“A Compressed History of Everything Ever Recorded, vol.2: Ubiquitous Eternal Live” reviewed by Vital

Just like the first volume, I really like the title of this work. In this first volume Autodigest delt the compression of music, the new volume is about ‘all the audiences ever recorded and has them share one hour of hysterical, progressively apocalyptic applause’. And that’s what you get: people clapping their hands, cheering, shouting. On end. It’s probably an extensive loop being repeated. Or maybe not.

Yes, this is minimal music indeed. If ‘music’ is a term to be applied to this. Is it good? I don’t know. Is it bad? I don’t know that either. Do I like it? I don’t know. It’s certainly a CD to impress your friends with, if you want to show off some of the weirdness of your record collection. The weirdest thing I have come across in 2004 for sure.

FdW

“Two Novels: Gaze / In the Cochlea” reviewed by Repellent Zine

I wonder just how angry Mr. Eric Satie (the turn of the century composer) would be if he were allowed to live and see what has become of his legacy.

Mr. Satie, well perhaps, was first and perhaps foremost in asking for and then making music like…err…as furniture to fill a place and make it for living. And then he was gone and more people, maybe, read about it in a magazine and then made music for rooms or music in rooms to make a room. And there are many many less known than Mr. Satie, so, perhaps, he may not even have known … even given the fantastic chance to see.

O. Blaat makes rooms of music by making music of a room. This is how I read once when I read about her once, in a magazine. Before and since that article she has made abstract rooms of sound by recording the little taps and crinkles of coat check halls, tables and chairs, and feet in a museum, and then arranging them in a computer, and then amplifying the arrangement to make the room all over again.

This is her first real record and it comes in two parts. Part one, Gaze, is comprised of duets and collaborations with others, including Kaffe Matthews, DJ Olive, Iku Mori, who may have tickled or tortured old Mr. Satie. These pieces are big worlds made up of little sounds taken from the big world, and are as fascinating when they are all one hears as when allowed to stand up like little tables and chairs. The pieces are composed with a deft ear tuned by emotional need and crafted by skilled hands focused on function and form.

In the cochlea, part two, was made at home but was meant for no space at all. These pieces exist as hallucinations but are very real stimulations of the deep insides of the ears. These are rare meditations for a contracted space when experience allows a grand expansion of sensation. The deep bass solidifies the body, limiting the universe to corporeal boundaries and shifting perspective from a speck in the eye of grandness to grandness looking down at the speck.

This recording is a thrill for those still walking the world, but how will the dead feel about it?

Frankly, they’re quite dead.

BB

“Two Novels: Gaze / In the Cochlea” reviewed by Downtown Music Gallery

O. Blaat is our old friend Keiko Uenishi, former tap dancer and early member of the downtown scene. She has been booking an unusual international cast of electronic(a), DJ’s and sonic manipulators for the Sub-Tonic Lounge weekly for a few years, as well as helping organize electronic(a) festivals upstairs at Tonic on occasion. Besides all that, she performs her own version of electronic music under the mysterious name, o. blaat. This is her first solo offering, where she works with a few other sonic wizards: Kaffe Matthews, (former DJ) Toshio Kajiwara, DJ Olive, Ikue Mori, Aki Onda, Eyvind Kang and Akio Mokuna. Christian Marclay once recorded Keiko’s tapping for his record “Footsteps” and has written some choice liner notes. The first half of this cd is called “Gaze” and her duo with Kaffe Matthews is first. Intense, crackling static, radio frequency transmissions, strong and well defined, refined, confined, yet fascinating, The duo with Toshio (sampler) is filled with streams of glitches, warped samples, electronic chirps and squeaks, short but sweet. The duos with DJ Olive slow things down to a more minimal, snail-paced detour, yet retain some more introspective consideration. “Hanging Sky” is a superb duo with Ikue Mori and Keiko, a mature, evocative, careful and exquisitely well-constructed. The duos with Eyvind Kang (monster violinist with a psychedelic soul, currently with Secret Chiefs III) start out softly yet soon expose eerie feedback drones. The second half of “Two Novels” is called “In the Cochlea” and it is an o. blaat solo work. A highly detailed piece in ten parts that unfolds like a story, one scene at a time, neatly magnified if you take the time to observe and let it happen. Very tasty, spicy little tales, quiet yet intense.

