Got a couple of releases from Hazi Esporak!, a new small label in Bilbao run by Enrike Hurtado. Both sent 22 May 2023. “Help support the Basque experimental scene,” exhorts he. One of these CDRs is by Miguel A. García, long-standing fave in these pages, very prolific solo and collaborative fellow often associated with very unique brand of intense, inward-looking noises…on this double-CD set Oppolumi (01.23) it looks as though he’s reworking tracks provided by 17 artistes I never heard of but likely to be Basque given their names, and they originally came out on Crystal Mine, Grisaille, and Vacancy Recs (today’s record seems to compile them). This all took place during lockdown in 2020, or as it’s called here “confinement” – a most apt choice of word – for Koldo Ansoleaga’s Audiat project.
Well, so much for the background context. Wish I’d enjoyed this one a bit more, finding most of these escapades quite pointless and inconclusive, as they just hang around in the parlour like a dead piece of cheese. Somewhere lacking is García’s usual force and intensity. Settling for vague aura of menace, when what we all want is to feel that our very bones are in danger of imminent heat death from his remorseless glare. It’s good to be exposed to this long list o’ new names, but curious how samey their contributions all end up in this particular boiling-down operation. Second disc just edges out the first, but only because the tracks are longer and so crowd aside your psychological blocks in favour of the long-form greyness. Cumulative effect of this two-discer is pretty depressing – maybe that was the point, conveying something about the boredom, loneliness, and futility of that “confinement”.
Gettin’ a little more juice for my jugs from Hardcore Punk Dissasters (00.23) realised by Enrike Hurtado himself, but we’re out of time…tune in next post for a review of that item.