Robert Henke – Page 2 – { feuilleton }

Uncopyable

Moldover’s CD case: a working theremin.

In May this year, Brian Eno was writing in Prospect magazine about the current state of the music business as it continues to be assailed by digital technology. Among the things Eno discussed was the packaging of music:

The duplicability of recordings has had another unexpected effect. The pressure is on to develop content that isn’t easily copyable—so now everything other than the recorded music is becoming the valuable part of what artists sell. … That suggests to me the possibility of a refreshingly democratic art market: a new way for visual artists, designers, animators and film-makers to make a living. So, as one business folds, several others open up. (More.)

Having started out as an album cover artist (I wasn’t a designer back then), and working still as a CD designer, this is naturally an attractive thesis. Earlier this week John Walsh in The Independent wrote a potted history of the album cover and noted that the big record companies are also realising again that contemporary music as an artform is more than merely a collection of audio tracks:

Apple, creator of the iPod and the iTunes store—the sworn enemies of commercially-packaged music—is getting into bed with the four largest record labels, to help them stimulate album sales. They’re working with EMI, Sony Music, Warner Music and Universal Music Group on something called “Project Cocktail” that will produce all manner of extras to go with albums: interactive booklets, sleeve notes, photographs, lyric sheets, even video clips. Buyers will be able to call up album tracks through the interactive booklet, while leafing through pictures of the band and trying to make sense of the lyrics.

This, however, seems to be missing the point. Absolutely anything digital can be copied and passed on, and that applies equally to album extras as to the tracks themselves. What can’t be copied, of course, is a desirable object which contains the music. The lavish album sleeves of the 1970s were very much desirable objects which contained music, and no end of facsimile CDs of Physical Graffiti will match the impact of Peter Corriston and Mike Doud’s design for the vinyl release.

Which brings us to Moldover‘s extraordinary light-operated theremin-in-a-CD-case, a beautiful design and a really clever use of the wretched jewel case box. The music on Moldover’s accompanying CD may be swapped around illicitly but no one is going to copy the hardware. The “Awesome Edition” of this work costs $50 and can be ordered here.

Moldover’s theremin is only an adjunct to his music, albeit a delightful one. Tristan Perich, on the other hand, like Fm3’s Buddha Machine, makes the case and the instrument one, and in Perich’s case (so to speak) possibly takes the 8-bit/chiptune thing to a definitive extreme. This is the kind of invention we could use more of, not some lazy Flash applications appended to a pop release then dumped onto the iTunes Store as an “exclusive”. It’s notable that the one thing all these works have in common is that they’re the inventions of no-budget independent artists, not big record labels.

While we’re on the subject of the Buddha Machine, the guys at Mountain*7 noted this YouTube loop work which extends the drone-loop idea into the audio/visual realm.

Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The album covers archive

Previously on { feuilleton }
• Buddha Machine Wall
• God in the machines
• Layering Buddha by Robert Henke
• Generative culture

Versum – Fluor by Tarik Barri

Regular readers will know I’ve enthused before over the electronica of Robert Henke, aka Monolake. The Monolake site recently resumed its monthly free downloads and the offering for this month is a 9-minute piece of abstract video by Dutch artist Tarik Barri. Fascinatingly immersive, this is like a 360º view of the Star Gate from 2001: A Space Odyssey accompanied by ambient drones and rumbles. Henke and Barri are planning on touring this audiovisual experience with a couple of dates already announced on Barri’s website.

Previously on { feuilleton }
• Moonlight in Glory

Buddha Machine Wall

I love my Buddha Machine, the music release by Fm3 which comes as a set of sampled loops in a plastic case looking like a cheap pocket radio. This is one music work which can’t be downloaded since the physicality of the thing is as much a part of its attraction and purpose as the loops themselves. It’s probably the most playfully inventive “album” since Chöre & Soli (1983) by Die Tödliche Doris, 8 miniphone records packaged in a box with a battery-driven player like those found in old talking dolls.

