröhnminmalistisches Brainstoming geworden. Der Science-Fiction-Soundtrackcharakter des Angelnoise hat sich veridichtet zu einem Epos, das nicht am Kaspischen Meer zu spielen scheint, sondern out there. Auf eine, winzigen Planeten, den die Ankömmlinge wegen seiner Wüst- und Magerheit sarkastischden irdischen Namen einer Republik der einstigeb Russischen Föderation gegeben haben. Das Abenteur der Explorer beginnt mit dem Fund von 'Bones In The Sand', der Entdeckung einer Kalmukia-Kultur. Die folgende Invasion stößt auf Schierigkeiten, Tests führen zu unguten Ergebnissen, dem Alarm folgt die Katastrophe. Der Epilog heißt ominös: 'Aftermath: The Mutation'. Was im Zeitraffer nach einem SF-Plot klingt, weilt sich in Wirklichkeit wie Sanddünen. Die wüste und scheinbar leere Landschaft, die als Gitarrendrone sich von Horizont zu Horizont hinbreitet, verschluckt jedes Zeitgefühl. Das Lost-In-Hildurness-Cello bleicht im Sand wie weiß polierte Knochen, wie der Trauerrand einer abgestorbenen Zivilisation. Das Cello verstummt und der Wind spielt ein Schlagzugsolo. Mit dem Cello erwacht auch das verbogene Kalmukia wieder, wird spürbar als Verzerrung und Dissonanz. Wellen bekommen Sägenzähne oder stechen. Die ganze Landschaft beginnt wie eine gigantische Cellosaite zu surren. Als ob etwas Riesiges erwachen würde, dessen Haut zu beben anfängt. Danach ist mehr wie es war. Die Luft ist erfüllt von dongenden und scheppernden Glocken, über die Wüste rauscht eine Meeresbrandung, alles gerät in Wallung und blüht auf. Die Bewässerungsstrategen im irdischen Kalmückien waren leider keine Engel.

RIFRAF, 02.08

Angel is een tot de verbeelding sprekend trio: Ilpo Väisänen (Pan sonic), Dirk Dresselhaus (Schneider TM) en Hildur Gudnadottir (Lost In Hildurness) die norse, weerbarstige soundscapes maken, nu en dan dooraderd met weemoedige, grijze noten. 'Bones In The Sand' had van Sunn O))) kunnen zijn, 'Aftermath' is dan weer uitgerokken, exotische ambient broeierig en mysterieus. Een geslaagde collaboratie. (svs)

THE MILK FACTORY, 17.02.2008

As though emerging from a pirate airwave, the deep wobbly bass and stabs of twilight noise that open Kalmukia shadow the dirty, chaotic dynamism of so much present-day metal rock. It makes for a disconcerting moment, but at the very least, the rest of the album is an oftentimes disorienting, disjointed experience.
Ilpo Vaisanen (Pan Sonic), Hildur Guonadottir (Lost In Hildurness), and Dirk Dresselhaus (Schneider TM) tie together all of their loose, flying ends, but a great deal of curiosity and tact isn’t shown in the process. With the sharp contrast between the first pair of tracks, a premonition of an album of many threads, crisscrossed here and there, woven into deranged sound structures, devotedly served, rises to the fore. Nothing of the sort happens, though, and the group not only settle into the style of the second, more ambient piece of evil, but they fall asleep in it.
A gooey consistency is maintained throughout the album. Much is happening, but within a rather narrow compass. Thus the slow pace doesn’t mean minimal development. Problematic, however, is that the sedate horror-film ambience is repeated rather than closed in on, and suggested rather than slyly challenged. With few moments of exception, guitar scrapes, rumbles, and judders correspond closely with the dark droning cello of Guondottir, with Vaisanen’s surprisingly tame electronic hatching and shading. There is a certain dexterity in the playing, and indeed it hints at much, a good deal of which hasn’t been advanced upon as of this point.3/5
Max Schaefer

ROCKERILLA, 02.08

A nascondersi dietro il celestiale moniker di Angel ci sono tre vecchie conoscenze di Sonic Bang come Dirk Dresselhaus (aka Schneider TM), Hildur Gudnadottir (Lost In Hildurness) e soprattutto Ilpo Väisänen (Pan sonic). Il loro nuovo lavoro arriva su Edition Mego e mostra ancora una volta le incredibili suggestioni sonore con cui questa label austriaca ci vizia da perecchi anni: drone che si intersecano attraverso brani dilatati, elementi cristallini che giocano con stridori elettrici, visioni oscure che vengono illuminate da improvvise scintille di piatti crash ed un'aria gradevolmente onirica che riempie la sala d'ascolto. Lontani dalle proprie esperienze personali e attirati da una voazione spirituale e psichedelica, gli Angel danno, vita ad un felice progetto parallelo. 7/10
Michele Casella

CHRONICART, 03.08

Décidément, l'époque est étrange. Même la musique électronique la plus expérimentale, autrefois si fière de ses joujoux techno, de sa radicalité et de son amour de la déconstruction, n'en finit plus d'ouvrir les fenêtres et d'étendre son champ d'action. On se demande ainsi si un bordel comme 'Kalmukia' aurait été possible ne serait-ce qu'il y a trois ou quatre ans, surtout que le line-up d'Angel comprend un sculpteur de sinus (Ilpo Väisänen de Pan sonic), un emblème indi IDM (Dirk Dresselhaus aka de Schneider TM) et une violoncelliste d'obédience neuneu (Hildur Gudnadottir, ex Mùm). 'Kalmukia' est donc un vrai fourre-tout, tendant á l'avenant des bourdons dans toutes les directions: drone blues apathique á la Earth, drone ambiant sinus mâtiné d'ouverture harmoniques orietales, drone saumâtre et stachostique, drone western solaire aguichant pour clore l'affaire. Pas mal, mais on reste un peu circonspect face à la politesse un peu convenue de l'affaire, un peu indigne de ses protagonistes.
O.L.

EARPLUG, 03.03.08

Pan Sonic's Ilpo Väisänen is the guiding force behind Angel's Kalmukia, writing the story and scrawling the drawings that direct and accompany the album. Still, Dirk Dresselhaus (aka Schneider TM) and Lost in Hildurness' Hildur Guanadóttir are important presences, both caught up in and further articulating Väisänen's galaxy-gobbling drift. Given his interest in more conventional forms, Dresselhaus' presence is especially interesting (where are the campy Smiths covers?). Using the hiss of escaping gas and the drone of the underworld as scaffolds, Angel drag slow, melancholy threads of slide guitar along the knotty rasp of an aching cello. The results are surprisingly like the morose, deserted Americana of early Steven R. Smith, or Neil Young's Dead Man. While its emotional theatricality isn't always appealing, it's nonetheless easy to submit in the face of Kalmukia's desolate shades of grey.
Jon Dale

