On Paper is perhaps the most strange, uncommercial, unfathomable and difficult releases around. Yet I say that with a strange sense of awe. The concept of mixing and remixing the sounds of paper being ripped, those great big thick, almost cardboard gig posters you see around town, or you would if you lived in Berlin, is unmistakably weird. Stranger still is that this is a double disc set filled with numerous souls who have lined up for the challenge. And there’s even some known names such as Sebastian Meissner (Random Inc/Autoposies) and Ran Slavin who team up under the name b.Z_ToneR for a couple of incredibly minimal and tense electronic pieces flirting in that quiet and gentle way with dangerous frequencies that in the wrong hands could be potentially head splitting, yet in theirs are almost pop. There’s also German artist Stephan Mathieu, a master at dragging out the unseen/ unheard frequencies trapped beneath the recordings. Mathieu’s contribution surprisingly is a spooky drone, half feedback, half organ, a dreamy narcotic that seems to have little to do with the paper preamble, which only leads to more confusion. Many of the tracks feature much scratching, banging crashing and yes of course ripping, but little in the way of melody, rhythm, or repetition, in short there are very few handles. Yet it’s in these strange bleak environments where the unexpected can grow, such as the fragile warm industrial drone of Pal or Pure’s All This Paperwork, which begins abstract and difficult yet develops a soothing electric ambience that is simultaneous painful calming before erupting into a strange mechanical drone. Again what this has to do with paper is totally beyond me, yet given this disc boasts some of the strangest music I’ve encountered I’m willing to sit tight and forgive any thematic inconsistencies.
Bob Baker Fish