I put my music into the space. I don’t want to
send any messages, I think of nothing and I don’t want to purport any meanings.
The listeners hear what they hear and behave to the music as they feel.
Austrian
composer, Klaus Lang, describes himself as observer of tones. As stated
himself, his roots belong to Gregorian tradition and his music definitely represents
abstract way of perceiving it.
Though
abstraction (of form and content), he is interested in clarity and truth.
His work includes
pieces for various setups, but common term that can be used as description of
Lang’s work is construction of time. Whether
he composes stage works, big or small ensembles or solo instruments, the
listener experience a huge space, filled with either wall of sound or sound
blocks that varies in intensity and massiveness.
Lang’s image
is largely marked through his output for stage and his favourite instrument –
organ, exploring entire spectrum of possible sounds, from hum to sine waves, therefore
starts GODrec a series of releases with his organ music with two different
aesthetic examples mentioned above.
Massiveness
is the best description for 17 symmetrien.
A wall of sound, the piece explores the whole range of the instrument at the
maximum power. To some extent, this is pure organ symphony – but someone would
also define it as drone music too.
The second piece, mars attacks. deals with punctuality
and pointed tones with occasional sub layers, creating quite astonishing and
scary mood of unpredictability.
For the
second time, rocked Bernhard Lang basis of GODrec, delivering his ultimate
piece from Monadologie series – Monadologie XII, for ensemble.
Unlike the
previous release (TablesAreTurned, with Philip Jeck), Monadologie XII is
nothing less than a blast: a three-part concerto for ensemble with occasional
saxophone solos
and terrific drum parts (watch your ears on the second side of
the vinyl!).
And all that, in astonishing performance of Klangforum Wien, under the direction of genius Johannes Kalitzke.
Together with Differenz/Wiederholung 2, Monadologie XII could definitely be
Lang’s most jazz-influenced piece up to date and at the same time, one of the
biggest quakes
LSD is one more trio formation from Vienna on GODrec, that works mainly in the field of electro-acoustic improvisation.
They are also a part of big network for improvised music and soundart (Klangkunst), velak and snim.
Also another formation which possess distinct quality - unique sound.
And not only, their fantastic ability to react on each other, which builds variety of styles where they are moving, no matter if we speak about rhythmical "conversations" of different sound sources, or all over present drone/loop aesthetics.
Although their music sounds very serious and complex, duo adé don’t want to be considered as
abstract formation. Graz-based duo, comprised of members of cult band, Code Inconnu,
already established
themselves as very specific low-fi electronic constellation on their first
release, Hungrige Speisen.
This time, avoiding any kind of electronic devices and
electronic manipulations,
they sat themselves on (out-of-tune) piano, set different
tempo each, and recorded eleven versions of Freilassing (one available on the record and the rest as free download!).
The piece is half-structured
improvisation, combination of micro-tonality, bitonality,
rhythmically
independent counterpoints, integration and disintegration, and (in)homogeneous repetitions.
25 minutes of extremely challenging piano music, on
the run into the unknown known…
For
Slobodan Kajkut there was always and intention to write a piece for
hardcore/trash/speed/reaction duet Heifetz.
Fascinated
not only with their variety of different musical styles, that are part of their
musical language, but also with their ability to perform with extreme level of passion and
variation of sarcasm and severity, Kajkut wrote a piece that musically and
physically tests their patience.
Somehow,
the piece titled City of Bore (named by Heifetz), illustrates the character of
the piece. Literally, there is nothing happening, the piece is a half an hour
of emptiness, filled with periodical points. There is nothing new in the piece
itself, many artists, such as Taku Sugimoto and many others, wrote thousands of
such pieces, but in this case, interesting is to hear how Heifetz perform such
music, always on the border to explode, though with ability to abstain.
On the
other side, Sick Nature (played by Maggot, duet formed to perform this
particularly piece), also explores punctuality but in a rhythmical way, and with
slightly extended instrumentation.
