Ezekiel Honig – Folding in on itself 7.8

                “Folding in on itself” is a warm record in multiple ways. Ezekiel uses gentle, slow-moving melodies alongside field recordings. While I was listening to it, I thought of some of my favorite artists on the 12K record label, particularly Shuttle 358. It is that smooth. The field recordings merge so well with the melodies; it is as if the two were created simultaneously. 

                Things move slowly. One of the hallmarks of the record is Ezekiel’s patience. Having such a slow-paced album allows you to focus on the small details, such as the rhythm or small beats. For the first song, he avoids beats altogether, allowing only a wavering drone. 

                Ezekiel’s melodies are often melancholy. They remind me a bit of Terre Thaemlitz’s early work (particularly Soil), which combined these elegant sounds with a modern-day sonic neurosis. Folding in on itself doesn’t have the same darkness of that album, but it does have a similar bleakness. 

                My personal favorite on the album is “Ancestry Revisiting Each Other”. On this track the field recordings take over. The composer tries to invade the sounds of the city, hesitating at times. Personally, the conflict between these two different sources made this track one of the most interesting ones. 

                I like the intense focus on the quiet. Even when beats are introduced, they are so slight that you have to put up the volume to notice. This is a perfect album for a quiet rainy day.

Giuseppe Ielasi – Aix 8.4

Giuseppe Ielasi had dealt with drones up until this point. Most of them he showed a particular knack for, not just being engaged in the technical details of it, but the emotional core. With Aix, he continues down this road. 

Born in France, the album comes across as a more random version of Jan Jelinek’s “Loop-Finding Jazz Records”. Unlike Jan’s work, this isn’t as smooth. Noises of zips, aerosol cans, pieces of piano, cut up drones, and whatever else he could get his hands onto are thrown into the mix. Despite this apparently odds and ends collection of sounds, it comes across as a spry little album.

Looking at the album cover, you get a sense of what is in store for you. The bright colors and patterns should prepare you for the music. It is playful, fun, and even includes rubber bands. A rhythm does exist through most of these tracks, though it may be a bit more syncopated than expected for electronic music.

None of the tracks are titled. All are anonymous but each one has its own distinct texture. The opener is great, offering the barest of ingredients; it presents its soul out flatly to the listener. Other songs use even quieter songs to get the point across, it helps to have quiet surroundings and good headphones for this stuff, like for most 12K stuff. Track 8 in particular is beautiful, including a harp, guitar, and horns from far away.

I enjoyed this. This proves how academic exercises can bear fruit emotionally. Even though the sources are vast, there’s not Matmos-like showing off at any point. Rather than having the sounds as gimmicks, they are pieces of the whole.

Pjusk – Sval 5.4

12k has yet to release a distasteful album. Usually their groups are exercises in restraint, with the focus being on how they can forge new paths in the quiet and subdued.

Following in this sort of template is Pjusk, who employ a minimal dub aesthetic for all of these songs. Monolake has already worked in this sort of sound, and with a bit more energy. Yes, the ambiance is tasteful, yes the sounds are well-picked, but it feels very derivative.

Most of the sounds you hear on the first track are the same you’ll hear throughout the entire album. Plus, there’s little to indicate when the last track ended and the new one began. At some point this transforms into images of Europeans hunched over laptops barely making any motions and refusing anything to us.

This music feels starved. On one hand, it isn’t an intense enough exploration of sound to justify its minimalism (like Stars of the Lid) and on the other hand its failure to have a groove or melody that would make this more palpable (like Monolake) means that the album really drags on. “Skodde” and “Valldal” do a pretty good job of mixing field recordings, ambiance, and brief melodies. However, the rest of it comes together as a gray mass.