THE WIRE, MARCH 2007

Angel was originally a collaborative effort featuring Pan Sonic's Ilpo Väisänen and Schneider TM's Dirk Dresselhaus. Icelandic cellist Hildur Gudnadottir (aka Lost In Hildurness), who featured on 2006 albums from Pan Sonic and Múm, began playing with the pair in 2004, and 'Kalmukia' is Angel's second release as a trio.
The album drifts through distinct phases: four tracks that stretch between 12 and 20 minutes each. It opens with the majestic drawn out riff of 'Bones In The Sand', a dense and engulfing mass of guitars and cello, like crossing for sperading across great plains. The positive grandeur of the opener is quickly surrended in the longest track 'Kalmukia - The Discovery, Wiring, Invasion', in which the outline of an uncomfortable drone is formed, one that sinks and falls as if breathing. Blurres, shallow interference tugs at the skirts of cello tones, distracting then defeating the strings and slowly degenerating to gritty metallic caterwauls and the slide of steel on steel.
'Effects Of Discovery, Test, Alarm, Catastrophy' moves below dround to dwell in an underworld of shadows. It is dominated by deeper strings and the Industrial remnants of the title track. A signature Pan Sonic atomci blast clears the floor for the redemptive glow of a layered build that dominates 'Aftermath: The Mutation'. The output from this collaboration is utterly immersive, the slow drones driving a gradual shift from strings and guitars to harsh electronic tones and feedback. 'Kalmukia' moves from the wide open spaces and panoramic landscapes of the opening chords through to the gloriously grim, darkened caverns of the final two tracks; engrossing from start to finish.
Jennifer Allan

SOUND OF MUSIC, 12/02/2008

William S. Burroughs målade mästerligt upp skrämmande världar med ord. I många av sina böcker löser han upp begreppen tid och rum med hjälp av död, myter, korruption, ejakulationer, insekter och främmande livsformer. Myt möter verklighet i mörka och ondsinta tillstånd utan illusioner av det goda.
När jag läser "Short notations of the Kalmukia Plan" på Angels Myspace-sida är det svårt att inte tänka på Burroughs. Texten handlar om en expedition till "zonen" vid floden Volga i ryska Kalmukia: lokalbefolkningen vågar sig inte dit, platsen ger enligt sägnen upphov till död föregången av en kort tids lycka. Mätningarna som ska göras går naturligtvis fel och katastrofen är ett faktum...
Till skillnad från på Myspace-sidan är orden obefintliga i Angels musik, man lockas att säga att de muterats till ljud. Jag antar att man ska se musiken som ett soundtrack till den korta berättelsen om Kalmukia. Inte minst som låtarna har titlar som "Kalmukia - The Discovery, Wiring, Invasion", "Effect of Discovery, Test, Alarm, Catastrophy" och "Aftermath: The Mutuation". Ljuden formar levande historier där Burroughs ande svävar ovanför likt en "El Hombre Invisible".
Det är mörkt och dystert. De långa dronernas land öppnar sig där tillstånden får tid att etsa sig fast. Statiska sci-fi-landskap möter mer varierade skepnader. Stillaståendet är ett viktigt stadium och rörelser sker oftast långsamt.
Musikaliskt är det ändå inledande "Bones in the Sand" som sätter störst spår. Det känns som att de mörkt formulerade dronerna med elektronik, cello, gitarr och diverse annat inte hunnit att lägga sin grund ännu. I stället tar denna trio - Ilpo Väisinen (Pan Sonic), Dirk Dresselhaus (Schneider TM) och den isländska cellisten Hildur Gudnadóttir - den distade slidegitarren till nya fint melankoliska territorier. Det är som en långsam filmsekvens över vidder av sand och tillstånd av vemod. Och det blir inte sämre när Gudnadóttirs sorgliga cello tar över ljudbilden. Hon krånglar inte till det, utan gör det enkelt och precist med stor känsla.
Även om "Kalmukia" är bra i sin helhet är det lite synd att Angel inte för vidare tongångarna på "Bones in the Sand". Det är här de verkligen skiljer sig från den dronande mängden, och för in nya tankar och tillstånd. De övriga låtarna är hur skickligt utförda som helst och jag gillar att lyssna på dem, spännande detaljer dyker upp ur den vibrerande, ljudligt utdragna bakgrunden, men stämningar känns igen, landskap känns igen och ljud känns igen. Det behövs något mer för att det ska bli lika mästerligt som Burroughs. Men det är å andra sidan väldigt högt satta krav.
"Kalmukia" är det tredje albumet med Angel. Gruppen började som en duo 1999 med Väisinen och Dresselhaus och debuterade 2002 med "Nr 1-Nr 10" på Bip-Hop. De blev en trio med Gudnadóttir 2004 och hon är med på "In Transmediale" som kom på Oral 2006.
Magnus Olsson

BRAINWASHED, 12/02/2008

At first reference, this could easily end up pegged as a Pan Sonic side project, given that Ilpo Väisänen is one of the three members of Angel, but the music itself does not paint itself in that way, and other than the use of some textural electronic elements has no auditory connection with his other band. Don't take that as a slight against this project at all, it just an entirely different animal that, unfortunately, opens with a misstep that isn't disastrous, but isn't a high point either. The remaining three quarters, however, more than make up for it.
This misstep is the opening "Bones In The Sand," which tries to ape the current trend of Sunn O))) styled frozen monolith guitar riffs that become the focal point for the listener, drowning out the more nuanced guitar playing and electronic punctuation. The sound is admittedly less bleak and dark than what the robed ones usually release, but it also lacks their sense of theater and exaggeration, so rather than subwoofer rocking caveman riffing, it is more just repetitive chords. As the mix shifts to the more spacious and subtle electronic textures near the end, the level of interesting sounds also begins to increase.
The three remaining tracks that comprise the remainder of the disc more than make up for the doldrums of the opener, however. The rest of the album is more of a lurking, tension filled nod to film score ambience. Both "Kalmukia-The Discovery, Wiring, Invasion" and "Effect of Discovery, Test, Alarm, Catastrophy" are supported by thick, tangible drones of strings that layers of bizarre electronic manipulations are built upon. The former is overall very moody: buzzes of electronics sound like locusts waiting in the distance as the track slowly craws through its near 20 minute duration, becoming more and more tense as time elapses. The latter favors high pitched tinnitus bursts and other unidentifiable textures that somehow evoke a sense of being frozen in time, cold shards of digital sound enveloping the mix.
The concluding "Aftermath: The Mutation" has a somewhat lighter, more organic feel than the darkness of the preceding tracks. Its dramatic opening gives way to a deep thick mix of layered electronics, wobbling synth lines and tweeting oscillator birds flying around the rainforest. Instead of the cold, gray, bleak opening this feels much more organic, natural, and inviting.
Other than the pedantic attempt at drone metal that opens the album, the remainder is a captivating audio film that, without a specific narrative, instead allows us, the listeners, to construct our own meaning and story behind the images that the music creates. It truly feels like a film without the visuals being shown, but are instead created and given meaning by the listener.
Creaig Dunton