I only own one Buddha Machine so I haven’t had the opportunity to try creating a choir of the things with each playing a different loop. Robert Henke’s marvellous Layering Buddha album does this with considerable sophistication, processing the sounds through his bespoke digital filters. For those without their own Buddha Machine or Henke’s technology there’s now the Buddha Machine Wall which allows you to not only play with one machine but to also play several simultaneously. This is actually a lot more fascinating than I expected, it’s essentially an ambient music machine for the web, following the Brian Eno model of creating ambient patterns by layering loops. It’s great; give it a try.

• Layering Buddha Live | Two free downloads from Robert Henke

Previously on { feuilleton }
• God in the machines
• Layering Buddha by Robert Henke
• Generative culture

Fragment Endloss by Robert Henke

I’ve mentioned before that Robert Henke, aka Monolake, is one of my favourite electronic musicians, and it was great last year when he reinstated his habit of offering a free download each month. Unlike the short fragments or scraps that many artists throw for free to audiences there’s been some substantial work on offer, such as an hour-long live performance of his Layering Buddha set.

The download for this month is a perfect soundtrack to accompany the New Year chill, Fragment Endloss, a 30-minute piece of ambient drift from 1992, reworked slightly for 2008.

This is a very personal piece for me, created in a time where I felt quite dark and lived in an appropriate environment. I just had moved from West-Berlin, Neukoelln, to the east, to Prenzlauer Berg, which at that time was not the expensive hippster neighborhood it is now, but the very opposite. I lived in a small place on the ground floor in a backyard, with a coal oven and a toilet outside the building… It was the end of winter, cold, unfriendly, and very dark. Pretty much like on the pictures above.

Musically this is influenced by ‘The Pearl’ (Brian Eno, Harold Budd). Sound design wise it shows that I just go the TG-77 and SY-77, and then there is this one long brass-like sound that I made as a result of listening to John Chowning.

For the free track of the month version I slightly edited the original 45 minute version and added field recordings of Bahnhof Zoo and the S-Bahn here in Berlin which I also captured in 1992.

Previously on { feuilleton }
• Live Performance in the Age of Supercomputing
• Layering Buddha by Robert Henke
• New Monolake

Machinefabriek in Manchester

The Bacon-esque blur is Machinefabriek, aka Rutger Zuydervelt from the Netherlands, performing this evening at the Cross Street Chapel with Xela and friends. Events I’ve seen here before have been predominantly acoustic so it made a change to see something where the balance was shifted in favour of electronics or the electronic processing of acoustic sources. The chapel is a good, intimate venue, with seating in the round.

Xela (above) played first, comprising John Twells (Mr Type Records, left) with an amended line-up featuring Danny Saul on guitar and laptop with Greg Haines on cello and the chapel’s own piano which he proceeded to treat in a distinctly secular fashion. These three set the tone for the evening, starting quietly and harmoniously then working into an accumulated frenzy of noise. Type Records are one of the best labels around at the moment, all their releases (and, it should be said, those of these artists) are worth checking out.

There was a break from the noise with Soccer Committee, who aren’t a group of Eindhoven footballer managers but a young woman named Mariska Baars. Mariska plays very quiet (and very good) songs on guitar and it’s a shame that most of her pieces were so short. I didn’t get any photos as she was playing in near dark and rapt silence from the audience.

Next up was Wouter Van Veldhoven (above) playing a Stratocaster guitar through a variety of what looked like synth modules topped by an antique table lamp. One can’t help but speculate whether any German musicians (including my sainted Robert Henke) would dare to have such an anacronistic item near their gear.

And so to Machinefabriek, an artist who releases a bewildering amount of limited edition CD-Rs, mostly on his own label. Mr Zuydervelt sat before his tiny table and proceeded to produce a quite incredible array of sounds from an electric guitar and what looked like effects pedals and electric egg-timers (and a pan-scourer…?). As with Xela, the sounds proceeded from melodic ambience to noise, in this instance great sheets of harmonic distortion which—like all the best noise performances—became deliriously overwhelming. Brilliant, compelling stuff, and it’s a shame he didn’t play for longer. After this, Wouter and Mariska returned and the three quickly launched into an improvised coda. A great evening.

Previously on { feuilleton }
• Helios in Manchester
• Music on Cross Street