French
label Bip-Hop have always encouraged their artists to collaborate
with other musicians, so the launch of Reciprocess +/vs.,
a new split series, released in collaboration with Northern
Ireland-based Fällt label, doesn’t come as a surprise.
The concept behind the series is rather simple: take two musicians
with different sonic realms, let them remix a couple of each
other’s tracks, collaborate on some joint compositions
and include a few more tracks of each in solo. The first two
to present their common work are Bip-Hop’s Chris Dooks,
aka Bovine Life, and Raster-Noton’s Frank Bretschneider’s
Komet.
Both are accomplished sound designers. If Bretschneider refutes
the minimalist tag attached to his music, he acknowledges its
austere shape, referring to it in the booklet accompanying this
release as economic. His passion for clean sounds and unorthodox
arrangements has benefited each one of his releases, confirming
the man’s ability to unveil surprisingly attractive qualities
to his structures. Of Dooks’s own admission, the processed
he uses while recording is far more disorganised. His sonic
arrangements are rich, built around a multitude of fragmented
elements arranged together in complex formations. This album
reflects the considerable differences between their specific
works through their solo compositions included, four tracks
for Komet and seven for Bovine Life, but also reveals the connections
between both artists. Combining short, impulsive sounds with
clicks and glitches, Bretschneider puts together intriguing
sound combinations, emblematic of Mille Plateaux’s releases.
He however tends to support his music with linear beat constructions,
giving a perverse dance twist to it. He happily claims preferring
sound design to melodic structures, and the tracks included
here are all representative of this. By contrast, Chris Dooks’s
compositions appear more open and connected with the outside
world, feeding on a variety of sources ranging from film samples
to environmental noises. The tracks included here are however
more minimalist than some of his previous work. If Vone,
Platuex and Behind are startlingly simple
linear ambient moments, things get more intricate with the rest
of his compositions. The four tracks providing the core of this
album sees both artists merging their unique soundscapes, creating
intricate moments of abstraction. Using very basic sounds and
developing scarce rhythmic patterns around them, Dooks and Bretschneider
blur the boundaries between their respective worlds by bouncing
back of each other constantly. The most intense of the four,
Second Question and The Conclusion are also
the compositions that reveal their common grounds in the sharpest
light.
Both artists have got good experience of collaborative work,
and this album shows their adaptability to new environments,
focussing on their approach to sound design and soundscapes.
The inclusion of solo tracks, remixes and collaborations works
perfectly in the present context, highlighting the artists’
impact of each other’s work, creating a thrilling collection
of abstract music.
4/5 |