BOOMKAT NEWSLETTER, 08/02/2008

A collaboration between Pan Sonic's Ilpo Vaisanen, Schneider TM's Dirk Dresselhaus and Hildur Gudnadottir of Lost In Hildurness, this incredible album finds the trio spinning a fine web of dark drones and digital noise oscillations in a fashion that's clearly got a lot in common with fellow Editions Mego labelmates KTL. Angel relies upon a similarly organic relationship between doomy, metallic abrasion and avant-garde minimalism, with computer manipulations weaving deathly guitar and cello textures into an eerie, dark ambient soundscape. The echo-plain slide guitar on opener 'Bones In The Sand' could have been lifted clean off Earth's Hex LP, but transcending any sense of being derivative, the piece unfurls to reveal a menacing, lyrical cello solo cutting through the tangle of distortion and sustaining noise. Befitting its confusing title, 'Kalmukia - The Discovery, Wiring, Invasion' presents an epic lurch toward atmospheric, industrial sound processing, riddled with shimmering cymbal clatter and shards of cello scrapes escaping the overwhelming factory hum. It's only once you arrive at the final piece 'Aftermath: The Mutation' that the album truly distinguishes itself from the death ambient pack: there's a brightness and effulgence of tone that's closer to the psychedelic excess of Burning Star Core, albeit with a little less dirt sucked into the recording. Another magnificent spillage of auditory dark matter from the Editions Mego camp, and a beguiling, limited package to boot. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

WESTZEIT, 02/2008

Hildur Gudnadottir ist momentan sowas von angesagt. Nach ihrem Album als Lost In Hildurness auf 12 Tónar kann man auch verstehen, warum man nicht nur auf Island Schlange steht, um mit die Cellistin zusammen zu arbeiten. Nachdem sie schin 2006 mit Angel - seit 1999 das Noise-Drone-Projekt von Ilpo Väsiänen (Pan Sonic) und Dirk Dresselhaus (Schneider TM) - auf dem Transmediale Festival in Berlin aufgetreten ist, gehört sie für das neue Album auf dem Wiener Label Mego von Peter Rehberg offenbar fest zur Mannschaft. Die Drei versetzen ihren klassisch-avantgardistischen Noise-Drone aus Gitarrensaitenschwingungen und Elektronik nun also mit einer Prise Neo-Klassik durch die tiefen Schwingungen des Cellos. Ein Monster.
Dennis Behle

FOXY DIGATLIS, 29.01.2008

Since when is Schneider TM evil? Having never experienced the Angel sound before, I saw that the German glitch-popper was a member (as his true self, Dirk Dresselhaus) and thus expected a more Mego type of twist. Then I noticed that Ilpo Väisänen from Pan Sonic was a co-founder, so I expected some harsh rhythms and pummeling slivers of glass. But wait, Hildur Guðnadóttir’s here too, and since she contributed some amazing cello drones to her collaboration with BJ Nilsen and Stilluppsteypa last year, I was confused. And when I realized Sunn O))) doomer Stephen O’Malley designed third album “Kalmukia”’s booklet, I gave up, threw out the press release and just listened to the thing.
“Kalmukia” is, not surprisingly, an amalgamation of the above pedigrees, with the exception of Schneider TM’s typically shiny veneer. Four tracks spreading across 58 bleak minutes, the album often sneaks up on loveliness before veering back into discordant gloom at the last second. “Bones in the Sand” serves up some dusty doom, like a narcoleptic Earth. “Kalmukia—The Discovery, Wiring, Invasion” rides Hildur’s cello along a more desperate Dirty Three mood, while menace and spit gather in the drones. At twenty minutes the track has plenty of time to delve into more abstract, even musique concrète terrain before bubbling to a close.
The cello is what keeps “Kalmukia” from being merely an alien landscape. Its majesty balances the other two members’ dark scraping and droning and makes me really eager to hear Guðnadóttir’s Touch debut. Angel, however, present a worthy beast of their own, with just enough blackness to make me want to throw on some Burzum and just enough ambience to make me not do it. 7/10
Michael Wehunt

VITAL WEEKLY 610, 15.01.2008

The word 'hobby project' is a word I don't particularly like. It sounds like something is not serious or for plain fun, without too much effort. With various releases as Angel, it's probably safe to say that Angel is no longer the hobby project of Ilpo Vaisanen (from Pan Sonic), Dirk Dresselhaus (Schneider TM) and since their last CD also Hildur Gudnadottir (Lost In Hildurness, she also plays on the latest Pan Sonic release) - it's as much a real thing as their 'main' occupations. Four lengthy cuts here of guitar, cello and loads of electronics - loads as in many, but they are not used all the time and to the same extent. The pieces are rather empty, like a dessert can be empty, yet full of sand, if you look at the detail. 'Kalmukia' seems like a concept album, with the four pieces linked together. It moves away from the previous, much louder and fuller releases. More is less it seems. The empty music is not always bright, or rather: hardly bright. This is not black but grey music - an area in between the sun doing down, or autumn changing for winter. In between space music. The music howls about like cold wind over the tundra - perhaps a better reference than a hot dessert. Cello and guitar strum about, while the electronics shiver in the background. A bit of raw and a bit quiet. Very nice, this grey and cold winter music. (FdW)

OX, 09.01.2008

Wirklich überraschend, ANGEL hat überhaupt nichts mit PAN SONIC oder SCHNEIDER TM zu tun und hört sich auch nicht im entferntesten danach an, obwohl Ilpo Väisänen und Dirk Dresselhaus hier mitspielen, wegen der Vollständigkeit darf man auch Hildur Gudnadottir von LOST IN HILDURNESS als drittes und natürlich gleichberechtigtes Mitglied nicht vergessen. "Kalmukia" (Editions Mego/Groove Attack) ist ein auf möglichst breit angelegtes Gitarren-Drone-Album, welches mit sehr feinen Nuancen arbeitet, die sich ständig, schleichend verändern und sich dabei gegenseitig sehr viel Raum geben um ihre Wirkung und Einzigartigkeit vollkommen zu entfalten. Es fällt bei dieser Musik immer schwer, nicht die üblichen Bilder von majestätischen Landschaftsaufnahmen in Ultra-Panorama-Vision im Kopf entstehen zu lassen. - Verdammt nochmal! - Warum eigentlich nicht!? Das hier ist sehr gut gemachtes Kopfkino, Soundtrack oder meditativer Ambient. Und wesentlich schöner als das was ihr auf ihrer Myspace-Seite zu hören bekommt! (8)

