Top Bar
Musique Machine Logo Home ButtonReviews ButtonArticles ButtonBand Specials ButtonAbout Us Button
SearchGo Down
Search for  
With search mode in section(s)
And sort the results by
show articles written by  
 Review archive:  # a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z

Andrew Chalk, Ralf Wehowsky & Eric Lanzi - Yang-tul [Cold Spring - 2016]

Yang-Tul is a re-release of a collaboration between these three sound artists originally put out on Anomalous records in 1998. It consists of two side long pieces of unheimlich slowly evolving sounds evoking notions of spectres and the spirit world from which the album's title is drawn. The Yang-tul as the note in the digipak explains is in Tibetan mysticism an emanation proceeding from a higher form of spirit called a Tulpa.

The first piece Wycha was composed by Chalk using material supplied by Wehowsky and consists principally of layered drones and textures slowly phasing and panning across the stereo field. Over its near twenty-two minute duration various unidentifiable sounds bubble furtively in the background while never fully coming into the open. At times they could be the sound of a distant foundry and at others the growling and scratching of some ferocious beast. As an attempt to conjure the atmosphere of exotic dread implicit in the album's theme it functions well although in all honesty I would have liked to have had a little more going on. The central rumbling drone continues throughout with little or no change and there is an ever present sound of phase modulation which somewhat undoes the otherwise organic quality to the composition.

The second piece Chalawy is only slightly shorter than the first and was put together by Wehowsky with materials from the other two collaborators. Here elements of found sounds and misused percussion vie for attention over queasy organ and brass drones. Half way through the clanking of wood and metal is surrounded by tortured screams and groans vaguely reminiscent of Nurse With Wound's classic A Short Dip in the Glory Hole, albeit here they swirl about the mix as if seeping in from the walls of some remote log cabin. Quite creepy stuff. After a couple of minutes of this the spirits depart and the scratching and rumbling drones carry on their work. Just before the piece comes to an end they make a return for an encore before again fading back into the walls.

Both pieces here are characteristic of a type of post-industrial organic sounding music that was common around the turn of the millennium. Artist like Colin Potter, Jonathan Coleclough, Christoph Heeman and the three artists involved in this record produced many intriguing examples of music that straddled the borders of ambient, new-age, drone and modern composition and played technological intervention off against chance, environmental and seemingly mundane sources. As a result of this aesthetic most of this work - including Yang-tul has aged well. However as a style it has never to my ears got beyond the level of "hmm interesting" and twenty years later it's difficult to pick out any real stand-out examples of the form. As such the reasons for choosing this record for a re-release instead of say Coleclough and Chalk's Sumac from 1997 are not clear. It's a nice, somewhat chilly example of dark drone based music which never yields to cliché, but in end the most I can say is hmm interesting.

Rating: 3 out of 5Rating: 3 out of 5Rating: 3 out of 5Rating: 3 out of 5Rating: 3 out of 5

Duncan Simpson
Latest Reviews

Andrew Chalk, Ralf Wehowsky & Eri...
Yang-Tul is a re-release of a collaboration between these three sound artists originally put out on Anomalous records in 1998. It consists of two side long p...
290324   Piranha - Piranha(DVD)
280324   Typhoon Club - Typhoon Club(B...
270324   Jerzy Skolimowski Collection ...
260324   Latex Choker - Sealed
260324   Occlusion - 59: No Input Wall
260324   Nihil Impvlse - Anabasis
260324   Marta Forsberg - Sjunger För...
260324   The New Boy - The New Boy( Th...
250324   The Stargazer’s Assistant - ...
250324   Liza Lim - Annunciation Trip...
Latest Articles

The Music of Clay Ruby & Burial H...
Over the last couple of decades Wisconsin native, Clay Ruby has been creating some of the world’s finest dark electronic music under the Burial Hex mon...
280324   The Music of Clay Ruby & Buri...
290224   Sutcliffe No More - Normal Ev...
100124   Occlusion - The Operation Is...
181223   Best Of 2023 - Music, Sound &...
051223   Powerhouse Films - Of Magic, ...
181023   IO - Of Sound, Of Art, Of Exp...
210923   Lucky Cerruti - Of Not so Fri...
290823   The Residents - The Trouble W...
110723   Yotzeret Sheydim Interview - ...
250523   TenHornedBeast - Into The Dee...
Go Up
(c) Musique Machine 2001 -2023. Twenty two years of true independence!! Mail Us at questions=at=musiquemachine=dot=comBottom