Asmus Tietchens / Robert Rutman - Schritt Um Schritt / Buzz Off (Die Stadt, 1999)

1 Asmus Tietchens - Schritt Um Schritt 4:47
2 Robert Rutman - Buzz Off 7:58

Le truc important que j'ai oublié de préciser hier; c'est qu'Asmus Tietchens jouera, avec Le Syndicat, le 25 novembre aux Instants Chavirés....

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Z'EV / John Duncan / Aidan Baker / Fear Falls Burning - Untitled (Die Stadt, 2005)

A Z'EV - Elementonal 5:01
B John Duncan - Offffffff 5:01
C Aidan Baker - Drone Four (Excerpt) 10:06
D Fear Falls Burning - The Beautiful Decline (Excerpt) 9:47
CD1-1 Z'EV - Untitled 20:34
CD1-2 John Duncan - Bkg 12:03
CD2-1 Fear Falls Burning - Drone Four 36:46
CD2-2 Aidan Baker - The Beautiful Decline (Declining Mix) 14:15
CD2-3 Aidan Baker - The Beautiful Decline (Declined Mix) 9:58

On October 2nd 2005, the four above mentioned names performed at Bremen's Lagerhaus in a concert curated by Die Stadt's Jochen Schwarz who, in customary fashion, released a commemorative double 7-inch of the proceedings, one track for each artist. No surprises as to what we get: Z'ev's "Elementonal" is a crashing pandemonium of metal and irregular rhythm, John Duncan's "Offffffff" sounds like treated white noise (but it could be heavily processed breath or something), Aidan Baker's "Drone Four (Excerpt)" explores different approaches to guitar looping in what is the deepest music on offer, while the flat repetition of Fear Falls Burning (aka Vidna Obmana)'s "The Beautiful Decline (Excerpt)" is the shallowest. What counts more is the double CD that comes with the limited mail order edition, which finds the four manipulating and reworking each other's sounds in settings that allow the mind better to adapt to the sonic circumstances. Z'ev transforms a short field recording by Duncan into a violent grey uncertainty of haunting voices and concrete rumbles saturating the listening space with oppressive power. Duncan's response in "BKG" is to attack tweeters with nails and teeth and send the listener into a maze of intoxicating distorted sibilance. Disc 2 finds Fear Falls Burning and Aidan Baker at work on each other's trance-fusion: Baker's "Drone Four" is re-looped and progressively degraded with effects and slow beats into something curiously reminiscent of sections of Genesis' "White Mountain", while Baker's remix of "The Beautiful Decline" adds some much-needed inner movement, transforming it into a Frippertronic forest fire with hopelessly screaming guitars heard from every treetop.
Paris Transatlantic

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John Duncan - Crucible (Die Stadt, 1999)

1 Crucible (23:11)

CRUCIBLE is a 23 minute sound installation recorded at an outdoor concert in the tiny village of Topolò on the Italian-Slovenian border in July 1997. Its thunderous opening is literally the sound of a downpour which Duncan harnesses and treats to produce something elemental yet edgily unnatural. Bruce Gilbert's work springs to mind though Duncan has a less synthetic touch. The aquatic theme continues as water drains down pipes, gutters and sewers. Thereafter an eerie quiescence pervades. There is still static in the ether, the ebb and flow of mountain air currents and the occasional chance human or animal intervention, but it is the calm after the storm.
How Duncan actually achieved this process is ... ultimately inconsequential. Presented in a neat wooden box, the results reveal little but yield something fresh with each listen.
The Wire

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John Duncan - Phantom Broadcast (Allquestions, 2002)

1 Phantom Broadcast (47:08)

At one point in an artist's life there's a sort of revelation, something telling him all the routes took so far have finally fused in a single course, lightened by a "north star" indicating all his next choices and moves. In John Duncan's case, I feel his continuing exploration of frequencies' manifestations has lately yielded a music that reaches a calm detachment, even when emotionally charged at its most. Now, what do I hear in the 47 minutes of "PHANTOM BROADCAST"? The answer is: powerful harmony (both in musical and "inner self" sense), shifting orchestral chordal streams, a stretching tubular bell sound, male and female voices, a trembling cello in the realm of low notes, a couple of jet engines during a slow transit towards somewhere I could not figure out, a pumping, massive breathing by all human beings remaining alive despite ongoing tragedies; all in all, I felt wrapped in sound and protected. Were all these things really there? Of course not, as this record was made with modestly treated shortwaves only - just like that, but it's maybe one of the best, if not THE best among Duncan's "static" releases. I'm afraid I'm forever trapped in your radio frequency, John - but please don't show me the way out.
Massimo Ricci, Touching Extremes

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John Duncan / Andrew Chalk & Christoph Heemann - The Elgaland-Vargaland National Anthem / Old Hive (Die Stadt, 1998)

A John Duncan The Elgaland-Vargaland National Anthem (2:34)
B Andrew Chalk & Christoph Heemann Old Hive (6:03)

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