Daniel Menche and Kiyoshi Mizutani “Garden” [Ground Fault Recordings]

Krzton Drda   1/17/2006   A Library

Music concrete sunny side up takes you to visit a garden in the summer time. Insects, birds, wind, are all extensively layered to make this work. One track goes all the way through. Around seven minutes in there is a gong noise and within a few minutes of the end a helecopter can be heard thumping far away. Daniel Menche is credited with low sounds and Kiyoshi Mizutani with the high sounds. This was recorded in Japan in 1996, mixed in 2002 and released in 2003. Joyful yet restive.

Mori, Ikue – “Labyrinth” – [Tzadik]

Krzton Drda   1/17/2006   A Library, CD

Experimental laptoppery with a sound that is constructed, smooth, and articulate, kind of like playing aggressively with glass without breaking it.

Riley, Terry – “Olson I I I ” – [Cortical Foundation]

Krzton Drda   1/11/2006   A Library, CD

This is a live performance at the Nacka School of Music with Terry Riley directing using Soprano Saxaphone.

Swarms exhibit behaviors that extend beyond what individuals or small numbers can achieve. One voice, one violin, one sax can be enchanting. Here many build something together more complex and constructed that chaotic. Layers, syncopation, transitions that slide throught many measures. There is a quick, stable backbone rhythm throughout that gives the piece a feel somewhat akin to dark techno. This mixes well with a wide range of sounds and works as fill or punctuation. Audience involvement can be heard especially toward the end.

Starting is slow with low wandering for the first fifteen minutes, then voices and strings phase in and out and back and forth. At fourty one minutes in there is a crash and rising tension. At fourty two minutes there are vocalizations, then shouts and warbling from the audience which rise to meet the end of the piece. At fifty two and a half minutes there is a loud buzz that sounds like a production problem, and shortly after this the piece ends to screams and applause and random horn sounds.

Samartzis, Philip – “Soft and Loud ” – [Plates of Sound]

Krzton Drda   1/6/2006   12-inch, A Library

Environmentally derived composition from Tokyo December 1999 to Melborne August 2003. Music concrete evoking the spirit of urban Japan.

A side: crackle, clang, pulse, gaps, water, sizzle, clunk, hum, hiss, ploink, pause, whir, chant

B side: flute, fries, static, birds, 2001, temple, machines, voices, ring, shoot, hai!

Phon.O – “Burn Down the Town ” – [TIGERBEAT6]

Krzton Drda   1/6/2006   A Library, CD

Techno and trip hop mixed with machine stamped fuzz textures on the sequencer samples and some clever but edgy raps.
Track 5: “Bitches and Hoes”
Track 9: “Hoes over Bros”
Track 10: “Kill”
Translations of French titles on CD labels.

Jgrzinich / Nehil, Seth – “Confluence ” – [Intransitive]

Krzton Drda   1/6/2006   A Library, CD

Summarizes the progressions of a sound arts team with three tracks each havng different character. Track one scrapes the bottom of the barrel–literally with bonking noises and such. Track two starts to get distant and droney, and track three gets very far away with rumble and hum and heavy depth of texture. Follow the sound artists to find out where they go!

Doublends Vert – “Doublends Vert ” – [Present Sounds Recordings]

Krzton Drda   1/6/2006   A Library, CD

Accoustic instrumental dronings, no drums. Spaces of energy are invoked, passed around a room of musicians as trance absorbs all. Not gassy or low cloud ceiling like some ambient, nor mechanical sounding. Very human and personal with reeds, strings, and winds coming through very crisp and clear. Like an intense sunny day when looking around and a flash of sun makes your eyes water. Has potential crossover appeal as drones go: Kind of like jazz stripped down, slowed down, trapped in sap, and over many years preserved in amber.

Touch 00 [coll] – [Touch]

Krzton Drda   1/6/2006   A Library, CD

Collection of sounds feels like a modern soundtrack. Includes techno ambient, trip hop, music concrete, tones and pulse, glitch. Several tracks are short filler transitions that are not as good as the core material.

Some notable tracks:
Track 1: signals from Matrix by Ryoji Ikeda (this full piece is in the library, but the selection is quite choice)
Track 3: haunting chant layers with calls to prayer as memorial for a murder in Morocco
Track 4: Sailsbury Cathedral tour
Track 11: space reverb mix, flaming marshmellows
Track 12: glitchy lounge recorded at KZSU 14 Sept 1999 with People Like Us, Jet Black Hair People, and Wobbly
Track 15: Moscow air traffic control over Siberia Oct 1990
Track 17: Village crier
Track 20: blippy bloop from Tobias Frere-Jones with extensive but seemingly incoherent notes in CD jacket

Ult Nusrat Ali Khan V1 [coll] – [Narada]

Krzton Drda   1/6/2006   CD, International

Nusrat Fateh Ali Kahn, Pakistani master of Qawal, traditional Sufi music, was a musical giant who influenced many, started and ran a school, explored. Lots of information on the CD jacket about him. These early tracks have minimal instrumentation, dominant vocals with occasional accompanyment. Vocal improvisations here are in a way familiar, but more extreme and raw than are heard in his later works. This will be a treat for listeners familiar with his more popular works.

