Articles
2009 Top 10s and 20s
King Midas Sound
Starke

Albums
36
Aardvarck
Matias Aguayo
Anaphoria
Anduin
Arbol + Fibla
Aufgang
Beneva vs. Clark Nova
Black to Comm
Bvdub
Cornstar
Dinky
Enola
Fieldhead
FOURM / Shinkei / Turra
Billy Gomberg
The Green Kingdom
Chihei Hatakeyama
Ian Hawgood
Marek Hemmann
Khate
King Midas Sound
Marcel Knopf
Robot Koch
Lambent
Shinobu Nemoto
Olekranon
Laurent Perrier
Piano Magic
Porzellan
Pylône
Ryonkt
Shadyzane
Slow
Small Color
Solomun
The Sound of Lucrecia
Stray Ghost
The Use of Ashes
Sylvie Walder

Compilations / Mixes
Sebo K
Will Saul
Tama Sumo
VOLTT Amsterdam Vol. 1

EPs
Blindhæð
Roberto Bosco
Franco Cangelli
Dieb
dub KULT
Abe Duque/Blake Baxter
Gemmy
Christopher Hobbs
Duncan Ó Ceallaigh
Christopher Roberts
The Sight Below
Two Fourteen
Van Der Papen
Andy Vaz
Vetrix
Eddie Zarook

DVD
Optofonica

Beneva vs. Clark Nova: Dramadadatic
How is Annie Records / Fenêtre Records

That the root of Dramadadatic is ‘dada' is clearly no accident. On the follow-up to their celebrated debut album Sombunall of last year, Frank Benjamin Finger (Beneva) and Rudi Simmons (Clark Nova) up the anarchy ante in a dozen songs that find the duo channel-surfing through a multitude of styles in whipcrack style. To their credit, the Oslo-based duo haven't allowed any pressure that might have accrued from the critical success of Sombunall to tame their madcap tendencies, and the new material ends up being a no-holds-barred, thirty-nine-minute ride.

“A Schlemihl and Human Yo Yo” kickstarts the album in surreal manner, with acoustic guitar strums alternating drunkenly amidst voice garble and beat splatter before splintering into fragments. Powered by an analog synth-driven snap, “Koala Sideburns” exudes the kind of joyous exuberance one might have encountered on an early Warp release, while fulminating beats turn “Turning More Zebra-like” into one of the album's hardest-hitting tracks. “Face Like a Metronome” offers a diseased take on instrumental hip-hop, “Elevator Shoes” underlays acidy synth babble with breakbeats, and “Silenzio Stampa” crawls through a writhing swamp of mangled voices and beat convulsions. With the material so hyperactive and sonically dense, the largely undoctored sound of a piano in “Inside His Vagina” can't help but catch one's attention. The material's rambunctious spirit persists from one song to the next until the closing moments of “Quick Thinking Inmates” where, one by one, the instruments appear to retire to their respective corners.

With one exception, all of the songs are under five minutes, and most make their point efficiently and then step aside—there's no filler, in other words. There is, however, wackiness aplenty, as Beneva vs. Clark Nova dig into trippy ditties like “Dog Does Eight Impersonations” and “Once Youth With a Crispy Beard.” Peel away the weirdness, however, and you'll find plenty of melodies sweet and simple enough to counter the lunacy.

December 2009