MY EARS MY EARS, 14.01.2008

Angel is Ilpo Vaisanen (Pan Sonic) Hildur Gudnadottir (Lost In Hildurness) and Dirk Dresselhaus (Schneider TM). Ilpo and Dirk have worked and released material as Angel for a couple of years but to the best of my knowledge this is the first time they've recorded with Hildur (she also appears on the current Pan Sonic album).
I don't have the proper cover for this as it's a promo so I'm not sure how the cover relates to the sounds as Ilpo is credited with "story and drawings," so I'm wondering if this is supposed to be the soundtrack to a story printed on the cover.
The sounds itself are nothing like either Pan Sonic or Schneider TM. The same elements are there but this often veers closer to modern classical than it does to experimental. The whole feel of this album is very subdued and slow moving there's nothing rushed everything moves along at it's own pace. Even the first track with it's use of loud heavy guitar still only moves at a slighter faster pace than say a recent Earth track. It wouldn't feel out of place on Earth's "Hex: Or Printing in the Infernal Method."
The guitar takes a back seat for the middle of the album. Tracks two and three (Kalmukia and Effect of Discovery) are both led by the cello. Kalmukia is a very mournful sounding piece, the cello playing slowly as some background electronics very subtly start to take over the piece. It fades out to five minutes of a restrained collection of taps and ambient electronics. Effect of Discovery starts of sounding like Stockhausen's 1950s Electronic Studies. Again very subdued and understated with the cello starting to make its mark a few minutes in. The whole track starts to get busier with more electronics and a slightly heavier feel to it. The last track Aftermath reminds me of Tangerine Dream around the time of Hyperborea. It has a similar range of sounds to that album with a slightly Eastern tinge to it. Sounds like lots of loose guitar strings going through some delay with some slightly discordant cello sounds behind it. For me this is the weakest piece on the album it hasn't got the slightly sinister ambience of (particularly) tracks two and three and though it's got a nice balance of light and dark it's too uplifting in comparison with the rest of the album. Again I think maybe the cover would explain more and perhaps make it clear why this track sounds as it does.
On the whole it's a good album it's not what I expected having heard Ilpo's solo album of a few years ago but after a few listens it's certainly a grower and it's good to see people step outside the box and surprise you.

MUSIQUE MACHINE, 05.03.08

Altars of Science is a very messing with your head experience, it's built around a collection of accelerating, stretched, droning and bent electronic tones which Marcus Schmickler has put together in often jarring, breathless, alarming and at time almost suffocating sound collages.
The release is split into eight parts running just shy of 40 minute mark all togeather, coming in standard audio and DVD + format so you can really feel it stretching and bending your mind. A lot of the eight tracks start off relatively subdued & stripped down, as he filters past you building-up, accelerating and droning electronic tones, that he often suddenly cuts in and out at the most jarring and brain jerking manner leaving you checking you equipment for faults. As the pieces progresses he lets your mind settle less and less in one place, as he winds out dense nets of strange pulled out and melting harmonic electro structures that shift, morph or suddenly stop. Giving one the feeling that something has gone wrong with your balance and gravity, for Christ sake don't play this after a few beers it could screw you for good. As the tracks progresses they become alot denser and suffocating, like been enveloped by complex techno structures or buildings- this could be the soundtrack to JG Ballard at his most paranoid and techo fearful. Though there are noise elements here it never losers it's control or atmosphere, every element is heard and felt - like trying to feeling your way around some vast shifting complex mathematic shape with your eyes closed.
A brain frying and reality altering slice of electronica - chaotic and deranged yet very controlled, which rewires your brain to Schmickler own sound reality - that seems to deify sonic logic. 4/5
Roger Batty

FLUCTUAT, 22.02.08

Il n'y a pas de justice en ce bas monde. S'il y en avait, des artistes comme Markus Schmickler seraient reconnus à leur juste valeur, et ce n'est pas le cas. On ne peut pourtant pas reprocher à l'Allemand d'être inactif, ou de se contenter d'un domaine de création restreint puisque cela fera dix ans cette année que ce musicien, producteur et manager se démène comme un beau diable pour faire exister une musique "autre". Avec son label A-Musik, il est le premier à signer Microstoria, Holosud, FX Randomiz, Schlammpeitziger, Data Politic et Felix Kubin. En temps que musicien il se fait connaître sous différents pseudos et différents projets incluant l'ethno électronique de Wabi Sabi, la techno primitive et tribale de Pol (sans "e") ou le néo-krautrock de Pluramon qui nous intéresse ici. Sous son nom propre, il signe également Amazing Daze que nous chroniquions l'an dernier, et aujourd'hui le centrifuge Alter of Science. Vous l'avez compris, Schmickler est un artiste curieux, ouvert, hors de toute chapelles et c'est ce qui fait tout son intérêt.
Sur The Monstruous Surplus, il revient sous le nom de Pluramon avec le même line up que son précédent album (Dreams Top Rock), incluant la chanteuse Julee Cruise et ses vocaux ultra smooth. Au sommet d'une complicité qui ne cesse de surprendre, les deux interprètes semblent réellement se fondre l'un dans l'autre pour nous offrir une belle tranche de post-shoegazing aérien dont les mélodies subtiles demandent pourtant une certaine qualité d'écoute. En effet, il serait facile de passer à côté des merveilles de cet album de pop toute simple au premier abord. Les arrangements de Schmickler et la voix de Cruise fusionnant souvent dans un wall of noise mélodique, l'ensemble donne parfois à The Monstruous Surplus un air de Mazzy Star enfiévrée (même si Julee Cruise bénéficie d'une gamme vocale beaucoup plus large que sa consoeur Hope Sandoval). Quant à la guitare tour à tour écumante ("Fresh Aufhebung") et étincelante ("The Kids Are United") de l'Allemand, elle offre à l'ensemble une quantité infinie de variations subliminales réellement psychédéliques.
Dans un tout autre registre, celui de la computer music pure et dure, Markus Schmickler sort quasi simultanément Altar of Science, un puits bouillonnant de musique informatique en fusion. Composé entièrement sur ordinateur et conçu pour la diffusion multicanal (en version 5.1 disponible sur DVD audio), Altar of Science oscille entre performance bruitiste electroacoustique, musique contemporaine et stoner numérique d'une densité hallucinante. Hallucinations (sonores) qui ne manqueront d'ailleurs pas d'assaillir l'auditeur de cette ¦uvre difficile, mais salvatrice, en ces temps de musique électronique "tagadatsointsoin". Si "surplus monstrueux" il y a, ne cherchez plus, c'est bien ici que vous le trouverez.
Maxence Grugier

