Eleh - Location Momentum (Touch, 2010)

A curious album of denseness, wrapped in low frequency ossicilation. Much like the work of say Phill Niblock or perhaps more accurately Saito Koji, or at least a much darker version of the aforementioned, the music(?) presented on Eleh first digital release is made up of, in the very accurate words of the Wire, "just a handful and discrete (and discreet) but highly charged sound events that emerge, overlap, recede and reverberate at critical frequencies over extended durations". Humming drones like factory machinery ticking over, the buzz of lights in an empty office. As encapsulating as it is mysterious. The envelopes that rotate like windmills in Linear to Circular/Vertical Axis are a sound I've never heard presented in such a way before, perhaps a little hard work for the impatient listener but for those with an open mind and an appreciation for creativity, this is a truly excellent adventure in sound.

Spoiler : What Boomkat Said:

*The long awaited Touch debut from Eleh - one of the most fascinating and mysterious projects in contemporary electronic music* Ever since we heard our first Eleh record back in 2006 we've been completely blown away by the precise architecture and conceptual realisation of one of the more mysterious recording projects in electronic music. A succession of eleven vinyl-only releases on Important and Taiga followed, marking the enigmatic figure behind the name as a purveyor of exceptional drone music, exploring analog synthesis with a particular emphasis on the physicality of sound from the very lowest registers of the frequency spectrum. 'Location Momentum' is the first time Eleh's music has become available on a digital format, giving Touch the honour of releasing five long, deeply immersive tracks. The patient deveopment and concentration of resonant acoustic phenomenae on the 20 minute opener 'Heleneleh' leaves us breathing slowly and feeling as though our atoms are about to disintegrate like a sandsculpture built on a bassbin. The overlapping drones hit critical frequencies, creating tactile synaesthetic sensations akin to some religious/narcotic experience. The cathedral-set reverbs of 'Circle One' further enhance the worship/trip, something we recommend experiencing on a good set of speakers as opposed to headphone for maximum effect (apparently you're supposed to be 7 feet away from the sound source), putting us into a drowsy, maleable state, but still acutely aware of an immense and insistent presence in control of our senses. By the time you're onto slow subduction of 'Observation Wheel' expect blurred vision and possibly speaking in tongues as par for the course. Finally we're left open mouthed and drooling at the measured and ultra-precise control of 'Rotational Change For Windmill', gradually lowering the pure, unadorned bass tones into a vacuum of abyssal nether regions, enveloping all other tones until we're in the presence of a mass of tangible air movements, at one with a properly arcane vibe. If the music of Eliane Radigue, La Monte Young or Kevin Drumm has affected your life, this album comes very highly recommended. *WARNING* Do not listen to this album while using heavy machinery or operating a vehicle!

Read full review of Location Momentum - ELEH on Boomkat.com ©

Jacaszek - Treny (2008)

Each time I listen to this album i'm left wondering why it took me so long to understand it, to see what all the fuss was about and to fall totally and utterly in love with it. Without doubt Treny has a firm place in amongst my favourite ambient albums, a worthy contempary of albums like The Fun Years - Baby, It's Cold Inside, Grouper's Dragging a Dead Deer Up a Hill, Phill Niblocks Touch Strings, BvDubs Prayer to False Gods and Eluviums Lambent Material. Its sound is so soothing, deep, not warm, almost eerie in places, but generally enchanting, maybe even spiritual, certainly angelic, the kind of album that demands to be listened to through headphones and certainly a grower.

Jacaszek - Treny by miasmah

Spoiler : What Boomkat and Miasmah Said :

Marsen Jules, Arvo Part, Zbigniew Preisner's soundtrack work for Krzysztof Kieslowski, Deaf Center, Max Richter, Erik Satie, Alberto Iglesias - if you are familiar and in awe of any or all of these names then this latest album on the exceptional Miasmah label will no doubt end up on your essential listening pile for the foreseeable future. Jacaszek has managed with "Treny" to assemble an album so heart-stoppingly beautiful and personal that we've been stunned into silence for its entire 55 minute duration. With string arrangements provided courtesy of Stefan Wesolowski, the foundations of the album are set with Cello and Violin painting fragile outlines coloured by subtle electronic manipulations, harp, piano and reduced, haunting operatic voices. Unlike so many of his contemporaries, Michael Jacaszek doesn't make use of any samples, with everything on the album assembled by the musicians on hand (notably Maja Sieminska, Anja Smiszek-Wesolowska and Wesolowski and Jcaszek themselves) - and the subtle grandeur of the album is almost impossible to take in over one sitting, even if the impact is absolutely immediate. This is the kind of album that you just cannot believe a bijou imprint like Miasmah is able to lay its hands on - such is the scale of its success that it feels like a hugely important piece of work, far outweighing almost anything else we've heard in the modern classical field these last eighteen months. Cinematic without ever feeling contrived, "Treny" is surely one of the most impressive, mystical and astonishing albums of the year - we just cannot imagine that anyone listening to it will fail to be utterly bowled over and taken in - listen to the previews and you'll get an idea of just what we mean. Deaf Center's Miasmah label has slowly and carefully assembled a life-changing catalogue of releases designed to enrich and expand our musical horizons, and with "Treny" they have just delivered their most complete and compelling musical statement to date. We absolutely implore you to check this album out, one of the year's most important releases thus far. ESSENTIAL PURCHASE.

