Whalt Thisney / The Phlod-Nar / el_masmore / Claus Poulsen
THING
GERMANY ATTENUATION CIRCUIT ACUD 1006 (2024)
Actually “thing” turns out to refer to a place of assembly much like a parliament, or on a smaller scale a town square, where views can be freely exchanged without risk of verbal cancer or ostracising treatments. Some also call it a council meeting or use that charming archaic word “folkmoot”. You’ll find the word in old Norse, Icelandic and Germanic languages. This is to allay suspicions that this CD is a soundtrack for the John Carpenter movie, or like-minded horror-mood music and atmospheres. Rather it is the label’s way of attempting to present a set in a way that’s less banal than calling it a compilation, split release, or various-artists survey.
Whalt Thisney turns out to be Fernando Cerqueira from Lisbon, who sometimes uses typographical tricks to call attention to his unusual name; may have been making ambient albums since 2014; here today with ‘Dreams are the Seedlings of Realities’. Distorted tones and hazy piano recorded in such a way as to suggest nostalgia, a fantasy world, or a land of benign visions; rich sound; and at least it’s underpinned by a slow rhythmical figure and not simply a drab violet drone. This may be what prompts the press release to hint that it’s “walking” music, and by verbal sleight of hand lead us to a wholly unearned comparison with the greatness of Erik Satie.
Another solo act is The Phlod-Nar from The Netherlands, may be in Belgium just now, real name Randolf Smeets. I think Smeets has sent us some solo releases for consideration at a future date. Phlod-Nar’s catalogue might not be so large, but he is ambitious; blending genres and styles; mixing composition with improvisation; unafraid to put field recordings alongside other layers of non-natural sound. This may make him appear more interesting than he is here with ‘nadie se conoce’, a forgettable piano piece whose textures have been lightly processed and presented alongside wistful burrs, buzzes, backwards tapes and such. There is subtlety and good taste in the overall sound he makes, but the piano playing is very ordinary, never straying from its very simple harmonic parameters.
I’m in a slightly more enjoyable shell for my crab-like form with ‘Illuminated’ by el_masmore, another solo guy Jesús Alfaro from Spain. Large number of file-based releases he has made since 2022; he works with guitars as well as his Korg synths and other analogue keyboards. In his allotted 13:42 mins, he does create the impression of lots of movement, action, and constant change in his tiny pixillated shards of alien-sounding tones, his clusters of processed information emerging from the diamond mines at tremendous speed. But his musical logic is very hard to follow; no root note, no map of the terrain which he intends to stake out for his next excavation of rare minerals. I end up coated with crystals and dust, but for no good reason.
Claus Poulsen is the very able Danish fellow who has been represented on this label before, on Inner Space / Outer Space performing as one half of Star Turbine with Sindre Bjerga. That 2013 grape from the bunch was, I recall, packed with juicy events and a real sense of hands-on discovery in real time. Here, his solo piece ‘Vertical Horizon’ might not be quite as urgent, but there’s a slightly obsessive manner to the way he wrestles with his twisted, snake-like forms that I do enjoy. If he was a plumber by trade, he might twist his taps and spigots with the same restless curiosity, determined to get hot water flowing even from the emptiest of tanks
To return to the “parliament” theme of THING, I fail to see how four soloists (all of them men, I might add) are creating much of a productive dialogue or conversation on this release, but apparently that’s not the point; the idea is that the four artistes will use this record as part of their “networking” strategy, passing it on to their fan base or the audiences at their gigs, thus spreading spores a little further across the meadow. One name will help to sell another. The label are thus hoping for a “virtual” meeting, or THING, which kind of fits these days of online meetings and live podcasts taking the place of real gigs. (18/03/2024)