GEIGER, 04/02/2008

Marcus Schmicklers Altars of Science består af én dvd, som indeholder to udgaver af det samme materiale; et stereomix, som kan afspilles på enhver cd-afspiller og et, med pressematerialets ord, "mind-blowing Multi Channel Mix", hvis afspilning kræver dvd-afspiller og surround-anlæg. Anmeldereksemplaret indeholder imidlertid kun stereoversionen, så det må foreløbig forblive utestet og ufortalt helt præcist hvor "mind-blowing", dette særlige Multi Channel Mix i virkeligheden er.
Schmickler er uddannet ved musikkonservatoriet i Köln. Han har lavet musik i en række forskellige genrer; decideret klassisk på Demos (for Choir, Chamber Quintet and Electronic Music) (2006), hvis titelstykke anvender fragmenter af tekst fra Nietzsches Also sprach Zarathustra; shoegazer-pop med Julee Cruise (hvis sang man formentlig kender fra Twin Peaks-serien) på Dreams Top Rock (2003), under navnet Pluramon; drone med sækkepiber og elektronik på Amazing Daze (2007), som er et sambarbejde med Hayden Chisholm. Og foruden meget andet - under blandt andre navnene Arabic Sheetpealing, Charms Music Clerk, Christian Daniel, Marcgraf, Param og Wabi Sabi - nu Altars of Science, Schmicklers første rent elektroniske udgivelse siden Sator Rotas fra 1998. Sidstnævnte plade er ikke uden lighed med den hér anmeldte og, skal det siges i forbifarten, kan kun anbefales.
Det er ikke udpræget let at give en rigtig udfyldende karakteristik af Altars of Science. Alle otte numre består hovedsagelig af digitalt lydende materiale. Gennemgående er der et selv på stereo-udgaven temmelig rumligt lydbillede, hvor en mængde separate, alle sammen "kunstige" lyde, i hvert nummer interagerer med hinanden, flytter sig omkring i lydbilledet, støder sammen, etc., hvilket giver et ind imellem nærmest handlingsagtigt præg. Nogen egentlig rytme eller puls er der ikke tale om, det er snarere collager af oftest ret distinkt materiale: hvid støj, sweeps, summende, skrattende og pibende lyde, tøjlesløst uregelmæssige tonegeneratorlyde og enkelte kortbølgeradiolignende brudstykker, hvortil kommer en ret intensiv panorering og oscilleren, enkelte spors vekslen mellem mono og stereo og lignende. Alt sammen på én gang kaotisk og kontrolleret. De stærkeste påmindelser går til japanske Nagata Kazunao og Hado-Hos udgivelser på Zero Gravity-selskabet, der har den samme fornemmelse af "ren" elektronisk lyd og på samme tid præcision og løssluppenhed, om end af en noget mere analog karakter. Dertil kommer, hos Schmickler, et antydningsvist sci-fi-præg, som dog bevæger sig uden om retro-referencerne. Materialet er fortrinsvis abstrakt lyd, i den forstand at det ikke efterligner eller refererer til noget, men som sagt kun fortrinsvis, eftersom der tillige med en antydningsvis maskin-agtighed, som om lydene var maskiners ytringer, på pladens sidste nummer optræder, hvad der dårligt kan høres som andet end simulerede frøer og insekter. Man får altså med den stærke rumfornemmelse - hvilket givetvis i endnu højere grad gælder for surround sound-versionen - indtryk af en art "setting" med interagerende elementer. Og endelig, for også at få dén side af sagen med: Det er i og med alt, hvad der her ovenfor er nævnt, vitterlig godt!
Men vi kan nu ikke længere undgå titlen, Altars of Science, ved hvilken der er noget unægtelig højtideligt. Først og fremmest udmærker den sig selvfølgelig ved sin paradoksale forbindelse af de traditionelle modsætninger videnskab og religion, og det, bemærker man, undgår ikke at være en lille smule "fikst". Men bortset fra det kunne man nu, hvis der skal etableres nogen forbindelse mellem titel og indhold, yderligere forestille sig musikkens maskinagtige lyde som frembragt på disse altre - altså: noget ofres på videnskabens angivelige altre, og lydene er en art biprodukt. Et yderligere aspekt er antydningen af videnskabskritik, dels: Videnskaben har ofre. Dels: Videnskaben indeholder selv et element af sin angivelige modsætning: religionen. Det er ikke til at komme uden om den noget industrial-agtige alvor ved denne titel - det sterile, kliniske, humorløse - som, hvis man kaster et blik på Marcus Schmicklers hjemmeside under "downloads", stemmer lidt for godt overens med den meget alvorligt poserende mand, man her ser. (Og man bemærker i øvrigt, at der blandt disse downloads imod én 11 megabyte-mp3-fil er syv fotografier af MS i så høj opløsning, at de til sammen fylder mere end 150 megabyte.) Der er ingen tvivl om, at intentionen med den megen poseren er at fremstå "seriøs", men beror seriøsitet på at lægge ansigtet i meget alvorlige folder? Den demonstrative insisteren på alvor kan næsten ikke undgå at få det hele til at tage sig noget hult ud, lige meget hvor god musikken er. Man får den mistanke, at hele denne redundans af alvor mest af alt tjener til at overbevise ham selv. Hvis produktets "substans" var hævet over enhver tvivl, kunne han vel stort set have poseret lige så åndssvagt, det skulle være; som det er, får det hele med dets selvhøjtidelighed et umiskendeligt wannabe-præg. Hvem skal det narre?
Og lad os for lige at holde fast i denne ikke uvæsentlige side af sagen lidt endnu knytte et par bemærkninger til pladselskabets omtale af Altars of Science, hvilken nemlig kun underbygger de samme tendenser yderligere. Her læser man: "A fascinating 'tour de force' of modern computer music composition. Intense in its outlook, yet polished in its execution, making it an essential addition to any serious collection of 21st century audio." - Hér tales igen til en forestilling om "seriøsitet", nu blot forbrugerens billede af sig selv som seriøs - endnu et wannabe-element: man er ikke "seriøs", i det mindste er ens "samling" af 21.-århundredes lyd det ikke uden dette produkt. Og videre: "Intense in its outlook" - hvad mener man? Et "intenst" udblik? (Og hvordan kan en poleret udførelse tilsammen med det angivelige intense udblik gøre pladen essentiel?) Hvorfor overhovedet alt det "seriøse" bullshit, når musikken i sig selv er glimrende og i det hele taget ville være langt bedre tjent uden? Når den sagesløse plade i en sådan grad er forsøgt forlenet med seriøsitet, synes det mest af alt at antyde, at den eftertragtede seriøsitet mangler, end at den virkelig er der. Lad os således endelig bemærke det underligt modstridende ved navnet på Schmicklers hjemmeside: Piethopraxis. Pietho er den antikke gudinde for overtalelse, forførelse og charmerende tale, hvilket præcis er, hvad der mangler i Schmicklers selviscenesættelse.
Altså: nøjes med lydsiden. Det er langt tilstrækkeligt.
Thomas Kyhn Rovsing Hjørnet

