Um, didn't I want to write about BORIS, CLARA ENGEL, JASNOVIDEC, LEAGUS, PAM RISOURIÉ and THE OCEAN at some point?

Even though I can only check out a small percentage of the promo invitations I received with this one life I have, some stuff unfortunately still gets left behind on my to-do-list.

And since we're doing collective reviews right now anyway, here are a couple of promos and other digital releases I bought or snatched somewhere else, which definitely deserve their justice:





LEAGUS - Flora Eallin (2023)

And there's no album I have criminally neglected more than this Norwegian Contemporary Jazz masterpiece! Normally just a guitar / piano duo Leagus was recruited to write a piece for the ten-member North Norwegian Jazz Ensemble in 2021, and the result - besides several live appearances - was this amazing album, whose twelve tracks always sound fresh and modern, but somehow also take you through a historical journey, touching on all different kinds of experimental Free Jazz and Fusion.

Even the specific achievement of putting one of the most annoying parts of any music album of the year into one of the best songs surrounded by an hour-long cornucopia of beautiful stylistically boundless magic, is somehow respectable and ultimately works. Well, just listen to "Pripyat", have a little patience and I'm sure you'll know, what I'm talking about, haha!

All other various vocal and instrumental performances and arrangements really are flawless though. And between Ambient, Pop, intimate Smooth and large Big Band Jazz, Heavy Fusion and all kinds of delicate and wild experimentalism connecting and dividing those elements, "Flora Eallin" is a truly exciting journey you just don't want to miss!

Is It Jazz? the record label asks. The answer is yes, but also so much more!

BORIS - "Akuma No Uta" Anniversary single "Ibitsu" (2023)

Now let's obliterate our hearing for a small moment and enjoy Boris' re-recording of a little song from an album originally released twenty years ago. BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZT. Fuck yeah, Rock'nRoll! That was good. I'll continue writing once the veil of feedback tinnitus has lifted a little.

THE OCEAN - Holocene (Instrumental) (2023)

From Japan back to Europe, where Post Metal superpower The Ocean has released a new album. As always I didn't care much, because this band is undoubtly good on stage, but seldom has that it, which makes me want to listen to their studio work. Or maybe they have the other it, which holds me back from engaging, being the redundant sheer existence of vocals.

Luckily they kind of know of this themselves and always make their releases available as alternate purely instrumental versions. And suddenly this heavy atmospheric stuff is so damn extra-good! This music just works way better this way. Hell, I even enjoy the track with freaking Karin Park as guest singer much more... um... without her. Not her fault, obviously. Sometimes even the greatest vocalists are best if they just shut up. The song needs what it needs - and doesn't need what it doesn't.

Still not saying that regular "Holocene" is a bad record by any means, but "Holecene (Instrumental)" just feels like the real thing, the Director's Cut, the legit Post Rock album of the year contender.

PAM RISOURIÉ - Days Of Distortion (2023)

Definitely pro-vocals is my stance on the full-length debut of the French Shoegaze group Pam Risourié. Not that the falsetto voices here would be something super special or outstanding on their own. But they are just the right choice to accompany the breathy dreaminess of this rhythmically often quite upbeat Post Punk affair, which towards the end gradually grows into a more and more spacious and cosmic experience.

Distorted guitar music in an ethereal haze. Eruptive and beautiful.

JASNOVIDEC - Vzpom​í​nka Na Sv​ě​tlo / Fyziognomie Hyeny (2023)

The most abstract release of this bunch by far comes from Stoned To Death Records in the shape of this two-track EP (also available as limited 7") from Jasnovidec. Just like on the 2020 self-titled debut album you should expect buzzing, crackling, droning and random analogue synth and electronics with zero hooklines, yet a lot of atmosphere and a big experimental tag on it!

With that inner preparation you'll find this is quite listenable and enjoyable.

CLARA ENGEL - Sanguinaria (2023)
AVI C. ENGEL - Sanguinaria (2023)

Look, I waited so long that I missed the name change! But does it even retroactively apply to a release once it is already out there in the world? If you obtain just the digital version it could, right? I don't know, I better leave that question for someone else to contemplate about.

Avi doesn't sound radically different than on their last album "Their Invisible Hands", the delicate minimal DIY instrumentation of these ten Alternative Folk songs is just as interesting and compelling. But even tough we're basically staying on the same high level and Engel keeps the total running time at least a little briefer this time, there are just a couple of tracks I somehow cannot fully warm up to. Hard to say why, maybe some of the sparse melodies simply don't fully meet my taste.

