Oldman – Two Heads Bis Bis (Low Impedance Recordings)

French producer / multi-instrumentalist Charles Eric Charrier is perhaps best known for his previous work alongside Rasim Biyikli as one half of the acclaimed electronic duo MAN, who recorded four albums for DSA and SubRosa whilst also collaborating with an impressive number of film directors, choreographers and musicians including Rob Mazurek. While Charrier’s backhistory might sit firmly in the electronic music domain however, this debut solo album as Oldman ‘Two Heads Bis Bis’ sees him relying on the traditional ‘rock’ suite of bass, guitar and drums to create six tracks that sit somewhere between ambience, lo-fi post-rock and free-form jamming. Expansive opening track ‘Broken Teeth’ provides an apt illustration of this overall aesthetic approach, layering slow, clattering drums and dry-sounding snares beneath distracted Michael Karoli-esque rippling guitar chords and the spectral sweep of sampled found sounds and ringing harmonics in an offering that frequently calls to mind a more narcotised Can as it gradually deccelerates down into spooky sampled voices. Indeed, while it doesn’t exactly ‘go anywhere’ or develop drastically over its vast running time, the focus here falls more upon building a sense of underlying background mood, a factor consistently present throughout this entire album. If the title track represents perhaps the one unwieldy moment here with its rapidly grating mix of distorted bass twangs and metronomic drums, it’s a brief miss-step that’s quickly redeemed by ‘Dust’s haunting exploration into tribal percussion, eerie vocal tones and plucked instrumentation, as well as ‘Sunny Afternoon African Charge’s descent through mesmerising sampled radio chatter and glistening metallic percussion tones, the sudden entrance of a rapidly rewound tape rousing proceedings out of their reverie. An intriguing debut album from Charrier as Oldman, ‘Two Heads Bis Bis’ simply grows more compelling with ensuing listens.