LIABILITY, 14.01.2008

Quand il n'est pas occupé à ses divers projets (Pluramon, Wabi Sabi, Sator Rotas...) Marcus Schmickler sort des disques sous son propre nom. Cette année il aura sorti pas moins de trois albums. Deux sous son patronyme (Altars Of Science et Amazing Daze sur le label Häpna) et un autre sous le pseudo Pluramon (The Monstrous Surplus - Kakaoke Kalk), Marcus Schmickler se voit fardé d'une actualité des plus chargées. Pour ce disque il sera tout de même bon d'oublier purement et simplement ce qu'il a pu faire au sein de Pluramon avec The Monstrous Surplus. Avec Altars Of Science on revient dans la musique expérimentale la plus extrème et la plus tordue. En somme on se tourne vers ce à quoi Marcus Schmickler nous avait habitués pendant si longtemps. Disons simplement qu'il est le genre de personnage qui n'hésite pas à faire le grand écart quand il s'agit de création musicale. Ici tout est traité par ordinateur et tout y est affaire de distortion et de chaos aussi bruitiste qu'intuitif. La froideur assumée des réalisations cache une variété d'humeurs sonores qui apparaissent brutalement mais qui donnent un relief saisissant.
Altars Of Science ne se veut alors aucunement d'un seul tenant. Pouvant être tout aussi bien ambient que noisy, il privilégie néanmoins les formes expérimentales les plus poussées. Ainsi Marcus Schmickler tente d'aller le plus loin possible avec le risque de se couper de la compréhension de ses auditeurs. A l'évidence, Altars Of Science n'est pas à la portée de toutes les oreilles, détruisant sciemment toute logique dans la conduite de sa musique. De ce fait il n'est pas toujours aisée d'être en adéquation avec les productions tourmentées de l'Allemand mais on ne pourra leur enlever cette force inouïe qui s'en dégage. Altars Of Science c'est un peu une main de fer dans un gant de fer. Rien ici n'est fait pour adoucir l'audition qui, d'ailleurs, ne peut se comprendre qu'avec un fort volume. C'est, certes, inconfortable et sera sans doute considéré comme inaudible par quelques culs serrés mais il faut reconnaître que Altars Of Science est un disque qui ne fait aucune concession et que par bien des aspects il remplit parfaitement son rôle de sculpteur de formes sonores inédites. PS : il est à noter que Altars Of Science est présenté sous deux formats. On pourra l'écouter sur cd, dans une version stéréo, ainsi que dans sa version dvd 5.1.
par Fabien

DUSTED MAGAZINE, 10.01.2008

Marcus Schmickler might not have the most immediate name recognition in the crowded field of contemporary electronics composition and improvisation. Some of his collaborators – like Fennesz and Rafael Toral – are far more widely known than the Cologne musician. But Schmickler has been active as a “pop” artist (with Julee Cruise in Pluramon), as a noise assassin (with Cor Fuhler in The Flirts, among others), and as an important large group collaborator (in, e.g., MIMEO). Take his entire discography into consideration and you'll find he’s one of the few artists in this medium who has a feel for pacing, dynamics, structure and color.
Basically, Altars of Science is a multi-part suite (the commercial release also comes with a DVD), with a palpable form that’s compelling and mysterious. It opens with a disorienting cavernous rush, framed by electronic burble. Schmickler doesn’t simply like to play with contrast; he favors interruptions, gaps, almost as if he enjoys problematizing his ideas as soon as he’s laid them down. The record races quickly into a long passage that sounds like squealing bows and excited glass, with jarring dynamic shifts and tension created via near glissandi effects. The ringing and whirring of the first track, combined with its harsh spatial shifts (which create an almost claustrophobic environment) remind me of some of Xenakis’ harsh, early electronic music (hey, Schmickler’s website is called Piethopraxis, after all).
The second piece changes direction, with a continuous stream of sound and disturbing commentary from the margins, like the inside of a barrel scraped with a contact mike. Bulbous bass ostinati seem to be clawing their way into life before the piece gets flayed by digital knives. And by the time we reach the muffled choruses and amplified blades of the fourth piece, I’m more convinced than ever that this is – even unconsciously – some kind of homage to Persepolis (except, of course, for the brief, almost subliminal fragments of Pluramon-style techno). The music whisks you away in its rush and froth: the swirling, polytonal, almost psychedelic head-fuckery of the fifth part; the harsh, tortured balloons of the sixth; and the long, slow cooling down of the closing section.
Richly imagined and realized in detail, Altars of Science is possibly the best thing I’ve heard from Schmickler. And that’s saying something.
Jason Bivins

OCTOPUS, 01.2008

L'Allemand Marcus Schmickler ressemble au prototype de « l' artiste total », doté de talents multiples et complémentaires : musicien, compositeur et producteur, aussi à l'aise dans un environnement résolument pop (à l'image de son projet Pluramon) que dans des contextes plus arides, qu'il s'agisse de musique improvisée ou de l'électronique la plus exigeante. Altars of Science appartient justement à cette dernière catégorie et porte ainsi parfaitement son titre, à croire qu'il a été conçu dans un laboratoire de physique des particules. Dans cette étude de recherche fondamentale, Schmickler s'emploie à rendre audible cet inextricable faisceau d'ondes aux fréquences multiples qui sous-tendent notre monde inter-connecté - saturé ? Cherchant désespérément à s'organiser en un mouvement d'ensemble cohérent alors qu'ils semblent prisonniers d'un univers où dominent les processus stochastiques, les flux de particules courent d'un canal à l'autre, se poursuivent, se croisent, s'entrechoquent pour finir soit par fusionner, soit par s'annihiler mutuellement. Crépitements incessants de l'inter-monde numérique dématérialisé, les ondes portant ces flots ininterrompus de données vibrent sur un rythme trépidant, exploitant au maximum la stéréoscopie. Pour jouir pleinement d'une telle dynamique brownienne (ce CD-DVD dispose à cet effet d'un mixage multi-canaux), on rêve de disposer d'un acousmonium personnel. Dans tous les cas, port de la blouse blanche obligatoire.
Aymeric Lozet

TOUCHING EXTREMES, 04.01.2008

I am always skeptical about contemporary jacks-of-all-trades, yet there is no question that Marcus Schmickler is usually serious enough in what he does and, whenever the inspiration or the right influence calls, he's able to produce sonic materials that are worth a good attentive listen. Still, "Altars of science" is unlikely to be loved by your partner, being a computer-based composition in eight movements that sounds, well, ruthless for its large part. Working on the juxtaposition of different kinds of waves, distortion, silent intermissions and scarcely recognizable sources - even though I'd be willing to bet that human voice is there, camouflaged somewhere - Schmickler unloads a non-stop bombardment of violent discharges, threatening ellipses and howling discrepancies, reminiscent both of the pioneers of the genre and a self-destructive electronic pinball machine. It takes a while before our pleasure-seeking will accepts what's offered, and despite reiterated tries there's no chance to grant the piece a "nice" attribute. It's instead an uncompromising ode to causticity that has to be valued as an interesting experiment, and it should be approached as such. But if one's on the nervous edge of their current life, better stand clear off this stuff. The double-sided disc contains a stereo mix on the CD side, and a multi-channel version on the DVD side. More work for lawyers if played at high volume.
Massimo Ricci

BLOW UP, DECEMBER 2007

Concludevamo la recensione del recente album di Marcus Schmickler firmato con Hayden Chisholm definendolo un lavoro di notevole intensità, ma dall'emozione prossima alla zero. Nel caso di "Altars Of Science" si vira sul suono glaciale e tagliente della computer music e dacché di gelo si tratta le emozioni in questo caso scendono addirittura sotto lo zero. Poco da dire e poco da sentire, dunque, a meno che non possiate trovare di qualche appeal le neutre tonalità del sibilo feroce e montante che attraversa gli otto segmenti della partitura. Supponiamo che la versione multicanale, presente nella sezione DVD, contribuisca a dare peso, corpo e profondità alle acuminate traiettorie alla composizione, ma dal momento che la stessa è fruible esclusivamente con lettori 5.1, noi comuni mortali che dobbiamo accontentarci della porzione stereo non possiamo che ripagare con la stessa moneta. (5.1)
Nicola Catalano

