“Up, Down, Charm, Strange, Top, Bottom” reviewed by The Wire

A quite brilliant offering from @c, who are Crónica label bosses Pedro Tudela and Miguel Carvalhais, with third member Lia contributing live visuals and sleeve art. The music here is by turns witty, dark and ravishing, with acoustic instrumentation, particularly percussion, woven into the dense digital fabric of the sound with great flair and precision. …

“Up, Down, Charm, Strange, Top, Bottom” reviewed by Comunicazione Interna

Settimo disco firmato @c, duo elettro-acustico portoghese composto da Miguel Carvalhais e Pedro Tudela qui all’opera su una serie di file-recordings registrati tra il 2002 e il 2007 in giro per l’Europa, catturando performances musicali da Porto a Glasgow, da Lilla ad Helsinki, da Lisbona a Vienna, da Londra a Monaco di Baviera. Materiale questo …

“Up, Down, Charm, Strange, Top, Bottom” reviewed by Textura

@c’s Up, Down, Charm, Strange, Top, Bottom declares its unique character even before a single note is heard. There’s the unusual group name, for starters, and then there’s the album’s four tracks, two of which are under two minutes, and the others twenty and forty. Assembled using studio, live and field recordings, Up, Down, Charm, …

“Musicamorosa” reviewed by Cyclic Defrost

For this release, Jorge Mantas acts as an esthetician and a sound designer more than a composer or artist. The thematic concept around which this album orbits is one drawn from the French literary tradition, that of love lived through sadness. In particular, author Marcel Proust serves as a muse for the romantically inclined Mantas, …

“Täuschung” reviewed by Music Club

Il compositore austriaco Davor Mikan realizza con questo “Tauschung” un concept esteso sulla memoria e sul ricordo, compilando trentuno microtracce elettroacustiche dove a prendere il sopravvento è la dimensione noise del suono. La suddivisione in titoli è onestamente arbitraria: tutti i pezzi – composti e rielaborati nel corso degli ultimi quattro anni – sono minimi …

“Täuschung” reviewed by Bad Alchemy

Mikan lebt und arbeitet in Wien, kommt aber wie aus dem Nichts. Sein Debut (?) komprimiert 31 Miniaturen auf 37 Minuten, noisiges, teils schroffes, manchmal aber nicht unwitziges Gekritzel, meist offenbar algorithmisch, teilweise auch von Hand generiert mit “generative graphic-tools togehter with granular synthesis”, was auch immer das heißen mag. Es hört sich stellenweise wie …

“Täuschung” reviewed by Loop

This is the obtuse and abstract music of Viennese artist Davor Mikan who makes his debut on Portuguese’s Crónica Electronica label always pushing the boundaries of experimental electronic music. ‘Täuschung’ comprised 31 short tracks that collect sketched ideas of microscopic and sharp digital sounds. The music forms the most unpredictable shapes and mathematics angles. This …

“Up, Down, Charm, Strange, Top, Bottom” reviewed by The Sound Projector

Candidate for ‘puzzler of the week’ is a curious recording by Miguel Carvalhais and Pedro Tudela, here trading under the name of @c. Their Up, Down, Charm, Strange, Top, Bottom (CRÓNICA 031) takes the practice of sampling into a strange and hermetic dimension. About 11 musicians were recorded over a five year period, only to …

“Up, Down, Charm, Strange, Top, Bottom” reviewed by France Musique, Tapage Nocturne

C’est sous le pseudonyme d’@c que les portugais Miguel Carvalhais et Pedro Tudela viennent d’éditer leur 7ème album et leur troisième collaboration au catalogue du label Crónica basé à Porto. Miguel Carvalhais et Pedro Tudela sont des compositeurs chevronnés de musique concrète, ils utilisent des prises de sons réalisées en studio, sur scène ou en extérieur …

“Up, Down, Charm, Strange, Top, Bottom” reviewed by Loop

This is the seventh instalment – and the third for Crónica – of Porto based duo Pedro Tudela and Miguel Carvalhais. This CD took to Miguel and Pedro two years of production and comprised five years of live, studio and field recordings, work inspired from several artists that in this album found their contributions by …