Portugal’s Crónica once again must be acknowledged for keeping to task, and truly offering work that is challenging in the busted world of electronic music. Freiband (Frans de Waard) and Boca Raton (Martijn Tellinga) team up to release their split live recording from 04’s Earational Festival (the Netherlands). The jittery “Temptations” sways with a ridged and weighed crackle, something of a rocking ship on stormy seas complete with outdated floorboards. As the low rumble of droney hum beckons quietly into the distance a warning tone glides resonantly like a constant reminder, an alarm call. Throughout de Waard uses a low-grade vinyl hiss to play on the artist’s hand in the work, an organic earthy reminder that we all grew from an analogue world that was far less Technicolor just a few years ago. “Heaters” builds this up into a field of braided friction, as it warms up the room, literally. As the chugging motor of Boca Raton’s “Crop” (circles) begins there’s a bit of space, a breath, and some sense that activity like watching, searching and scraping is taking place. It’s an active piece that also blends lovely, yet sheer Asian tonalities that just glisten. It sounds like Tellinga has incorporated field recordings of blunt force winds, adding a natural percussive element here. As these circles evolve he adds tension with tiny gestural pieces that are a bit fidgety, and uncoordinated. These circles build like a forceful gas and wind down to a soft scratch like a rake on hardened, smooth surface. The sweet chirping of an arboretum bodes well for the sonic tones that just let go into the wilderness. It’s quite rapturous how he did that. 4 1/2
TJ Norris