THE WIRE, NOVEMBER 2007

'Altars Of Science' is something entirely different - hardcore computer music, beatless, unrelenting and thoroughly alien. These eight untitled tracks are a mass of clashing, bristling sinewaves; they rise and fall with queasy logic, throwing off teeming clouds of brushed steel tension and building to frenzies of abstraction. Experienced in stereo, its deeply unsettling and obscurely invigorating, but the release also includes a 5.1 surround sound mix on DVD which must rank amongst 2007's most intense audio experiences.
Chris Sharp

BRAINWASHED, 21.10.2007

I must specify before the review that, although this release is packaged as a dual disc, containing the stereo mix of the piece on one side, and a 5.1 DVD compatible surround sound mix on the other, that my copy was only of the stereo mix, so I cannot completely speak for how the surround portion is. However, given the layering and disorienting phasing and panning of channels in the stereo version, I can only imagine the surround mix is even more fascinating if you have the equipment to fully enjoy it.
'Altars Of Science' is a single piece of computer generated chaos, split across eight individual tracks, indexed for ease of listening. The track dives in with the electronic noise, buzzing, distortion, sharp piercing tones, air raid sirens, all things that make for uneasy listening. There is no gentle introduction to science, just a quick dive into the mechanization. The piece begins to calm, if only somewhat, by focusing more in swells and pulses of noise, akin to cars racing by on a freeway, rendered via an old Atari video game. Glitch type outbursts are unexpected and a bit shocking at times, punctuating the mix with even more volume and force. Then, like an unprepared spacecraft re-entering orbit, the sounds begin to come apart, like pieces flying off and burning in the atmosphere, represented through stutters and digital time stretching.
Later, the panning and shifting of the computer-based noise is like a swarm of insects, their tiny wings amplified to defining volumes, coming together to destroy an old mainframe computer a la the kind in Wargames, all flashy lights and meaningless bleeps. The buzzes mix with the dying beeps of the machinery, a bit of nature triumphing over science. The culmination of the disc is a final bit of minimalism, buried clicks and scratches, some stuttering, much more mellow and less aggressive than the previous parts of the work, the calm reflection after the previous storm.
Schmickler’s 'Altars of Science' has enough harshness and chaos to appeal to fans of harsh realms despite being a work of electronic composition. Although he has previously worked in more conventional and pop-like genres, this is purely experimental. It is hard to say whether this is one man improvising with his laptop, or something that was planned, programmed and scored beforehand. In the end, it really doesn't matter worth a damn, because the final result is exemplary.
Creaig Dunton

BOOMKAT UPDATE, 30.10.2007

One of electronic music's most versatile voices, Marcus Schmickler is able to alternate between his dream pop persona as Pluramon and cutting edge contemporary electronic composition work like this, under his own name. Schmickler's instrument-based electroacoustic works have always been among the very finest within the genre, with releases like Param and Demos (Music For Choir, Chamber Quintet and Electronic Music) finding Schmickler every bit as adept within academic circles as he is in the electronic pop elite. This latest collection of music marks Schmickler's first solely electronic album since 1998's excellent Sator Rotas, although Altars Of Science is released as a far more ambitious multichannel format, written onto an audio-only DVD, mixed in 5.1 (fortunately, for the more old-fashioned listener out there the release also comes with a CD stereo audio mix too). Fans of Russell Haswell and Florian Hecker will find Altars Of Science essential listening, with Schmickler exploring the colourful extremes of computer music with the same pioneering flair as you'd hear on that duo's Blackest Ever Black album. Schmickler's music seems to be more concerned with pitch and harmony than the more textural compositions of Haswell & Hecker, with the first piece on the disc sounding not unlike the microtonal sound worlds of Gyorgi Ligeti in its rich discord. Further in and you might find that the sixth piece sounds like a Flight Of The Bumblebee for algorithmic music, propelling a flurry of almost melodic pitches panning from channel to channel with an intensity comparable to the very noisiest emissions from the Mego stable. Schmickler seems to be a bit of a Jim O'Rourke figure: equally suited to making complex avant-garde music as he is to working within the field of pop music, and Altars Of Science certainly stands as one of the composer's most adventurous and extreme works to date. Excellent.

GROOVE, 10.2007

Neben seiner Arbeit mit Pluramon hat der in Köln lebende Marcus Schmickler diverse Bands wie Jaga Jazzist und Tape produziert sowie auch Kompositionen für chor und Orchester verfasst. Auf Editions Mego erscheint nun 'Altars Of Science' mit acht Stücken schweren Computer-Listenings. Es ist seine erste Veröffentlichung elektronischer Musik seit der Mille-Plateaux-CD 'Sator Rotas' von nunmehr neun Jahre. Schon beim Anhören des Stereo-Mixes auf der CD-Seite stellt sich der Eindruck einer akustischen Op-Art ein - Frequenzen deformieren sich, aus Hinter- werden unmerklich Vordergünde, Taumel und Orientierungslosigkeit löst das aus. Und das ganze erscheint auch nioch im 5.1-Surround-Mix auf DVD!
Christoph Braun

VITAL WEEKLY, 10.10.2007

One of the things I like about Marcus Schmickler is his sheer variety in music styles. Wether it's rock with Pluramon, serious composing for a choir, improvisation or pure electronic works, he can do all seemingly without too much trouble. The luck of being classical trained probably. This new CD is actually a DVD: there is a portion that can be played on any audio CD player and on the DVD part the same piece for multi-channel set-up. That I don't have, so I have to do with the stereo version. Apparently it's his first electronic work since 1998, when he released 'Sator Rotas', and 'Altars Of Science' is a serious computer music work. Schmickler takes the form of 'old' serious electronic music, but then no longer analogue synthesizers or oscillators, but computerized sounds. Things pop up, take shape, disappear. Most of the times in a somewhat loud and noise based territory. We should not forget that Schmickler is also a member of Mimeo, so a bit of noise is well-spend on him. Sometimes buzzing like insects, but usually totally abstract. A strong work I think, taking this kind of music away from the acousmatic counterparts that is part of the serious work, and as such a work that truly stands out from the rest. Powerfull, at times even noise like, but moving about without staying in static territory. An example of how these things should sound for noise heads, serious composers and improvisers. Listen and learn. (FdW)

