Name I have known for ages. I suppose I have had stuff of Vertonen in my distribution (and in my shelves) since late 90's. However, for a lot of Finns, myself included, the name of project is quite... odd. It reminds of fairly typican finnish last name, but slightly mis-spelled, hah. There are handful of artists, who I am aware are doing good stuff, but just somehow the name of project makes sure it is very rarely when thought to consciously dig up that particular artist from shelves, is rare.
Now, after pretty intense episode in latest Noisextra, where mr. Vertonen talks so much and so fast, and so passionately about someone elses work (Z'ev) that it made me confident his own works must rule.
I got this theory, which seems often to be accurate. It may not be valid for all the "fanboys"/copycats, but artists, who are very passionate about other peoples works, seem to create great stuff. Later on when they conclude they are no longer interested, works they create seem to be pretty lame. I could obviously name names, but I'm quite sure that people can watch this type of correlation of some of the legendary cult noise names, who used to run labels, curate compilations, work with other noise artists, be passionate about listening other peoples works - and their own material was at its best. Later days when all signs indicating passionate interests have disappeared, one can basically see pretty lame down spiraling career artist churning out utterly lazy stuff. Seemingly having lost all sense of what is actually good and what is not. Almost as if "easy to make" is dominating factor.
Not sure how it works in measurable terms, but my assumption is, that when you keep hearing inspiring works, not only it feeds certain energy, but you know the level of stuff out there. Bunch of lazy crap you manage to make just ain't good enough, when having both awareness and lust to both make and hear. Also it would feel almost embarressing to go on stage playing shitty uninspiring gig, if you have sense of what actually good artists are doing.
From this Noisextra episode with Blake Edwards a.k.a. Vertonen, you could hear the fanaticism and appreciation for sound other people make - and perhaps needless to say, it seems to correlate with his own works being good as well! Vertonen doesn't have massive output of pressed CD and this VERTONEN "The ocean is gone, the ship is next" CD (Ground fault) is almost 20 years old stuff. Done roughly on era when he was re-issuing that Z'ev. Very often simple gear, very direct and raw sounds, yet not in form of harsh noise. My favorite is probably the opening piece, with air-organ and turnable motor.
If you do not have that CD, Ground fault recordings has bandcamp here:
https://groundfault.bandcamp.com/album/the-ocean-is-gone-the-ship-is-nextFor noisextra interview dealing with Z'ev, Vertonen, his label activities etc here:
https://www.noisextra.com/2021/04/07/zev-an-uns-momento-with-blake-edwards/Shorter text interview, which is not that informative, but exists nevertheless:
https://nopartofit.blogspot.com/2020/07/interview-series-17-blake-edwards.htmlIn that you find:
How would you describe your creative progression over the years, in a brief synopsis?
-Most recently I've been interested in extracting as much possibility as possible out of outdated or damaged equipment.
Some years back, into 2014, you'll find good live example of using turntable looping, mechanical, somewhat damaged sounding slowly moving noise. Again, not harsh noise but perhaps in the tradition of early NON, GUM, AMK, etc...
https://vimeo.com/90646840
