writings from vital weekly #1290, misspelling my label Nekorekords haha
i appreciate FdW actually listening
http://vitalweekly.net/1290.html----
SM/DP - COMPLEX FEEDBACK FACTORS (CD by Neko Records)
SM/DP - PLASMASYNTHESIS (LP by Huge Bass)
CURTIS ROADS/TODD BARTON (CD by Neko Records)
Tow new releases from the Finnish duo SM/DP, which stands for Marko Surosa and Penti Dassum, of whom I reviewed a work quite some time ago (Vital Weekly 1123). They call their music 'electronic contamination music', but you could also say this is computer music. The LP is from last winter, and the CD was just released. There are overlaps as well as differences. They use a wide range of computer tools, GRM tools, Hourglass, Reaktor, Soundgrain (no doubt also other stuff) and in their approach, they connect with the world of 'serious' composing. However, I would think that in the approaches of SM/DP there is room for freedom of choice, not bound by any laws of composition. This duo might just as easily tap into the rich field of live electronics and work according to principles of improvised music. The differences between the CD and the LP are mainly in the length of the various pieces; the LP has four longer ones, whereas the eight on the CD are throughout a bit (but not much) shorter. Another difference is that on the CD there seems to be more processing of acoustic sounds in a sort of musique concrete-kind of fashion, whereas on the LP these sounds are spun out and have an ambient feeling. However, all of these differences are quite small. Much of these two releases reminded me of the early laptop music movement, with live sampling and cracked INA-GRM tools; the sort of thing that made Mego big, Fennesz, Tu'm and many others in that slipstream. In the hands of SM/DP it all returns, now a bit darker but essentially along similar lines. A mash-up of old school musique concrete and do it yourself laptop technology. It was bound to return one day. I think it's great to hear again.
Penti Dassum is also the man behind Neko Records, who re-issued a 2016 cassette by Curtis Roads. and Todd Barton, two composers of electronic music, and as such established names in their field, although I admit I know more of Roads than of Barton, and I am not sure I heard a lot of music by either. Roads is a man for much of the software used by the likes of SM/DP, but here he returns to the world of analogue technology; function generators and a tape recorder with variable speed control. Talking about some ancient methods. It all deals with the output going back into the input, resulting in a lovely mixed up pattern of feedback sounds and a pleasant excursion in a somewhat rough noisy field. Todd Barton has three pieces here, using the Buchla 200e Electric Music Box and the Buchla Music Easel; in one piece he uses sounds from Curtis Roads piece. Barton is not really a noise musician in these pieces, and rather goes for some gentle sonic treatments of modulated tones, especially on 'Intersections' and 'Evolvings', already very classic sounding titles, at least in the world of modern electronic music, and these sound from the very same world. Lovely stuff. In 'Three Bursts', Barton with the sound material from Roads and does that in less gently than in the other two pieces, but with some fine elegance all the same, and make a fine tribute to the original. An excellent trio of new music releases. (FdW)
––– Address:
https://www.umpio.com/nekorekords/––– Address:
https://smdp.bandcamp.com/album/plasmasynthesis
