Reputedly only meeting to play live, without rehearsing,
refusing even to compose prior to performing, and barely
talking to each other between sessions, it is to wonder
how Supersilent manage to create such dense and complex
music and remain perfectly in line with each other.
From the cataclysmic noise of their first opus to the
resonant calm of their third, Supersilent’s improvised
music is at once uncompromising and unashamedly charming,
extremely varied in terms of shape and structure, yet
retaining the strong musical dynamic of their collaboration,
left untouched by the four members’ other projects.
Supersilent started as a spontaneous jam session between
trumpeter Arve Henriksen, responsible for last year’s
breath-taking Sakuteiki, keyboard player Ståle
Storløkken, sonic maverick Helge Sten, better
known as Deathprod, and drummer Jarle Vespestad at Bergen
Jazz Festival, in 1997. Followed endless recording sessions,
collected in the quartet’s first release, an impressive
triple album simply entitled 1-3, close to
the experimentations of Squarepusher
or Aphex Twin in
the way it combined electronics and frantic percussions.
This album also marked the first release from Norwegian
label Rune Grammofon. The second Supersilent record,
cunningly called 4, flirted with electro jazz
and helped establish the band well beyond Scandinavian
boundaries, while 5, published in 2001, compiled
over thirty hours of live recordings made across Europe.
Recorded during a five-day session, and presented without
overdubs, Supersilent 6 remains true to the
spirit of the band. From the early eerie moments of
6.1 to the monumental wall of sound of the
later part of 6.3 and the pastoral beauty of
6.6, this album shows the quartet working in
complete symbiosis, remaining entirely focused on the
density of the music. Even at its most quiet, the improvisation
retains the compulsive energy of earlier recordings.
On 6.3, perhaps the most cohesive piece of
work on this album, Supersilent develop the full range
of their collaboration. Starting with reflective drones,
the track is drown to almost complete silence before
erupting, ten minutes in, in a maelstrom of symphonic
proportions finally dying in a cascade of analogue sounds.
Textures and tones are applied with great care all the
way through, as the musicians interact with each other,
yet expressing a true collective work. If this recording,
like its predecessors, proves at times to be challenging
as the four seem to lose all grip on time to delve deep
in the sonic structures they patiently establish, the
intensity with which they carry their music and the
intrinsic beauty of the improvisations is in the end
extremely rewarding.
Devoid of any egoistic feelings, Supersilent 6
is once again a genuine collaborative work. With these
four accomplished contemporary musicians joining forces,
all ordinarily evolving in singularly different realms,
Supersilent is well and truly one of the most impressive
acts to have burst on the improv scene.
4.8/5 |
