Articles
2010 Artist Picks
Francesco Tristano
Albums
36
Access To Arasaka
Aeroplane Trio
Christian Albrechsten
Gilles Aubry
Andreas Bick
Wil Bolton
Caroline
Chaim
Scott Cortez
Dead Voices On Air
Margaret Dygas
F. Gerard Errante
Seren Ffordd
Field Rotation
Marcus Fischer
The Ghost of 29 Megacycles
Tania Gill
Gord Grdina Trio
Herion
Hummingbird
Ironomi
Yoshio Machida
Machinefabriek / Liondialer
Phil Manley
Matta
Mem1
me:mo
Miko
Momus
Moshimoss
Roger O'Donnell
orchestramaxfieldparrish
Cédric Peyronnet
Resoe
Danny Saul
Dirk Serries
Shedding
Clive Tanaka y su orquesta
Robert Scott Thompson
Two People In A Room
Undermathic
Wires Under Tension
Clive Wright
Compilations
Joachim Spieth Selected 6
Playing with Words
Reconstruction of Fives
20 Centuries Stony Sleep
EPs
Balmorhea
Clara Moto
d_rradio
Deepgroove
Kyle Bobby Dunn
Fear Falls Burning
Hammock
ptr1
Quiroga
Sawako
Dead Voices On Air:
From Afar All Stars Spark And Glee
Lens Records
Mark Spybey is nothing if not prolific: his latest Dead Voices on Air full-length is his fourteenth to date and was the second issued during 2010. Even so, From Afar All Stars Spark And Glee is a high-quality outing indeed that suggests that the project is not suffering in any way from a lack of ideas or inspiration. Spybey, a one-time Zoviet-France member who left the group in 1992 to pursue his own vision (and who is currently working with fellow Zoviet-France alumnus Robin Storey as Reformed Faction), is no doubt an old hand at this sort of thing by now, but the hour-long collection of music on the new release shows no signs of rust or corrosion. It's a heavily atmospheric recording where strings, pianos, field recordings, and disembodied voices thread themselves through blurry ambient-industrial-drone landscapes.
Spybey's got a number of stylistic tricks up his sleeve, and many are brought forth during the album, among them trippy sound collages, ambient settings, and even a vocal piece. “Something Maybe” enters the picture in a huge swirling mass of blurry tones and vocal emissions before a large choir takes over with a forceful delivery that matches the opening episode in intensity. That vocal part is in turn supplanted by a brooding, kosmische musik-styled section, which again pulsates with urgency. “This Silence Where the Murmours Lie” serves up nine gaseous minutes of symphonic ambient material, while “The Far Fields Melt My Heart” is a gloomy and war-torn soundscaping collage of the kind that would appeal to fans of Coil and the like. Phantasmagoric in nature, “Locusts Drummed the Darkening Air” relocates the Dead Voices on Air sound to the Far East where Chinese percussion strikes intertwine with distorted voices and glimmering streams. There are restrained moments, too: “Till the Dusk” is as peaceful as one would expect it would be, and “The Air is a Mill of Hosts” takes the recording out with restrained industrial-ambient soundscaping.
But one track stands out most of all: the title track, which includes a stunning vocal performance by American-Serbian singer Ivana Salipur. Intended as an homage to the Serbian poet Desanka Maksimovic (1898-1993), the track is a deeply affecting lamentation that wisely cedes the spotlight to Salipur, who takes full advantage of the opportunity and wrings the greatest possible emotion from it. Though only four minutes in length, the vocal drone setting is the one you'll remember long after the album's been filed away.
January 2011