BIOSPHERE
N-Plant
TO84
Touch 2011
09 Tracks. 49mins49secs

Amazon UK: CD | DLD US: CD | DLD Boomkat: CD | DLD iTunes: DLD

What would happen if a nuclear power plant, located close to the sea, was hit by an earthquake or a tsunami? The story behind this album is nothing short of puzzling. In late 20101, whilst researching Japan in the optic of recording an album about the country’s post-Second World War economic miracle, Geir Jenssen stumbled upon a picture of the Mihama nuclear power plant, situated on a tiny peninsula on the west coast of Japan, just over three hundred kilometers west of Tokyo. The plant was still then the site of the worst nuclear disaster to have taken place in Japan, when, in 2004, hot water leaked from a broken pipe near one of the reactors, killing four people and injuring seven.The plant, situated in an otherwise beautiful spot prompted Jenssen to question exactly how safe such facility would be if it was hit by a quake or a tsunami. Further investigations revealed a number of other nuclear power stations located in earthquake-prone areas. This provided him with the focus for the record, his first in over five years. The album was recorded in the following weeks and was wrapped up by the middle of February. Less than a month later, the North-East coast of Japan was hit by a magnitude 9.0 earthquake, the most powerful the country has suffered. The quake was followed by a series of tsunamis which caused widespread devastation and were responsible for the Fukushima nuclear disaster, during which three of the six reactors on the site went into meltdown, and the container of a fourth one got badly damaged following an explosion. Jenssen realised the prophetic nature of his work two days later when a friend left a message on his Facebook page.

Musically, N-Plants is almost as intriguing as its story, and sits somewhat at odds with some of Jenssen’s best known work. Much of this album harks back to the sound of the early Biosphere days and the way Jenssen had to assimilate lush ambient soundscapes and dance-infused grooves. It has however been twenty years since he released Microgravity, and his work has branched out in many different directions, from the nature-conscious Substrata or Cirque and the extremely austere Autour De La Lune to the much warmer and jazz-infused Dropsonde. With N-Plants, Jenssen doesn’t so much return to his sound of old as adapt it to a more contemporary context.

All named after nuclear reactors and power plants, the tracks make use of openly electronic-sounding textures and bleep-like elements, which Jenssen arranges around his more conventional ambient formations. The use of cold digital soundscapes is a clear reflection on the tight control nuclear power stations are placed under and the inherent tension created by the precarious location of some of Japan’s many reactors. Right from the humming noise on which the album opens, Jenssen sets out to instill an element of malaise and tension, emphasised on Sendai-1 by what sounds like the ticking of a clock which, while extremely discreet, rapidly becomes a persistent feature, or on Joyo by layers of statics clustered into a rhythmic loop. Later on, he injects acidic electronics to Ikata-1, ice-cold synthetic strings in the backdrop of Genkai-1 as much warmer hypnotic sounds pulsate in the foreground, or distorted bleeps on Oi-1 to let the feeling of underlying pressure radiate throughout.

Jenssen doesn’t always deliberately favour unsettling sequences here, and actually delivers some more peaceful moments on occasion, from the linear bass section of Shika-1 to the throbbing arpeggio of Monju-1 and Monju-2 later on, but these only serve to relieve the strain caused by the more oppressive tracks and soundscapes, and ultimately add to the tension once again.

In the aftermath of the Japanese disaster, N-Plants has become a particularly poignant project. Beside this totally unpredictable aspect though, this is an interesting move for Jenssen, away from the beautifully textured ambient that constitutes a considerable part of his work, and into a more conventional electronic set up. This is perhaps where this album falls short slightly however, its overall appearance lacking the truly individual identity of Substrata, Shenzhou or Dropsonde. Jenssen has lost none of his flair for creating evocative electronic music, but by getting closer to his contemporaries, he appears less as a frontrunner in his field.

4/5

Biosphere | Touch
Amazon UK: CD | DLD US: CD | DLD Boomkat: CD | DLD iTunes: DLD