Each
single note of the piece is performed with almost mechanical precision, which
make the piece extremely cold. Various percussion and dynamic extremes from
very silent, to extremely loud, make a great correspondence to boredom of City
of Bore.
If there is a record, that could be simply described with the word STRANGE, then this would be definitely the one.
This quartet, consisting of Juun (ex - Der Boese Zustand),
Steven Hess (Pan American, Locrian), Bernhard Breuer (from seminal
techno trio, Elektro Guzzi) and Alfred Reiter (sound), provided to be one of the most
original formations in experimental music of today.
Lovely Objects offers punctual
but sometimes also groovy drum parts, filtered through intimate
electronics, "harmonized" with bowed and striking piano strings (piano guts), provided chamber textures
and increasingly unique atmosphere.
Magnificent
balance between improvisation and fixed music material, create one of a
kind compositional style and musical language, whose structure and
sense request numerous listening in order to be discovered
properly.
Very distinctive and very powerful masterpiece, created by three very strong personalities.
Collecting
their experiences through various impro- and electro - acoustic projects, as a
part of Viennese circle, this Slovenia - born duo (Rdeča Raketa - Red
Rocket), manifests their own post - apocalyptic vision of today's humanity.
Wir
werden (We will), consists of two carefully composed pieces, each
spanning on one side of vinyl. Constructed from various electronic
sound sources and field recordings with acoustic instruments, duo offers
brutal
sine-wave attacks, discreet loops, scary drones and beautiful piano
passages. And this is just small part from what this fabulous catalog
of
human's habits offers, opened and closed with the spoken word lyrics.
"Wir werden deals with the past repeating, movements
and their absence in front of systems appearing to be crumbling, relationships
between people and their inner fears", as they claim themselves.
Ultimately, this release is collection of recommendations for surviving today's Brave New World.
This release turns out to be the best way to celebrate little GODrec
anniversary:
the tenth release of the label!
Woodscratcher (Scratching Wood) is a composition and sound generating
machine from Austrian composer, media-artist, sound-sculptor and performer,
Winfried Ritsch.
Already known as collaborator in different projects with Bernhard Lang
(pieces from his series Differenz/Wiederholung, Trike), Peter Ablinger
(Klavierautomat), Ritsch created “my own dedication to noise pieces of
experimental music from 70s onwards”.
This machine cuts a 2-5cm thick disk of a wooden trunk in a circular
line along the growth rings of the wood, which makes this nothing else then monumental turntable.
At the
same time, the wood is amplified with four pickups (sensors) and the signals
picked from microphones are spatialized over four loudspeakers in the corners of
the room which spans acoustically the slice of the wood. This scratching in the
concert is done until the inner part of the disk falls to the ground and the piece
ends.
The
movement of the cutting tool behaving like an over-sized record player needle,
has the performing function and is an allusion of the production of records, as
well as playing them. The woodscratcher pretends to extract and play the
information which resides in the piece of wood cutting it in an excessive
performance. The wood is heard as acoustic material with inhomogeneities annual
rings by superimposing a loops of the cutting process.
With the
progression of the cutting process the sounds evolves of the pieces in more and
more rubbing and squeezing sounds. The audio signal filter functions of the
wood is heard like repeatedly changing formants, almost imaging voices in the
noise.
Composition
With this
performances not only the machine as performer is broached as the issue, also
the exploration of unknown material is an artistic statement as also defining
the structured and timing of the piece. The aesthetics lies in the excessive
performance beyond feasible by a human actor or musician and also, links the
many possible associations and associative to the world of music performance. One
of them is the sound based on the noise
of the experimental music pieces since the 70s and another with ideas of
Herbert Bruen's computer music project sawdust
from that time, when the rejection of oscillators as a tone generator for free
definition of single events down to the scale of samples as a liberation of
note-oriented Music generation.
The
transition in algorithmic composition to the composition of processes as
instrument like done in live composition is expanded to the construction of a
mechanical machine which is the live composer. The main aspect of this is that
the process does the composing and the machine is composed for executing the
process of extracting the piece out of the disc of wood, destroying it and
defining the audible result of the piece. So composer becomes a mechanical
engineer and inventor of machines and the musician the operator as machinist.
