Jo David Meyer Lysne & Peder Simonsen: Spektralmaskin
SOFA

What with the resources digital tools, electronics, and generative systems offer, it's never been easier to create dronescapes of extended and even unlimited duration. But for their collaboration Spektralmaskin (“spectral machine”), Norwegian experimental musicians Jo David Meyer Lysne (b. 1994) and Peder Simonsen (b. 1987) have chosen an entirely hands-on and tactile approach that's grounded in timbres sourced from analog instruments. The foundation for the album's three long-form pieces is the sound of an e-bow sliding across guitar strings to produce harmonics. Custom-designed by Lysne, these small magnetic motors generate shimmering tendrils and cresting washes of sound upon which the two layered pre-composed parts for French horn, contrabass, violin, bass clarinet, and tuba.

The project originated in 2020 when Simonsen visited Lysne's studio and, captivated by the e-bows the guitarist was building, pitched the idea of applying them to harmonically tuned guitars. After recording improvisations, the two methodically added bits performed by bass clarinetist Espen Reinertsen, French hornist James Patterson, percussionist Ingar Zach, and Vilde Sandve Alnæs and Inga Margrete Aas, aka the violin-bass duo Vilde&Inga. In addition, Simonsen augmented Lysne's acoustic and electric guitars with microtonal tuba, modular synthesizer, sine waves, and pyrex bowls. Countless overdubs and fastidious shaping of the sound field ultimately brought the thirty-four-minute album to its finished form.

The first track (simply titled “I”) plunges us into a suspended-animation dreamscape punctuated by gentle descending pitches and thickened with violin, French horn, bass clarinet, and contrabass textures. As still as the music might appear, it's not static: subtly undulating and vibrating, the dense mass mutates ever so slowly as different timbres advance and recede and contrasting flavours and pitches emerge. In presenting itself so unassumingly and glimmering so softly, the material exudes a peaceful, relaxing, and even stately character that's easy to give oneself over to. “II” begins more aggressively with a clangorous pulsation and wavering tones battered by sharp guitar harmonics and metallic whines. If anything, the material only grows more ghostly and luminous as the minutes pass. “II” flows without pause into “III,” which sees a vaporous drizzle speckled with neon-lit pops and percussive tinklings flicker, glisten, and whirr for nine slowly expanding minutes.

July 2024