MIMIR (MIMIR)

"D.A." <dominic_audy@covitec.com>

>the Maria Dimension wrote:
>
> What does Mimir sound like? (you can give me an abstract definition or
> compare it to Tanith if you like) Does H.N.A.S. stand for anything? What >
do they sound like? (I like German music) (you can compare these bands > to
any LPD/TG album if it applies, I have 99.9% of them.
>
>
Mimir, as described by Christoph Heemann (ex-HNAS) is textural/atmospheric
music made using mostly analog electronics and some accoustic instruments :
guitar, flute, violin etc. The project started out of mutual interest toward
making textural music and began as tape exchanges between CH and
Ka-Spel/Knight that ended up by recording sessions together in Christoph's
studio in Aachen. Ka-Spel said in an interview that Mimyriad (and the yet
unreleased third Mimir album) is much closer to what they tried to achieve
originally, while the first album is partly considered by them as a failure
because CH (who mixed both albums) was too respectful of the individual
contributions and didn't succeeded in making it a "whole". Personally
though, I still like the first album very much. The music itself don't
really compare to anything by LPD but this "textural" approach is often
present one way or the other in their music. Many of the "Premonition"
tracks, part of Four Days, the Andromeda Suite, catch a match, many solo
tracks by Ka-Spel such as Fuse, the colour Xhine, Colour me vexed, Desiree,
Silverman's Dream Cell etc. - all of them are sounding quite differently but
are somehow still close in their approach to what they've done with Mimir.
Dream Cell is probably what's the closest to Mimir's sound in the dotsography.

As for HNAS (R.I.P., 1992) Well... Hirsche Nicht Aufs Sofa are one of a
kind, as much as LPD or Nurse with Wound are. To label HNAS is uneasy except
if you put them into some vast category that finally doesn't tell much, such
as "experimental music". Their music is quite hard to describe as it
combines many eclectic elements into something quite different and unique,
most of the times tinted by their absurd and often grotesque sense of humour
whether in their titles/lyrics or in the music itself; there are elements of
electronic music, german psychedelia/krautrock, musique concrete, tape and
sound manipulations, textural and ambient music, early industrial music,
...and I'm forgetting a lot of them. Told like that, the description could
almost fit for LPD as well... let's say they shopped for ingredients at the
same supermarket but then used very different recipe books - as far as the
result is concerned, they barely compare to each other. Mimir reflects only
one side of hnas' work and leaves apart, among other things, the second
member's (A. P. Li Khan) contributions to HNAS - Khan's solo works and
side-projects are much more grotesque, abrasive and generally thoroughly
electronic (and also far less good, IMHO). It has nothing to do with
Christoph's electro-accoustic solo works or his side projects like Seclusion
and Mimir. HNAS' music varies a lot: funny, chaotic, completely hypnotic,
very skillfully stuctured and evolving tracks and almost improvised ones,
quiet and beautiful moments - chaotic and noisy ones... the moods change a
lot between tracks but most of the time their music is totally amazing.

If you want to try out something from them you should look for the
"Gegenstande fallen zu boden" compilation CD. It's not ultimately their
best release (but all of them are very good, IMO) but it's the easiest one
to find out at a decent price. You can try at places like Staalplaat, Vinal
Edge, FIAV, Target Export or Verge Dist. The remaining HNAS albums but
Willkur Nach Noten are deleted and used copies of their very limited LPs are
rare and usually very high priced. Im Schatten der Mohre, one of their best
release, is supposed to be reissued on Streamline sooner or later.

D.

Erik Gibbels <erik.gibbels@pi.net>

the Maria Dimension wrote:
>
> What does Mimir sound like? (you can give me an abstract definition or
> compare it to Tanith if you like) Does H.N.A.S. stand for anything? What
> do they sound like? (I like German music) (you can compare these bands to
> any LPD/TG album if it applies, I have 99.9% of them.
>

Their music is instrumental. Their first album (from 1990), which was
titleless contained 9 pieces of music varying from about 3 minutes until
18 minutes, in total about 75 minutes. They use a lot of electronics
sounds, but you can also discover some violin, piano or percussion
sounds. As I said in my previous mail, it's merely atmospheric music.
Their second album (Mimyriad, 1993) contains one piece of about 45
minutes, but which has a lot of varyities in itself.
On the first album played besides Edward and Phil, Andreas Heemann,
Christoph Heemann and Elke Skelter. On the second album there were
Edward, Phil, Elke (at that time Ka-Spel), Andreas Martin, Jim O'Rourke
and Christoph Heemann.
H.N.A.S. stands, as far as I know, for Hirsche nicht aufs sofa. I was
looking in my record collection, but I couldn't find back where I got
that from. So if someone knows I'm wrong, let me know. The only thing I
have from them are contributions to compilation albums. But I think that
there was something on them in the cloud zero list of frequently asked
questions as wel.
German music is a quite wide range. I think you can compare Mimir best
with the Silverman's solo album 'Dreamcell', or maybe a bit to some of
the stuff on the '4 days' CD, or the instrumental part at the end of 'We
bring the day'.
I surely recommend the Mimir CD's, especially when you already have that
much.

Erik.