Tracks on the first CD (20, 30, 20 min) are from 1978 and have the most raw character to the vocal flourishes.

Tracks on the second CD (13, 15, 15, 30 min) reveal increasing discipline with the last track being a sombre piece with a deliberate feel.

Rich, Robert & Boddy, Ian – “Lithosphere ” – [Din]

Krzton Drda   1/6/2006   A Library, CD

Brief and gentle ambient explorations of imaginary places that track into each other. Has a depth and feel similar to other Robert Rich pieces, but more simple, stripped down, and atmospheric than orchestral. Some tracks have lightly plucked strings or ploinked percussion or both while others slide by like clouds.

Track 1 “Threshhold” spacey
Track 2 “Vent” guitar, meandering, backround percussion
Track 3 “Chamber” bells, clank, tapping of strings
Track 4 “Glass” glooping and spacey
Track 5 “Subduction” slide into percussive echo chamber
Track 6 “Geode” glow and rattle–will these pots ever come clean?
Track 7 “Stone” scrape that transformer!
Track 8 “Metamorphic” watch the blow dryer races from a distance
Track 9 “Lithosphere” belly dance 45 played at 33 1/3 in heavy syrup
Track 10 “Melt” slow, sad humming dirge with vaguely Frippertronic feel

My Cat Is An Alien – “Cosmological Eye Trilogy, the ” – [Last Visible Dog Records]

Krzton Drda   1/6/2006   A Library, CD

By Maurizio and Roberto Opalio of Turin, Italy. Includes original volumes one (2003) and two (2004) plus previously unreleased volume three.

Organic, cosmic minimalism kept loose and dreamy. Humming and whirring in back, some noises on top. Very far out stuff from the unknown depths of space. Haunting tones, echoes, bits of what may be signals revealing mysteries of anomalous trajectories, the unexplained phenomenon subtly warping the paths of the most distant space probes. Not cold and uniform–there are loud sounds of quasars being formed.

Vol1: 14min spaceflight; 55min space voyage with quiet and gaps only comes alive around 22min

Vol2: 8min whirr and wiggle; 40min exploration with ramblings around 3min, scary feedback hoot at 5min, intensity at 23min, howling at 38min; 22min far off, glitchy interference at 7min

Vol3: 33min whirr and buzz, at 2.5min hoots and chips, around 21min monster breathing; 34min with crickets? projector? chirps, beeps, bells, around 15min gets intense and at 30min starts to fade away

Fursaxa – “Amulet ” – [Last Visible Dog Records]

Krzton Drda   1/6/2006   A Library, CD

Fursaxa is Tara Burke of West Philadelphia. This has self released live work from 2002-2004 including material from “From The Cult of Moon Mountain”. Tracks 5 and 6 also have Michael and John Gibbons.

Wandering, distan, and yet never out of organ range. Airy vocal layers are joined by organ, flute, modest percussion, strings, and horns.

Track 1 (9:41) – vocals, blending, flute, percussion
Track 2 (3:57) – strumming and singing
Track 3 (13:42) – organ and voice, odd wandering
Track 4 (13:06) – string strum, rising drone, vocals
Track 5 (7:29) – horn drones, drums, piping
Track 6 (8:11) – guitar, organ, vocals
Track 7 (11:42) – vocals, murmurs, strings

Bright – “Bells Break Their Towers ” – [Strange Attractors Audio]

Krzton Drda   1/6/2006   A Library, CD

Happy people strumming guitars and singing accompanied by bass, drums, and more–a familiar medium refined with competent musicianship. Feels like 60s psychedelia 45s played at 33 1/3. Gateway to a pleasant space like an invitation to a summer picnic. Touches on modern abstractions and drones, but stays near happy guitar strumming roots. The result is sweet like hot cakes with lots of syrup. Longer tracks can cause a glycemic reaction.

Track 2: ends hard
Track 4: brooding “alone in myself”
Track 5: rough and droney
Track 6: abstract
Track 7: vocals lead, transitions
Track 8: Fripp-ish guitars, instrumental

Orb, the – “Okiedokie Itstheorb on Kompakt ” – [Kompakt]

Krzton Drda   1/6/2006   A Library, CD

Practiced, polished, textured, even crunchy, this shows wrinkles and weathering with grace like aging well without face lifts or memory loss.
Short pieces don’t come up and hit you, but soak in and take you slowly.
This has the feel of a oft used and carefully tended machine with well developed patina and wear marks.
Smooth and well mannered to an extreme, this starts you out with dinner and a movie and sets you up with breakfast afterward.

Track 2: nice “free” vocal
Track 6: odd “rolo” intro
Track 10 Russian intro
Track 12: noisy, ambient
Track 14: loop: orchestra, squish, repeat; end: mecha cruch