That also the excellent tracks require the right mood to work, shouldn't come as a surprise, because this music is not only slow-paced and quiet, but also very close and personal in away that doesn't work twenty-four hours a day. And that's totally fine.

If you're new to this artist, I'd recommend to listen to earlier releases first, but fuck me, you won't do what I tell you, so feel free to start diving into Clara/Avi's "one long continuous song" wherever it suits you best!

cassette craze chronicles XXIV feat. CLARA ENGEL, CRAWL, HAUNTER and IVAN THE TOLERABLE

Oh boy! With this new bunch I've reached the point, where I should make a decision soon: Buy a second new rack for tapes or just spread my cassettes into every other niche and board in the room?

What did you say? Buy less cassettes? Come on, it's not that much of an addiction! And seriously, who could blame me for not resisting this noble bouquet of albums?

IVAN THE TOLERABLE - Black Water/Brown Earth (2023)

Musically totally unrelated the Ska/Polka/Rock party band Russkaja just called it quits, because they understandably couldn't stand performing with their happy Russian image in the face of the war against Ukraine. Of course I mention this, because the moniker Ivan The Tolerable surely strikes some extra attention in today's climate.
Luckily the music of prolific multi-instrumentalist Oli Hefernan moves within completely different parameters, which don't include any Russian puns or mannerisms, yet instead couldn't voice a more primal and timeless message of universal inner and outer peace. Nothing to feel uncomfortable about now.

This sprawling album, on which Hefernan (bass, guitar and keys) forms a trio with Elsa van der Linden (wind instruments) and drummer Mees Siderius, speaks the language of gorgeously escapist Psychedelic Jazz. The smooth dreaminess of this album is achieved by a multitude of warm intermingling sources. The mixtures of synths, mellotron, saxophone, vibraphone and more on top is just as much key to its effect as the dynamic groundwork of the rhythm section or the natural ambience added via field recordings.

Listening to "Black Water/Brown Earth" conjures the easy playfulness of classic Latin Jazz and Fusion, the uplifting grandeur of Spiritual Jazz and the slightly different elemental esoteric spiritism of New Age Ambient groups like Tengger. Maybe some of its ideas could turn out corny in lesser hands, but what awaits you on these eleven tracks is just constant blissful perfection. If you need a recent reference of quality, I'd put this between the two "super groups" Djinn and London Odense Ensemble.
Yes, it's that good! An absolutely amazing, indeed extremely tolerable statement of modern Jazz. Love love love!

CLARA ENGEL - Their Invisible Hands (2022)

Ok, I just realized that I've used the wrong pronouns in my two previous reviews of singer/songwriter Clara Engel, so let me apologize for that, before we talk about the music here!
It really wasn't some kind of ideologic ignorance, but the sheer ignorance of simply not noticing back in 2021. (Admittedly if I had known, I would probably have preferred English for those write-ups too, because the German language hasn't found a way of being inclusive in a respectful, normalizing and non-clunky  way yet. But with right-wing a-holes having occupied the "critical" side of public dialogue, that's an unnecessary dangerous discussion to have.)

Even though it's also an integral part of the work of artists like Clara Engel, music fortunately is a much easier language to grasp than language.
The golden thread of contemplating, questioning and longing in their delicate pieces - including pure instrumentals like "Ginko's Blues" or "Rowing Home Through A Sea Of Golden Leaves" - should speak to anyone who owns a soul.
Engel finds a way of expressing a very special kind of intimacy by the choice of instrumentation alone. Based on the seemingly small and home-made sounds of cigar box guitars, shruti box, melodica or "found percussion", these songs appear as very private insights.
While there still are parallels to the more minimalist material of artists as different as Chelsea Wolfe, Steve von Till, Einstürzende Neubauten or A Dead Forest Index, it often seems as if Clara's compositions seem to be much less written for the stage, but more like self-rewarding musings. Which somehow makes it especially precious to have the luck to listen to them.

Too much luck may not always be healthy though. As beautiful as the chapters of Clara's "one long continuous song" are each on their own, putting thirteen of those on one album, adding to a total length of about seventy minutes, is much by any standard, even if you consider that they don't all sound the same, but are actually quite distinct from each other.
The bottom line is that when I want to listen to "Their Invisible Hands" attentively, I'll most likely take it one side of the tape a time. It's very good, but also very much.  