“Two Novels: Gaze / In the Cochlea” reviewed by Liability

O.Blaat c’est qui, c’est quoi? O.Blaat c’est tout simplement Keiko Uenishi, artiste basée à New York et qui est surtout connu pour ses créations sonores interactives qui ont fait le bonheur de bien des salles et d’évènements artistiques. Ainsi on l’a vu se produire à travers les Etats Unis et l’Europe (Allemagne, Autriche et France). O.Blaat a également multiplié les collaborations avec une foule de musiciens parmi lesquels on trouve Zeena Parkins, Ikue Mori, DJ Olive, Günter Müller, Kaffe Matthews ou Anthony Coleman. D’ailleurs ces nombreuses expériences musicales ont sans doute facilité la venue de nombreux guests sur cet album. Ce dernier d’ailleurs est la combinaison de deux œuvres distinctes mais qui ici semble se compléter à merveille. Bien évidemment, puisque éditée par Cronica, O.Blaat produit une musique électronique expérimentale saisissante et minimale comme il se doit. Le fait que K.Uenishi se soit engouffrée dans une voie minimale ne veut pas dire que ce disque soit monolithique. Bien au contraire. Les variations y sont ici nombreuses et les univers sonores sans cesse changeants. Ainsi O.Blaat ne reste jamais sur la même ligne, offrant des pistes multiples et sans cesse renouvelées.

Ce disque est également un disque étouffant, oppressant, qui semble plonger dans des eaux troubles pour ne pas dire opaques. Sombre paraît bien être le maître mot de la ligne artistique adoptée par la musicienne. « Two Novels : Gaze / In The Colchea » cherche toujours la profondeur des formes et des sons. Et c’est aussi en cela que ce disque est fascinant. Chaque morceau est une véritable exploration qui vous incite à la plus grande des attentions. O.Blaat nous offre donc un album glacial mais qui s’ouvre sur des espaces différents, qui attise votre curiosité et qui est souvent proche de la mouvance acousmatique. Musique cérébrale à tous points de vues certes mais elle arrive à nous toucher en se voulant également introspective. Entre bruitisme, chuchotements et architecture sonore, O.Blaat sort un premier album – ce qui paraît un petit peu surprenant au vu de toutes ses collaborations passées – des plus envoûtants et qui mérite qu’on se penche dessus. Amateurs de musiques contemporaines ou post-modernes vous savez ce qu’il vous reste à faire.

Fabien

“v3” reviewed by Touching Extremes

Sometimes it happens: from ruthless music generators a pulsating living organism comes to manifest itself, leaving questions and doubts behind, letting people have a glance to an uncertain definition of future without panic – instead confirming one’s will to go over the easy paybacks of “educated” instrumental voices. Seaming together three different live exhibitions, @C and visual artist Lia plus selected friends (Manuel Mota, Joao Hora, Vitor Joaquim and Andy Gangadeen) created a multiform quilt of discarded sonic remains in a self-blocking totality of intelligent noisemaking. Rising from subliminal lows, metal beats, looping steams and repaired electronics flow right into a multitude of impartial spectrographies, revealing new intersections and evidences that appear under constant monitoring by the artists. All the way through, the basic pulse returns to let us remember we’re still talking about life: our body reaction to this mixture speaks for itself.

