Israel’s Ran Slavin is the subject of two pieces for his contributing Product. As his liner notes state, there is something of an “organic synthesis in an urban environment” to these pieces. The environment itself, perhaps of Slavin’s hometown of Tel-Aviv, struggles to be heard in the composition. This accords with his process, for he “included extra sounds to the tracks after being randomly exposed to their juxtaposition with sounds from the environment.” Although the multivalent directions never approach cacophony, they verge on catastrophe at every turn. This is not tension as linear climax but rather the continuous implosion of repetitive strata, and at times it is heartbreaking. Localized recordings of guitar or other simple elements find themselves in a world criss-crossed by unexplained events. This is electronic music made profoundly within and of the world, and calls for sustained listening while pacing the relation between the environment and music itself.
Tobias C. Van Veen