For this reviewer, there’s a troubling paradox at the heart of “experimental” music. How is it that artists, critics, labels and listeners refer to a set of more-or-less codified musical practices that don’t come across as particularly spontaneous or searching, as experimental? I’m equally guilty of this, but I do often wonder just what it is about long form drone-scapes, ghostly electronics and gloomy sonorities that qualify as being experimental in the year 2011. Charlemagne Palestine and La Monte Young, amongst others, were being truly experimental back in the late 60s and early 70s, pushing the boundaries of performance, duration and sheer chutzpah to new extremes. Maybe the current generation of experimental musicians has it somewhat easier? A willing, if not smallish audience, who have been attuning their ears to drones and dark ambience over the past fifteen years or more, and who can reach into the eternal present of the essential reissue or the internet, to brush up on their knowledge of minimalist godfathers and low-movement misanthropes.
Mem1’s first album for their Estuary Ltd. label is as fine a slab of electroacoustic, glowering, dusky ambience as you’re likely to hear this year. Maybe the ranting paragraph above is just the by-product of having to review one to many dark ambient albums; how many words can I find to describe similar textures? But please indulge me, dear reader, as poorly argued and inconclusive as the above ramblings may be, I hope that my point concerning the nomenclature and approach of experimental music cones across clearly. I personally want artists to reach into hostile environments for inspiration, abusing stringed instruments and utilise the natural human desire for extremes of many hues, to produce great art. But then some days, maybe I’d just rather listen to a reissue of a surfing soundtrack from the early 70’s.
Anyways, back to {Tetra}. Slowly emerging from the silence “Trieste” is named in honour of the awe-inspiring bathyscaphe that descended to the absolute limits of the aquatic universe in 1960. Over ten kilometres down in the Western Pacific’s Mariana Trench, Jacques Piccard and Don Walsh would have been straining to hear if their craft could handle the many thousands of atmospheres of pressure bearing down on their craft. Mem1 utilise some watery sounds, but mostly the husband and wife duo descend straight to the bottom with mournful cello and subtle electronics. “Caldera” ups the ante considerably, as they trace a faster trajectory between smoking pumice and spewing craters. Inhabiting a similar sound-world to orchestramaxfieldparrish, Henrik Nordvargr Bjorkk or Ultralyd, the cello’s warm tones are gradually subsumed by an electronic scree that is as overpowering as it is thrilling. Retreating quickly, the duo leaves the caldera before noxious gases overpower their muse.
On the flip, “Hr” sounded to me like an Icelandic volcano, but actually turns out to be a mythological Norse giant who is represented as a massive eagle. Perched in an aerie at the end of the world, the daemons, beating wings cause the wind to blow throughout the world. On Hrsvelgr” Mem1 allow their long-form ambience to insinuate its weary mythic malice into your blood stream, as the cello cries and the modular synths swell and rupture. This piece would find devotees amongst fans of Machinefabriek, Tim Hecker or Cristal. Notable mention must be made of the lovely hand-produced, unique and marbled thick cardboard sleeve produced by Mem1’s Mark Cetilia using metallic inks, and the clear, well-produced collector-scum vinyl contained within. Always a nice touch of differentiation, now if only experimental music like {Tetra} could be a little bit more, well, experimental.
Oliver Laing