The picture vinyl release is vinyl simulation of woodscratcher: a vinyl
record has a picture of a wood on itself and recorded sound of scratching the
wood.
Eight years ago, Boris Hegenbart began turning his interests in Dub principles into reality and during this period of time, he made his
collaborations with (or if you want, he made commissions for)
monumental artists, such as Fred Frith (Henry Cow, Art Bears,
Skeleton Crew, Naked City, Material, Massacre), David Grubbs
(Gastr del Sol, Codeine ), Oren Ambarchi (Burial Chamber Trio, Sunn
O)))), Martin Brandlmayr (Radian, Polwechsel), Felix Kubin, Ulrich
Krieger (Metal Machine Trio), etc... The
principle was simple: artists did overdub recordings with Hegenbart's
material, which would be later transformed, using studio as an
instrument, as a typical work process
that features 99% history of dub sound. But in this case, dub
is only a statement or concept, which means, there are no typical dub
trademarks and tools (delay, reverb). This leads to only one result:
if dub is deconstruction of music, then those pieces are deconstruction of dub!
This double vinyl master piece, is nothing more then a perfect homogenous collection of so many different personalities at the same place/record. The
hardest and the greatest achievement, is to connect all of them into
one musical milestone, something that Boris Hegenbart succeeded without
highfaluting.
You never know what to
expect from Peter Ablinger: noise, silence, serious grotesque or black
humor. And you always get a total opposition from what you have
expected, which makes him so special and unique! On his first release for GODrec, he offers two pieces from his famous
"Regenstück" series: "Ohne Titel / 3 Klaviere (1-6) and
"Regenstück 1-6 / 6 (3) Schalgzeuger.
"Ohne Titel / 3 Klaviere" involves one tone in changing octaves (and
very seldom a few additional pitches). There are 6 sections, all in the
same sequence of registers, like one piece written 6 times - a series,
but at the same time there's an almost hidden development through the 6
sections. Coordinated by
click-tracks, each performer plays independently within separate pulses
that never meet within one piece. The piece focuses on the
micro-rhythmical shifts between piano-attacks and their different
location in space - an etude in listening to what is not obvious in its
details as well as its silent evolution.
Postepeno
is a project that lasts for a long time already, and began as a
fascination with the art of a unknown schizophrenic patient, settled at
the vienna psychiatric
asulym Oberdöbling, whose name was only marked with the
first two letters of her name, ST.
This
piece of "art", which is, basically, a definite collage, was created at
the year of 1890, at the time when collage art was actually not even on
the horizon, and it is also remarked as a "Music made of paper".
Already known for doing
a remix of Kajkyt's piece, Krst, Austrian guitarist and composer, Robert
Lepenik, was deeply occupied with experimenting with sine waves, either
only with them or in a combination with other instruments, particularly
piano.
At the beginning it was imagined as a musical setting for the eponymous
collage of Frau ST, but later, Lepenik decided to release the piece as
an extra piece of music. Release also contains extended version of the piece Grete vor dem Haus,
which was available as a CDr in 2008. The double vinyl includes this fabulous artwork on five huge posters, packaged in hard box, which makes this release
an ultimate special.
TablesAreTurned is the
first collaboration between one of the most significant austrian
composers of today, Bernhard Lang, and prominent English turntablist
Philip Jeck.
There is no doubt that mutual interested in loop technique, led to the
musical collaboration between two artists, connecting the worlds of
academic philosophy with underground aesthetic.
Unlike his previous works, where Lang was able to transform an ensemble
into a big loop generator (his series of Differenz / Wiederholung
pieces, accomplished with magnum opus opera, monumental Das Theater der
Wiederholungen/The Theatre of Repetitions), here he is turning into
celular automata, generating counterpoint based on the rest of the
loops.