CRAWL - Damned (2023)

Well, apart from a couple of similar letters this is quite a different one-person project. Its name may not be overly unique, but I'll be damned if it doesn't fit, because this music is really determined to push you to the ground, paralyse your body and cruelly drag you through the catacombs of desparation in the most obsequious way possible.

Crawl combines Dungeon Synth sounds with excessively horrendous Black Metal screeches and the dirtiest, most hateful Sludge Doom. It's oppressive and exhausting, but somehow also sacral, even with glimmers of beauty. Yet those subtle flashes only serve to show you what you will never deserve. Forget finding inspiration and motivation in music! These four tracks are ultimate hymns of self-loathing. If you party to Primitive Man you'll cry yourself to nightmarish half-sleep with Crawl.

And just to clearify before you read any of this wrong: This monolith is the greatest new Metal release I've heard so far in 2023!
On paper - judging from its ingredients and their intensity - this album should almost be a cartoonish caricature. Yet it never actually crosses that threshold, but always remains an undoubtly heightened, but still completely serious experience. Which makes "Damned" all the more terrifying in all the best ways.

HAUNTER - Discarnate Ails (2022)

And finally some epic Progressive Blackened Death Metal! Even if of all kinds of music I exclusively listened to Death Metal alone, the current renaissance wave would probably feed me with enough quality food to never starve. The Texans Haunter are yet another outstanding example of the many great diverse things you can do within the genre's framework.

Even though this release is a little bit short [insert "EP or album?" argument here], its three tracks all feel huge, not only in size, but also in intensity, heaviness, atmosphere and creativity. Lots of twists, turns and tempo shifts, and each and every of the countless parts is a killer. "Discarnate Ails" is just doing everything right. It's an all-around banger!

I especially love the band's own take on spiraling dissonant Virus / Blut Aus Nord style guitar riffs and the various different extreme vocals, which all have in common that they fucking slay.

You're probably already noticing it: Haunter would give me a very hard time if I wanted to write a longer and more detailed review about them. Of course they provide enough material for one of those - but honestly I just want to bathe in this awesome Death Metal bliss and enjoy it without any need of further dissection.

Bad enough that I missed Haunter last year, when they were also touring Europe for the first time; but I'm glad that I at least at last discovered them now via looking for another release to order from Profound Lore alongside the Crawl tape. This is unspoiled modern Death Metal in perfection.

BANDCAMP DAY November 2021 mit CLARA ENGEL, GONÇALO ALMEIDA / YEDO GIBSON / VASCO FURTADO, NADJA und SWITCHBACK

Warum habe ich diese Rubrik eigentlich nicht Bandcamp Friday Haul o.ä. genannt? Denn eigentlich ist es ja meistens nur das erste, noch gar nicht allzu sehr mit der Musik vertraute erste Überfliegen der virtuellen Einkaufstüte. Kuck mal, was ich mir gekauft habe!

Heute fasse ich mich mit Details auch wieder kurz, weil ich in drei meiner vier Einkäufe erst so richtig eintauchen möchte, sobald die CDs bei mir eingetroffen sind.

Zum einen wäre da "Thaumagenesis" aus der unüberschaubaren Diskographie der experimentellen Doom/Drone-Experimentalisten Nadja, ein einstündiges Single-Track-Album aus dem Jahr 2007. Solch ein Brocken atmosphärischen Gewummers, Gedröhns und Geknarzes von Aidan Baker und Leah Buckareff - da ist das Siegel für allerhöchste Qualität eigentlich schon in die Bassfrequenzen gestanzt!



Bassist Conçalo Almeida kenne ich vor allem durch seine heavy Avantgarde-Mathcore/Jazz/Metal-Band Albatre. Auf "Multiverse" einem gemeinsamen Album mit Sopransaxophonist Yedo Gibson und Schlagzeuger Vasco Furtado aus dem Jahr 2018, nimmt der Portugiese allerdings nicht den E-, sondern den Kontrabass zur Hand und huldigt ganz offen und unüberhörbar dem Giganten John Coltrane, spezifischer dem späteren, komplett ungezügelten, spirituellen Freejazzer. Gibsons Saxophonspiel verschiebt oft ganz im Sinne des Meisters die Grenzen des mit dem Instrument physikalisch Machbaren bis in alleräußerste Winkel, während der Bass diesem brillianten Tribut z.B. gleich im tief brummend unterlegten Opener "Chanty" eine zusätzliche sehr moderne Note einhaucht.