Massimo Ricci

“v3” reviewed by Bodyspace

O resultado fala por si mesmo: v3 é a intersecção de múltiplas linhas, o local puro de confluência de várias estéticas naquilo que é a procura de Pedro Tudela e Miguel Carvalhais de alcançar a perfeita combinação de vários componentes. Os primeiros dois temas flutuam por entre camadas mais ambientais, imprevisíveis estrépitos e bulícios, texturas sombrias de uma guitarra que produzem molduras denodadas, breves estalidos e um quase murmurar que rasga o tegumento externo que envolve o corpo. A partir daqui, assiste-se a um desenrolar de faixas que exploram a fragmentação de elementos, um percurso onde se restituem as batidas (cardíacas) a um território plano onde se juntam samples, naquilo que é a edificação de horizontes cerrados, planícies carregadas de uma obscuridade assumida e consciente. Aqui, caminha-se e sobrevive-se num limbo entre a reminiscência e a omissão, entre a purificação e a escuridão.

A complexidade das composições resulta de um experimentalismo, de uma composição em tempo real e, acima de tudo, da reunião das sonoridades extraídas dos laptops e das guitarras. As incursões rítmicas, que se fazem sentir especialmente a meio do disco, impelem para um movimento de dilatação e contracção, irregularidade da pulsação, pré-arritmia. O latejo rítmico é secundado por tramas tecidas à luz do improviso, pelo natural discorrer de ambiências soturnas. O mutismo e o desabitado são interrompidos por erupções e por porções ruidosas que emergem do fundo de um enredo digital, fornecendo a estas contexturas a quantidade suficiente de inquietação para que as entranhas sejam remexidas. No fim, todas estas estéticas sonoras complementam-se de forma lógica fazendo de v3 um coerente seguimento do caminho traçado em Hard Disk, o anterior trabalho de Pedro Tudela e Miguel Carvalhais.

André Gomes

“v3” reviewed by Radio Italia Network

“V3” è il terzo album di @C che si focalizza, ancora, su uno stile assai sofisticato mai preso in seria considerazione qui in Italia se non da etichette underground quali Betulla, Idroscalo e, talvolta, Final Frontier.

‘Ambient’ è la password d’accesso per @C, il musicista portoghese che raccoglie in “V3” tre recenti performances tenute presso l’EME Festival (il 5 ottobre in Portogallo) l’Atlantic Waves Festival (il 27 novembre) e l’Ultrasound Festival (il 28 novembre), entrambi a Londra. Il sound si fa abstract, iper-minimale, capace di catturare le immagini del subconscio dell’ascoltatore tramutandole in pixel musicali dalle forme geometricamente perfette. Nove le tracce presenti, tutte prive di titoli per non indurre chi ascolta all’immaginazione di un oggetto predefinito (ricalcando le teorie dei suprematisti russi guidati da Kazimir Malevic che lasciavano le loro opere senza nome). Curata nei dettagli anche la confezione che include un booklet capace di mettere in evidenza l’intellettualismo che pervade ogni releases della Cronica.

Giosué Impellizzeri

“Two Novels: Gaze / In the Cochlea” reviewed by Etherreal

Keiko Uenishi, puisque c’est son nom, vit et travaille à New-York où elle crée des installations sonores et collabore avec la fine fleur des laptopeurs expérimentaux (Ikue Mori, Kaffe Matthews, etc…). Une asiatique vivant à New-York donc, et qui sort ici sont premier album sur le label Portugais Crónica. Pour couronner le tout, elle créé son site internet en Autriche, rien que pour s’amuser de l’extension “.at” puisque l’adresse de son site internet est http://obla.at. Vu la musique que celle-ci produit, que l’on pourrait rapprocher des Autrichiens de Mego, la supercherie est presque parfaite.