On the other side, Jeck offers a dozen of low - fi locked grooves,
making the perfect extended interludes between powerful ensemble
episodes.
Premiered at Berlinerfestspiele, but also performed at Wien Modern and
Huddersfield Contamporary Music Festival, the piece is now available
for the first time in limited double - vinyl edition.
Fascinated with the comics named Life After Death by Michael Hacker,
Kajkut decided to make a series
of single records with short pieces that would be referred to mentioned
comics. Life After Death consists of three comics, covering different topics on
specified theme. First part was composed for ex-drummer of The Flying Luttenbachers,
Weasel Walter, who brought his own sound to silence and free chaotic
madness.
(feat. remixes from Lustmord, Plotkin, KK Null, Opcion,
Trajkoski, Lepenik, Kauders, Podrum)
2xLP / 2xCdr
Some
people also call Lustmord a
father of dark ambient, which is not far away from truth. His album "Heresy" is considered as a
milestone of dark ambient but he also showed a big interest in dub
music. His contribution is a very good example of that theory.
James Plotkin is not a person who
can be easily classified into one particular genre, as his works show
his interest of industrial/grindcore (OLD), drone metal (Khanate), but
also abstract electronic (Indirmed).
He shared his producing/mastering duties to bands such as Isis, Sunn
O))), Scorn, Pelican and Earth. Beside Merzbow, the other
monster of japanese noise culture is Kazuyuki Kishino (KK Null). Typical for japanese scene
from that time, he also began producing a large number of solo and
collaboration tapes. Nearby his numbered works, he is also a
mastermind of Zeni Geva. A cult figure in
macedonian underground scene in 80s, Goran
Trajkoski became worldwide famous with his band Anastasia, with
whom he provided soundtrack for the movie "Before the Rain". After the split
of the band he was a lead singer of the band Mizar, later to became an
solo artist. At the moment, his main interest is producing theatre
music.
Opcion (aka Ab Hinc), works since middle 90s. He
was closely linked to the label Wiederstand Records, for who he
produced one of the most fascinating down - tempo records of the whole
catalogue of the label, Farkhülse
Fist.
Robert Lepenik is the best known as
a member of industrial band Fetish 69. His list of colaborations
includes austrian composer Bernhard Lang, Dorit Chrysler and Kallabris,
among others. He is a member of the band The Striggles. Kauders, a multi - talented
guitarists-composer, was a member of austrian underground band, Code Inconnu. He produced
some of the most intriguing low - fi-electronic records such as Games and de Sade Messe). He is a member of
the band The Striggles.
Former guitar player in various noise bands, Podrum began to show interest in
electronic music with the 90s expansion of techno music. His works are
extremely rare, but here he provided a 15-minute piece with a great
downtempo/ambient mood.
Dimitrios polisoidis has been developing amplified viola since his very
beginnings and is most famous as viola player in Klangforum Wien. He
is also very recognised for his numerous collaborations with austrian
composer, Bernhard Lang (Versuch über das vergessen, Differenz /
Wiederholung 2, 6, 17 among others). Glue Sniffer is a combination
of fixed musical material and improvisation. Scratches, noises and
strange - melodical flashes, create six minutes of heavy distorted
hardcore.
Krst is a piece of
electronic music
composed between 2004. and
2009. and marks beginning of using name Kajkyt.
It combines dark ambient music with heavy beats, combining
with sort of byzantine chant, which is one of
the primary interest of his musical
development.
It also combines noise elements with contemporary
composing
techniques.
Krst is also a live piece which, due to
monument, is to be played at big venues,
such as churches or big
halls.
Slobodan Kajkut The Compromise Is Not Possible 2xLP
The Compromise Is Not Possible was composed at the end of the 2004. It was commissioned by Hoerfest, a festival of contemporary and experimental music, curated by Austrian composer, Peter Jakober. Composed
with the concept of combining contemporary techniques with heavy metal
elements, the piece brings crushing guitar/drums parts with various
screaming of voice, combined with silent appearing of high and low
organ drones.