Eigentlich hatte ich vom selben polnischen Label Multikulti Project schon seit Monaten auch noch ein weiteres, eine ecke kaputter orientiertes Album Almeidas auf die Bandcamp-Wunschliste gesetzt, mich dann aber spontan doch für eine 2016 veröffentlichte Aufnahme "Live In Ukraine" des amerikanisch/polnisch/deutschen Quartetts Switchback entschieden. Einfach weil mir nach einer meisterhaft dynamischen, alle Stimmungen der klassischen Free-Jazz-Tradition auslotenden Killershow war. Großartiges Zeug!



Und zu guter Letzt habe ich mir noch eine gerade Ende Oktober erschienene, eine rein digitale Do-It-Yourself-EP gegönnt. In den "Cicada Sessions" spielt Clara Engel vier Songs (drei davon vom letzten Album "Dressed In Borrowed Light") in noch reduzierteren Interpretationen, bei offenem Fenster mit Nebengeräuschen; deswegen auch der Titel. Wie schon auf "Dressed", so musikalisch entkleidet vielleicht sogar noch mehr, transportiert die Musik der kanadischen Modern Folk-Singer/Songwriterin vor allem reine, transzendente Schönheit. Zum Genießen!

 

CLARA ENGEL - Dressed In Borrowed Light

Wenn ich hier schon beim Bandcamp-Freitag bin: Seit gestern ist dort noch ein weiteres Album vorbestellbar, in welches ich schon seit einer Weile komplett hineinhorchen durfte.

Es stammt von der kanadischen Singer/Songwriterin Clara Engel, welche in der Vergangenheit u.a. schon mit Künstlern wie Thor Harris (Swans) oder Aidan Baker (Nadja) zusammengearbeitet hat.

CLARA ENGEL - Dressed In Borrowed Light (download) (2021)

Eines weiß ich bereits jetzt mit Gewissheit: Spätestens eine Woche nachdem ich dieses Review veröffentlicht habe, fällt mir garantiert die ultimative Referenz ein, um die Musik dieses Albums zu beschreiben. Irgendwie habe ich nämlich das Gefühl, dass es da draußen einen perfekten Vergleich sowohl für den Gesang als auch die Musik der Multiinstrumentalistin gibt, der mir beinahe auf der Zunge liegt...

Doch was soll's, ich komme auch so zurecht. Clara Engel selbst zitiert die Stilbezeichnungen experimenteller Folk und minimalistischer Holy Blues, welche die sechs durchschnittlich über sechsminütigen Lieder von "Dressed In Borrowed Light" tatsächlich schon sehr gut umreißen.
Es ist hauptsächlich mit akustischen Saiteninstrumenten, elektrischer Gitarre und sparsamer Perkussion von ihr selbst und ausgewählten, jeweils auf einem Track vertretenen Gastmusikern (u.a. an Lap-Steel-Gitarre, Cello und brendan-perryeskem Backgroundgesang) umgesetzte, lyrikbetonte Balladenmusik zwischen Americana und nicht geographisch verortbarem, universellen Anspruch.

Wer auf das reduziertere Material von Chelsea Wolfe, Marissa Nadler, Angel Olsen, Louise Lemón, Jarboe oder auch (natürlich mit ganz anderer Stimmfarbe) Steve von Till steht, der findet hier nirgends eine hundertprozentige Entsprechung, aber doch so viele zwischen diesen Künstlern variierenden Ansatzpunkte, dass dieses Album mit hoher Wahrscheinlichkeit zumindest interessant sein sollte.

Mir gefallen die wunderbar auf den Punkt arrangierten Kompositionen und das unaufgeregte, nicht effektheischende und dennoch sehr packende Timbre in Engels Stimme ausgesprochen gut.

Dies ist ganz klar eines der pursten, schönsten, am direktesten die Gefühle ansprechenden Alben, die mir dieses Jahr untergekommen sind.

"Dressed In Borrowed Light" erscheint digital am 20. August. Ein physischer Tonträger ist derzeit noch nicht angekündigt, wäre aber sehr sehr wünschenswert.