SPEX, 11.2007

"F.S. Blumm Meets Luca Fadda" wird auch in zehn Jahren noch Bestand haben, wenn Axl Rose lämgst vergessen ist. Das dachte sich offentisichtlich auch Fennesz über sine Debüt "Hotel Paral.lel" von 1997, das er jetzt wieder veröffentilicht, nachdem er als Duopartner von Ryuichi Sakamoto versehentlich fast so etwas wie bekannt geworden ist. Fennesz ist der Gitarrengott der Laptop-Ambient-Polarmusikforscher und "Paral.lel" klingt wie der Heavy-Metal-Papierkorb von Brian Enos Modellflughafen. Bei aller sich selbst zerhackender Elektronik lässt uns Fennesz immer spüren, dass da, bevor die Effektsprozessoren ihren Gitarre angeschlagen wurde. Heute klingt das stellenweise wie die Frischzellenkur, welche die elektronische Musik langsam nötig hat., stellenweise aber auch nach elektronischer Steinzeit. Fennesz wollte vor zehn Jahren noch mal beweisen, dass man einen 2:23-Track mit dem idiotischen Namen "Super Feedbacker" belegen kann, wobei im Laufe dieses Stückes nur exakt vier Mal viruos an der Frequenz geschraubt wird. Sonst lässt Fennesz das Feedback Feedback sein. Klar kann man so was machen. Das muss sogar hin und wieder einmal einer machen, aber Freude kommt dabei nur an theoretisch komplizierten Stellen oder am Ende der CD auf, bei dem erfreulichen Track mit Namen "Aus". der allerdings so wohlerzogen daherkommt wie Fennesz heute noch spielt.
Andreas Ammer

GROOVE, 11.2007

Fast zeitgleich veröffentlicht Editions Mego eines der Schlüsselwerke eines stilbildenden Künstlers neu, nämlich "Hotel Paral.lel" von Fennesz. Heute gehört., wirkt es wie eine Farbenpalette, aus der sich Christian Fennesz anschließend die Farbe des leisen, stilisierten Melodrams herausgepickt hat. Hätte er die Richtung eines Track wie "Fa" mit seinen Gitarrenschwämmen degegen weiter verfolgt, er wäre womöglich auch bei Shoegazing gelandet und nicht bei seinen angereichertem Desert Viewing.
Christoph Braun

BAD ALCHEMY, 08.10.2007

Piero Scaruffi führt diese Scheibe unter seinen ’Best glitch-music albums of all times' auf Platz 6. Der Anschluss der Gitarre an die digitale Gegenwart. Weißes Rauschen auf dunklem Grund, Ambient-Rhythm'n'Noise, der Pop nicht vor dem Unendlichen zu schneiden scheint und der kaum den Beach-Boys-Fan der Plays EP (1998) oder den Sonnyboy von Endless Summer (2001) ahnen ließ. Der Gitarrenklang des Wieners ist oft mutiert oder homöopatisch verdünnt, als Verstärkerwummern oder saitige Vibration kaum noch zu ahnen, aber dennoch als handfeste Grundlage präsent und bestimmend. Dann wieder zerschneidet er ’Dheli Plaza' in zwei fransige Hälften oder durchrauscht das rhythmisch pumpende ’Fa' und durchbitzelt das monoton pochende ’Szabo'. Fennesz wechselt geschickt zwischen solchen pulsminimalistischen Mustern und Drones wie ’Uds' und ’Super Feedbacker'. Hornissiges Surren oder flatterndes Rattern wirken nachträglich wie Appetizer für den harschen Fennesz von Plus Forty Seven Degrees 56' 37" Minus Sixteen Degrees 51' 08" (1999). Der Rerelease - zum 10-jährigen - enthält als Bonus den Syntactic-7"-Track ’5' aus dem Vorjahr 1996 sowie das skurrile Video von Tina Frank/Skot zum knackig rockenden ’Aus'. [rbd BA 56]

IL MANIFESTO, 01.10.2007

Sebbene non possieda i caratteri del capolavoro al pari del successivo Endless Summer, l'esordio su lunga distanza di Christian Fennesz rappresenta un eccezionale esempio di intuizione compositiva e innovazione sonica. Pubblicato per la prima volta nel settembre del 1997 dalla Mego, dopo dieci anni la stessa label ci propone una versione rimasterizzata di questo preziosissimo documento sonoro, un grande esempio di interazione fra due approcci musicali. Da una parte l'uso inquieto e allucinato dei drone, un suono denso in cui muoversi con passo rallentato, mentre dall'altra il glitch, le superfici ruvide e le ritmiche irregolari. Il concetto di aleatorietà e il suo utilizzo per la creazione di musica, vengono qui filtrati da un'incredibile eterogeneità di stimoli uditivi. Quel che qui risulta già chiaro è il criterio allo stesso tempo emotivo e cerebrale che Fennesz continuerà a sviluppare (e affinare) nel corso della sua carriera, portandolo ad abbandonare il filone glitch per gettarsi in avventure ben più impegnative e deflagranti. A impreziosire questa ristampa troviamo anche le sospensioni di 5 e il video fortemente evocativo realizzato per Aus da Tina Frank. (m.ca.)

ALMOSTCOOL.ORG, 28.09.2007

After the release of Endless Summer and Venice, Christian Fennesz seemed to be one of those artists that was name-dropped and referenced constantly as an innovator and revolutionary artist in his field. Other than some remixes, though, he pretty much disappeared until his collaborations with Ryuichi Sakamoto on last years Sala Santa Cecilia EP and this years follow-up of Cendre. In the meantime, Touch has gotten into the reissue act, first with his aforementioned Endless Summer release, and now with his debut solo album Hotel Paral.lel.
I will admit that I've always found Fennesz to be a bit overrated as a musician, although Endless Summer has in particular aged really well). If you haven't heard this debut release, you might be in for a bit of a surprise given his later work. It at the same time contains some of his most difficult and most mainstream-sounding work to date. It's noisy as hell, but also contains what's some of his most rhythmic work ever.
"Sz" and "Nebenraum" open the release, and are slightly closer to his more modern work, as high-pitched rips of feedback sheer through massive slabs of droning noise on the former, while filtered voices and piano comprise the quieter latter track. "Blok M" begins the surprises, as deconstructed techno beats slathered in feedback crunch through sparse drones. Of course, then "Santora" and "Dheli Plaza" follow it and come right back with gut-crunching ripples of deep electronics and overdriven noise while "Super Feedbacker" sounds like the sort of chin-stroking track expressly written to blow out subwoofers.
Along the way are two of Fennesz's best tracks to date, though. "Fa" might very well top my list of favorites, as a simple, heat-blistered 4/4 beat stomps through the middle of overlapping layers of compressed noise that's both heavy and stunningly gorgeous. Meanwhile, "Traxdata" introduces his skipping-CD style and blends together flickering tones with crushed beats and barely-supressed buzzing. With the bonus track "5" and an excellent video for the track "Aus," the reissue is worth hunting down if you're a completist. It doesn't reach quite the heights of Endless Summer, but it's a solid debut that almost makes you wish he'd veer back towards including more rhythmic elements in his work again. Rating: 7.25

LOSING TODAY, 12.09.2007

Christian Fennesz dieci anni dopo.
D