Comme le titre de l’album le laisse entendre, celui-ci est composé de 2 pièces, elles-mêmes divisées en 9 pistes. On distinguera logiquement celles-ci tant le ton et la forme diffèrent. Gaze est la pièce la plus facile d’accès, quoiqu’alternant expérimentations difficiles et flirts avec d’autres genres connus, plus faciles à appréhender donc. Mais sur Gaze, Keiko Uenishi n’est pas tout à fait seule puisque l’on y trouve de nombreuses collaborations avec Kaffe Matthews, DJ Olive, Aki Onda, ou encore Ikue Mori pour ne citer que les plus connus. Au fil des 36 minutes que dure cette pièce, on passe du coq à l’âne, et c’est cette alternance de styles qui contribue à une certaine richesse, et une impression de vie fourmillante, à l’image des deux premiers morceaux. On a régulièrement l’impression d’entendre des bruits d’animaux, piaillements, bruits de basse-cours, qui s’organisent petit à petit avec des bruitages électroniques ou notes acoustiques, évoquant tour à tour la musique concrète des années 70, une musique classique contemporaine avec des voix haut perchées, des cordes ou un piano lointain, ou encore de l’impro électro-acoustique minimale sur Froid qui clôture cette première partie plutôt enthousiasmante.

Fabrice Allard

“v3” reviewed by Liability

L’exercice de l’improvisation est certes périlleux mais peut se révéler très enthousiasmant. Force est de constater que @C s’en tire avec les honneurs. A la limite ce disque se trouve être plus accessible qu’il n’y paraît. L’impro à ce côté complexe qui rebute parfois mais ici cela reste assez ouvert malgré quelques morceaux assez expérimentaux. Certains titres se révèle même être assez « dansant ».

Quoiqu’il en soit « V3 » est un album intéressant à tout point de vue car il laisse libre court à presque toutes les fantaisies et ne reste pas cloisonné. Après des débuts un peu difficiles et froids avec les trois premiers morceaux (ce qui n’enlève en rien à leur réelle beauté) l’atmosphère se réchauffe avec l’enthousiasmant et très progressif « 21 ». Un techno minimale dont on avait presque oublié l’existence et qui nous fait rappeler la période « Kulma » de Pan(a)sonic ou même d’un Plastikman façon « Consumed ». Le reste étant un pur régal pour des oreilles délicates et à l’affût de sonorités élaborées. Alors bien sur ce n’est pas le genre qui feraient s’éclater une foule sur un dance floor mais on peut aisément tomber amoureux de ce disque aux qualités nombreuses.

Fabien

“v3” reviewed by Neural

La decima uscita dell’etichetta portoghese Crónica sembra chiudere una prima fase dell’eccellente percorso produttivo intrapreso. Fin dal primo Hard Disk, infatti, lo spirito di sperimentazione con i parametri del prodotto discografico è stato tenuto sempre vivo. Il lavoro di selezione della label, pur partendo da glitch e minimalismi, ha privilegiato la messa in discussione della composizione di default del prodotto discografico che ruota intorno ad un elenco di tracce, interagendo con ultrasuoni, combinando due autori (split) su un singolo compact e soprattutto trattando la parte visuale con il peso che le compete, sia da un punto di vista statico (designer ospiti per le grafiche), che da un punto di vista dinamico con video e tracce interagibili accluse. Una cura mantenuta intatta nel tempo che consacra questi lavori alla loro indiscutibile contemporaneità. Anche in questo ‘v3’ si avvertono importanti segni di transizione, in cui la presenza organica di voci e l’eco di frammenti della realtà s’insinua fra le presenze elettroniche. Un’alchimia composita, fatta di suite tutte collegate fra loro in un’unica fluida narrazione in cui le schegge di suoni digitali si mischiano indistintamente con campioni e registrazioni d’ambiente. Una tecnica che si riflette pure nella dualità delle illustrazioni del booklet, che integrano il tratto ad inchiosto illustrativo dei disegni con oggetti, citazioni e concetti dell’interazione uomo-macchina. Una scelta di commistione di linguaggi che testimonia una fondamentale ad andare oltre i dogmi di genere e a sporcarsi con suggestioni diverse. La traccia in Shockwave, infine, che consente di dosare visivamente, e di conseguenza in maniera sonora, le gradazioni di due diversi algoritmi, fa emergere limpidamente la sensibilità femminile di Lia, presente nella liquidità delle simmetrie e degli accostamenti cromatici.