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Looper's Delight
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>Anyone have any reactions to the band "Zoviet France"? They have a zillion
>albums out of varying quality, but they seem to be dedicated loopers in
>that
>"creepy and scary" non-groove, non-beat related way. My personal opinion
>is
>that they alternate between awesomeness/mediocrity, but as a band they are
>undeniably interesting.
>
>My personal favorite ZF is a live album called "Vienna, 1990"
>
>(Anyone know what gear they are using? The newer stuff sounds like cheap
>found sounds put through a high-end Lexicon reverb).
>
>Pete
I listened to a lot of Zoviet France a few years ago, and Vienna 1990 was
my favorite also, the only disc of theirs I still own. I completely agree
with your assesment of their sound, amazing what a really great 'verb can
do. I undeerstand that one of the members now does more traditional ambient
techno under the name Rapoon, haven't heard them but have heard good things
about them.
Another interesting band in a similar vein is P16.D4, a German group from
the early 80s. I have a CD called "Kuhe in 1/2 Trauer" which evidently
compiles much of their output from 80-83. Very compelling, dark
music-concrete, with some very cool analog tape loops. Lo-fi, but with a
sophisticated esthetic.
Also, German composer Bernhard Guntherr does some very interesting stuff
with samples of very small quiet sounds time-streched, pitch-shifted and
looped into longer pieces. I attended an informal "performance" of his last
year, it was him playing his CD's while talking about the pieces, answering
questions, etc. His music is extremely "difficult" often acting at the very
edge of audibility (is that a word?), and I'm not sure I would have gotten
to appreciate it without hearing him explain it, but I do like his records.
One piece uses a pine cone as the source-sounds, plucking the leaves very
close to a mic, and sampling the output. His goal is to have the sounds
work on a very purely textural level, and he'd prefer that his listeners
not be trying to "guess the sample". Interesting guy, very affable and
friendly considering how difficult and foreboding his music is.
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Dave Trenkel : improv@peak.org : www.peak.org/~improv/
"...there will come a day when you won't have to use
gasoline. You'd simply take a cassette and put it in
your car, let it run. You'd have to have the proper
type of music. Like you take two sticks, put 'em
together, make fire. You take some notes and rub 'em
together - dum, dum, dum, dum - fire, cosmic fire."
-Sun Ra
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