ALEXANDER SCHUBERT
Plays Sinebag
AH16
Ahornfelder 2011
07 Tracks. 40mins16secs

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Alexander Schubert plays Sinebag, or when two projects meet. This last part could very well be the subtitle for Schubert’s latest release as he brings various elements of his work together under one concept and vastly broadens his scope in the process.

Schubert describes Sinebag as his ‘pop-orientated side project’, yet none of the two albums he has released under that name can really qualify as pop in any shape or form. Instead, Milchwolken In Teein (2003) and Près De La Lisière (2005) have been highly refined exercises in micro found sound placement and electro-acoustic experimentation. Here though, Schubert combines this with a more spontaneous and ambitious approach, finding some roots in the some of the projects he has contributed to over the years, especially those based around improvised music.

The predominant aspect of the music is still very much infused with fragmented found sounds, processed acoustic instrumentation and electronic treatments, but there is an added glow to the tracks collected here which gives the music a different energy. Unlike on previous records, where Schubert acted alone, he is on occasions surrounded by additional musicians, who each bring new sonorities to the finely detailed soundscapes he creates. Hints of piano, clarinet, live drums, percussions, saxophone, double bass and electric guitar pepper Semaphores, A Few Plateaus and Wake Up, Fly Ray to seriously emphasize the electro acoustic nature of Schubert’s music. These often appear extremely fragmented and distorted, but never to the point of them being totally unidentifiable. Keeping some of the inherent aspects of these instruments seems to be a recurring concern throughout.

The three aforementioned pieces are by far the most complex and detailed of the album, and it is surely not a coincidence that they are also the most fully developed, A Few Plateaus and Wake Up, Fly Ray actually stretching over thirteen and a half minutes each. While Semaphores is rather peaceful and pastoral, delicate brushes of guitar and clarinet layered with bird songs and quirky electronics, the other two pieces are much more angular, complex and intricate. Entire sequences are painstakingly assembled only to be savagely torn apart and digitally reassembled in completely new ways, only for the process to be started all over again only moments later. Additionally, the instruments themselves are used as sound sources, expanding greatly on their simple musicality. Incorporated into the overall fabric of these tracks, they become totally anecdotal.

In between are four short interludes, the longest clocking at just under two minutes, collecting found sounds and sketches of melodies, which, while all linked, appear totally disjointed as Schubert mixes acoustic instrumentation, electronic textures and sounds and ambient noises into extremely bare and ephemeral pieces.

With this album, Alexander Schubert has developed his sound into a sort of hybrid of his previous incarnations. The dreamy aspect of previous Sinebag records is not perhaps quite as vivid and prominent here, but the more contrasted experimentations create a new dynamic in his work.

3.8/5

Alexander Schubert | Alexander Schubert (MySpace) | Sinebag | Ahornfelder
Amazon UK: CD | DLD US: CD | DLD Boomkat: DLD iTunes: DLD