England's Pork Recordings is home to many a mellow, pleasant andpolished, jazz inflected electronic downbeat. Tetris are a trio fromRussia, also home of the inventor of the addictive game from which theytake their name, and there's nothing remotely Russian about theirmusic. It fits well within the Pork mind-set with shades of techno,funk, latino, disco, big band, swing, easy listening, porno soundtrackand kitsch. The programmed bass and beats are bright, clean and peppyand are dressed up throughout with horns, organ, female vocals andvocal samples, jazzy guitar licks and vibes and synth stuff. The 9tracks are between 4 and 8 minutes with the exception of the morespacious and slower paced "Recordsman" which lazily sprawls for over 11minutes. I don't feel compelled enough to go into any more trackspecifics, it's not really necessary, suffice it to say it's 'same-y'but with variation. This is happy-go-lucky dance music. "Tetris" isfine but too streamlined, predictable and a bit bland for my personaltastes. I need something more daring, deep and soulful. Or moreamusing. Perhaps the most amusing item is the instructions for making aWhite Russian drink on the jewel case spine ...
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Penumbra is Mark Warren, one half of UK ambient pioneers Zoviet France,and this album on Iris Light is the follow-up to last years solo debut"Anoraks" on Universal Egg. "Skandinavien" explores - for exactly 74minutes - similar dark ambient terrain with the aid of repetitive beatsand natural and not so natural field recordings from the region."Welcome to Skandinavien" quietly drifts for awhile then adds in flightinstructions from a flight to Copenhagen. "Deep Listening" churns withsteady layers of electronic drone wave, reversed audio bits, rattles,bells and a deep percussive thud, a lovely female voice loop beingintroduced by the 10th minute. "Another Rainy Day" features a constantcascading beat pattern and, of course, trickling water by the end."Input from Origin" builds upon a never ending beat with synth swirland mildly annoying sporadic notes. Ditto the never ending beat, onlymore frantic and heavy, on "A Week in the Black Box" as steam hissesand sine waves drone incessantly. "Living on the Borderlines" calmsthings down again ... static sea waves, bird calls, a simple hi-hatrhythm, native bellowing and the gentle hum of an engine (plus 6minutes or so of hidden track - field recording of people conversing,traffic and construction). Relaxing. "Penumbra" is pleasant and sits inthe upper middle of my quality scale for these type of albums ...
You've all read the story by now. In a dream, David Tibet wasinstructed to release all his material together in one collectionbefore he died, echoing the old wives' tale that when you die your lifeflashes before you. Prior to its release, there was much speculationfrom fans on various email lists, would it be MP3 files? Could itmanifest as another greatest hits? No, the secret is finally out. 'TheGreat in the Small' is one long track of everything playing at the sametime, from 1984's 'Lashtal' single through 2000's 'Sleep Has His House'album. At the helm mixing the balances between everything was Stapletonand Tibet, who according to Tibet had a methodical mathematical systemof doing things. While they may have carefully and meticulously decidedwhere to begin and end tracks, equilizing the amount of sources playedat one single time, the gimmick of this release wears rather thin goinginto the 10th minute. To its credit, the mix is carefully constructedand is truly an adventure either in a properly setup room with loudspeakers or with headphones, listening and picking out popularfavorites as they fade in and out in a tapestry of noise. In total, itstretches over 61 minutes: which can be a true test in patience. Andwhat happens at the end of the journey? Sorry, I can't give that oneaway. Thankfully the release is mid-priced, as it probably won't getheavy rotation in most players.
Something I've learned over the past few years is to get anything withSteven Wilson's name attached to it - Bass Communion, Porcupine Tree,IEM and now No-Man. No-Man is the UK based duo of Wilson (instruments)and Tim Bowness (vocals, also of Samuel Smiles, Henry Fool) and this istheir 4th album in a decade. Here they are aided by 8 other playersincluding Colin Edwin of Porcupine Tree on bass and Steve Jansen (DavidSylvian) on drums and percussion on several tracks. The focal point isBowness' warm voice and poetic words, soft and heavy with aquintessential singer songwriter melancholy and yearning. This isadorned with piano, synth, saxophone, trumpet, flugelhorn, acoustic andelectric guitars and percussion, which is more of an accessory than adriving force. The result is a lush organic balladry with an ambientsheen, crossbred between acoustic and electronic sounds, and blessedwith perfect production. The songs are essentially pop but draw uponlight jazz, classical, psuedo-tribal and experimental influences. I'mespecially enamored with "Carolina Skeletons" (also title track of a1998 EP). It's utterly emotive with forlorn piano, crumpled sound loop,Floydian guitar and Bowness relaying the sad story of 'Cowboy Kate'(Kate Carpenter perhaps?) ... "it's carolina skeletons that make herstranger when she eats". "All That You Are" is another crowning jewel,ending the album on a note of romantic resolution ... "let me take yourhand and love all that you are". "Returning Jesus" is gorgeous,addictive and timeless. It's like a shared bed you never want to getout of ...
Christopher Penrose is a thirty something Californian who has receiveddegrees in music composition at UC San Diego and Princeton University.He currently resides in Japan and works as a researcher, composer anddeveloper of audio software for Apple's Rhapsody operating system. Thetwo 20 and 24 minute tracks on this disc are likely products of thatsoftware, possibly his image to sound program. Penrose is obviouslymaking a statement on the Americanization of the world as the digipackfeatures clever artwork by him of Stars and Stripes flags with thestars replaced by other nations flags and corporate logos. The titlerefers to 'one who vociferously supports one's country, especially onewho supports a belligerent foreign policy', no doubt a phenomenon hehas experienced firsthand in Japan. The title track churns throughcountless processed samples and passages, far too many to detail oreven identify, but most are seemingly random snippets of sound andmusic interspersed with several spoken statements: "here is what youthink", "be a winner at losing", "I love my body", "she is America",etc. "MK/Ultra" features an 8 minute wavering synthetic drone, apanicked phone call to a radio station from a recently dischargedsoldier who believes aliens are among us, and a numbered list ofunusual life lessons and suggestions delivered in a digitized voice,culminating with "walk slowly, but kill that motherfucker if he triesto take your money" repeated ad nauseam. Penrose's compositions arejust plain odd, both in content and juxtaposition, but also interestingwith a well balanced mix of ambient, noisy, serious and humorousmoments. Though, without the artwork I'd be somewhat puzzled as to whatit's all about ...
Aeron Bergman is a founding member of NYC based label Lucky KitchenRecords and this CD is his first for Germany's Tom. "The Tale of theUnhappy American" is a science fiction fairy tale told with words andsounds. Eleven short spoken word tracks are followed by correspondingmusical tracks, all less than four minutes, often to interpret theaction of each scene. The story follows the narrator's journey from thesurroundings of home to a futuristic battlefield and beyond via a hoverbike. There doesn't seem to be any sort of moral really, just a briefadventure then back home. The music is predominantly pretty ambientelectronic twinkles, waves, drones, static and gurgles, with theoccasional noisier passage. These sounds, despite being electronicand/or computer generated as I believe they are, feel very naturalalmost as if they are field recordings of the sounds of insects, powerlines, flight, water, battle, machines, different times of day/night,etc. There's a child-like naiveté to everything here: the concept,story, the music and the packaging. And it works. It's simply cute,fun, warm and relaxing. Next up for Bergman, as 1/2 of Alejandra andAeron, are "Kitchen" a split 12" on Fat Cat and "The Tale of Pip" fulllength on Autobus/LK in April and May ... 
