Minimalist post-jazz improvisations, medieval-electronic chants, dystopian loops, and drone masses. Every week, I recommend the four most interesting music premieres. From now on, in an extended version.
A few years ago, I started with weekly lists. At a certain point, I decided to focus on quality rather than quantity. Since last year, I have been following album releases, and every week, I choose four (sometimes more) noteworthy ones. I made blurbs to pass it on to others. Sometimes, it works, and sometimes, I get feedback.
I have just finished reading the book ‘Mood Machine. The Rise of Spotify and the Costs of the Perfect Playlist’ by Liz Pelly, which is terrifying in many places when it turns out that the largest streaming service is a bit like Muzak to kill the silence in an Orwellian style of subliminal messages that Winston Smith fights against. What counts is quantity, not quality, playing the bagpipes, not discovering new, often niche music.
Hence, the idea is for the Fantastic Four to adopt a slightly more elaborate formula, which I hope to maintain at weekly intervals. These are often albums that I won’t write about anywhere else, that I won’t have time to pitch, but also a different approach to the review section, which is where I started on this website. Let’s hurry up and listen to the albums, they come out so quickly. And they’re fantastic!
Gregory Uhlmann, Josh Johnson, Sam Wilkes
Uhlmann Johnson Wilkes
(International Anthem)
The reissue of Makaya McCraven’s ‘In the Moment’ has just been announced – thanks to this album my adventure with International Anthem began. But the Chicago label is having a great week – last Friday, the new Alabaster DePlume album was released (he doesn’t release bad albums!), and now comes the extraordinary release of the Gregory Uhlmann, Josh Johnson, Sam Wilkes trinity. There is no need to elaborate on their extensive achievements; this unique album, resulting from a spontaneous session, is about delicate and light compositions. It is minimalist music that trembles under the surface, in which the slightly perceptible bass line, sometimes of the distorted saxophone or electric guitar, changes the tone of the whole piece. Music that smolders endures, post-jazz intertwines with ambient patches and, at the same time, delights with the alertness of these experienced artists who do not play ecstatically but listen to each other and create a remarkably lyrical story.
Sopraterra
Seven Dances To Embrace The Hollow
(Präsens Editionen)
Magda Drozd and Nicola Genovese met in Zurich to create a surreal, quasi-electronic, quasi-medieval story. They join the afterimages of quasi-electronic music, Colin Stetson-style saxophone pulsations; they also remind me a little of Andrzej Korzyński’s achievements on the album ‘The Devil’ and a bit like the alternative soundtrack to Bergman’s ‘The Seventh Seal’. Their album sounds like an unobvious ritual, which, on the one hand, gives the impression of an unearthed artifact, and on the other hand, is characterized by a contemporary sound, sounds a bit baroque, a bit like contemporary electronic experiments, has something of the juxtaposition of Wojciech Rusin and Svitlana Nianio. It has ambient delicacy and drone-like darkness; it is a bit like a para-theatrical radio play, where the compositions are embedded in a narrative skeleton, in which the collected instruments, details, shouts, and sound loops create a peculiar, bizarre dramaturgy.
Golem Mecanique
Siamo tutti in pericolo
(Ideologic Organ)
Karen Jebane, who works as Golem Mecanique, is part of the French scene, which brilliantly refreshes tradition or creates lush, contemporary pieces based on it. She makes her contemporary folk on a ‘drone box’ (a mechanized hurdy-gurdy) and zither, and the title loosely refers to the last words of an interview with Pier Paolo Pasolini. These are the songs of mourning and sadness, endless drone compositions with a sometimes slightly black-metal flavor (in terms of texture and color, not aesthetic). Working at the intersection of microtonality and sacred sound, into which she weaves her singing, she creates contemplative, sacred pieces that seem endless but resonate stunningly. Minimalist and poetic, yet in their way overwhelming, hymns, meditations, and rituals are a starting point for dealing with the mysterious passing of an outstanding director. Music of reflection, a dark and experimental mass, processing the passing away with sound and music.
Dania and Rosso Polare
Keep Smoking Swamp
(Parallaxe Editions)
I’ve been following Dania since her incredible album “Voz”, where she combined her multilayered vocals with electronic music. This time, she joined forces with the Italian duo Rosso Polare, who emerged with expanding releases. They have known each other for a long time, and their joint material results from improvised sessions, with an often dark, frightening mood in an incredibly dystopian setting. It combines looped, pulsating forms, field recording, bass lines in the background, or delicately constructed sound forms made of various samples and micro-sounds. Surrealist music is inspired by the anti-colonial works of the poet Aimé Césaire, which is referenced in the title, but also in the hazy, abstract-sounding lyrics and vocals. They are hypnotizing but also evanescent, sounding ephemeral, even though the compositions are emotionally poignant in their content, carrying an underlying, nuanced music.
Planning a new record? Feel free to send me a promo: booking [at] noweidzieodmorza.com