Miasmah

Michal Jacaszek's 'Treny' is the seventh release from Norway's Miasmah label - a label that has already created a unique and distinctive identity for itself through a string of releases existing in the darker side of the musical spectrum. Bringing together a variety of musicians and composers from around the world, each artist shares a similar aesthetic and a penchant for introspective, lamenting, classically-influenced music. With this in mind, no better home comes to mind for the new album by Poland's Jacaszek - in fact, it could even be argued that 'Treny' typifies the Miasmah 'sound' and encapsulates everything that is so gripping about the label right now.

The opening track, 'Rytm to Niesmiertelnosc I', sets the dimly-lit scene perfectly. A beautifully arranged string quartet and a lonesome female voice are framed with waves of distant underwater rumbles and creaks, with fragments of harp occasionally breaking to surface to release mournful motifs onto the dense musical canvas. It could be argued that the talent that Mr. Jacaszek holds is in his perfect blending of acoustic and electronic sounds, inasmuch that it is hard to tell where tape loops end and forlorn violin melodies begin.

By the beginning of the second piece, the appropriately titled 'Lament', Jacaszek has already firmly established a sound for himself. Clearly influenced by the liturgical compositions of Henryk Gorecki or John Tavener, with a healthy pinch of Angelo Badalamenti's mood-setting soundscapes, Jacaszek manages to find his own niche somewhere between Murcof and Francois Tetaz's indispensible score for 'Wolf Creek' - somewhere dark and mysterious but ultimately beautifully rewarding and moving.

There are traces of optimism in these songs, and as the album ends with 'Rytm to Niesmiertelnosc II', the clouds turn from a heavy grey to a uplifting palette of autumnal shades as a subtle rhythm emerges to gently guide the listener into lighter pastures. Despite the somewhat uplifting ending, as the last note strikes you may find yourself wanting to turn back into the darkness and start the whole adventure again. Wrap up warm, and carry enough supplies for many years of repeated listening...

Phill Niblock - Touch Strings (Touch)

This already got itself an honourable mention in my end of year list but yet again i've found myself so completely enscapsulated by it that I feel the need to write again.

Despite being split into 12 sections, the truth is that in fact there are only three pieces here, two of which last around fifty minutes, split into several shorter pieces, normally exactly ten minutes in length and with no noticeable change. I normally hate the idea of super long tracks, pyscological no doubt but all the same they put me off, in this instance Mr Niblock has fooled me and drawn me in like a moth to the light.


Sometimes you just need a simple repetitious cycle of almost nothingness drone, the feeling of almost not being there, an ointment for the overused and over active brain, an equalizing fluid in the form of music, Phill Niblocks Touch Strings is every bit that remedy. Simple and repititious without ever veering towards eerie and every bit as delightful of Saito Koji's Candle on Resting Bell last year.

What Boomkat Said :

His fourth release for the label, Touch Strings is another commanding body of drone works from Phill Niblock, stretching across two discs. The first CD is occupied by the hour-long, six-movement Stosspeng, a composition for electric guitars and basses with a little e-bow intervention to sustain solid tones to avoid any 'artificial' post-processing. The piece is performed by Susan Stenger and Robert Poss who take up a stereo channel each, sounding a chord of three semi-tone intervals in various combinations over a variety of different octaves. As you'd imagine, it's the intensity of the microtones and subtly fluctuating harmonics that gives the composition shape, and it's really something that demands devoted listening to yield the best results. Over on the second CD, the twenty-three minute cello and sine wave piece 'Poure' is first up, capturing thirty-two layers of organic, sustaining tones. There's a fairly subtle dissonance to the composition, which takes its roots in the notes A and D but preserves an atonal quality via Niblock's layered, minuscule deviations from perfect pitch. The remainder of the second disc is taken up by the five-part 'One Large Rose', arguably the most remarkable of the three works compiled here. This is a forty-six minute orchestral piece recorded with the Nelly Boyd Ensemble in real time. It took four uninterrupted takes to get the desired result, but the version that made it to the final release sounds absolutely magisterial, manifesting itself in a powerfully physical way through the speakers, smashing the most clangourously incompatible micro-intervals together. Immensely powerful stuff that makes most drone records sound like kids' stuff. Highly recommended.