With the abundance of electronic music surrounding every
one of us each day, it is difficult to think that it
was once an art form reserved to a very chosen few.
Until the early to mid seventies, when portable synthesisers
first appeared, electronic music was a medium reserved
to musicians who had, on top of a strong musical formation,
a deep understanding of technology. It is exactly this
that Keith Fullerton Whitman celebrates with his latest
opus.
Multiples was entirely conceived and recorded
at the Harvard University studios, where Whitman was
a lecturer for a while. During his spare time, he made
the most of the university’s extensive collection
of vintage synthesisers and electronics. Collecting
just under fifty minutes of recordings split into eight
tracks, Multiples is yet another totally unique
record from Whitman. Hot on the heels of his wonderfully
droney Antithesis and Schöner
Flußengel vinyl-only albums and the release
of Yearlong,
his collaborations with Greg
Davis, this new album reveals the more academic
side of Whitman’s vast musical scope. Each one
of the eight tracks featured here is named after the
instruments used, beginning with Stereo Music For
Hi-Hat and Stereo Music For Serge Modular Prototype
and concluding with the Stereo Music For Acoustic
Guitar, Buchla Music Box 100, Hewlett Packard Model
236 Oscillator, Electric Guitar And Computer diptych,
thus establishing a connection with early experimentalists,
who themselves often placed their work in a parallel
context to classical music.
The apparently emotionless naming convention used here
hides however a series of wonderfully captivating recordings
which continuously erupts with musicality, sounds and
ideas. These eight tracks are designed to work as a
whole, some barely lasting a couple of minutes, other
developing over ten. Each track is totally unique, with
its own particular sonic setting and resulting mood,
yet they all appear to work best in perspective of each
other. The aridity and static nature of Stereo Music
For Hi-Hat or Stereo Music For Serge Modular
Prototype Pt. 1 & 2 contrasts greatly with
the incredibly rich and detailed sonic evolution witnessed
on Stereo Music For Yamaha Disklavier Prototype,
Electric Guitar And Computer and Stereo Music
For Farfisa Compact Duo Deluxe, Drum Kit, while
the concluding two tracks evolve between acoustic instrumentations
and electronic soundwaves to complete this impressive
sonic picture.
Despite the evident technological light under which
this album is resolutely placed, and the academic nature
of this particular work, what transpires all along Multiples
is the sheer joy and passion in Whitman’s work.
This album is the fruit of his knowledge and understanding
of electronic music as an art form and the result of
years of experimentations, and shows him as one of the
most important musicians of his generation.
4.9/5 |
