TUUSANUUSKAT
Nääksää Nää Mun Kyyneleet
FR78
Fonal Records 2011
05 Tracks. 36mins22secs

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

From the vaults of the wonderland that is Fonal comes this collaborative effort between Es (Sami Sänpäkkilä, who is, amongst other things, head of the Finnish imprint) and Tomutonttu (Jan Anderzén, leader of polymorphic electro-folksters Kemialliset Ystävät), for which they embark on quite a remarkable journey during which their main aim seem to thoroughly destroy every last sound they come across, just, it seems, for the sake of seeing what happens. All this digital destruction is contained within five tracks and lasts only thirty six minutes, but in that time, they manage to create a brutally abrasive mix which also happens to be remarkably cinematic and pastoral.

On first impression, one would be forgiven for thinking they have inadvertently stepped in a newly found Pan Sonic noise experiment. Tippa 1 opens with saturated electronics, but quite quickly, these are replaced by a much softer drone which is progressively distorted into dense slabs of noise. Unlike Pan Sonic though, the pair continuously swerve from fairly textured soundscapes to much more decaying ones and back, a process they take through the whole album. Noise may be a substantial component here, but it often comes in surprisingly gentle swatches. Tippa 3 opens with waves of sonic flares which become increasingly dense as they come crashing one after the other, and for a while, distortions are kept at bay, allowing for the shimmering remains of these original components to continue to burn for some time. Eventually though, these layers become so densely pact that they begin to collapse upon themselves, resulting in a more toxic set up as the piece reaches its end part.

Tippa 2 and 4 are more intricately woven forms, their respective evolution going through contrasted phases during which they in turn flourish and develop into smooth segments, then retract into more corrosive sound forms. The former is ridden with electric tension though, and its multi-layered drone structure at times takes on a slightly psychedelic turn, while the latter is a somewhat chaotic and disjointed assemblage of noises and electronics from which occasionally emerges a fragmented melody.

The longest of the five tracks on here, Tippa 5 is also the more purely progressive. Opening with a cloud of squiggly electronics and radio interferences, the sonic structure of the piece slowly builds up over its whole course, but not through a relentless layering process like on previous tracks, but in the more sustained intensification of one particular formation, which is overlaid with a recurring little melody in its latter part.

Albums built from noise and distortions are not usually poetic in any way, but Nääksää Nää Mun Kyyneleet manages to be despite, or in spite perhaps, of it abrasive nature. Tuusanuuskat create here a beautiful little gem which, in all fairness, probably couldn’t have been conceived in any other environment than that of Fonal.

4.1/5

Tuusanuuskat | Tuusanuuskat (MySpace) | Fonal Records
Amazon UK: CD | LP US: CD | LP Boomkat: CD | LP | DLD iTunes: DLD

Tuusanuuskat by Fonal Records