Another split 3″ featuring Nihil Est Excellence (see also Vital Weekly 310), this time featuring also works by Alphonse De Montfroyd. This is the nom de plume of Alexy Pilipenko from the Ukraine, who was before in a band with the same name, whom I never heard but who sound gothic from the descriptions. He offers three tracks. The first is a violin loop that is hummed away in drones. The sound sources for the “Le Dialogue Digital’ is not be defined, but is a dark howl, fed through or by some sound effects. Lighter tone and shorter in length, but with the same source unknown is the third piece. Nihil est Excellence is Andrey Kiritchencko (also from the Ukraine), and he has one piece of laptop crackles and feedback. Apperentely he takes his sources from concrete sounds, recorded with a microphone, but he knows well how to hide his sources. A sturdy piece that fits with the best from the west. (FdW)
Review
Alla Zagaykevych – Motus
The Nexsound label may have released a whole bunch of different music on MP3, CDR and CD, but so far they didn’t touch the serious avant-garde. But with the release of ‘Motus’ by Alla Zagaykevych they do. She is from the Ukraine and studied at the conservatorium in Kiev, composition and orchestration and later on at the IRCAM in Paris. In 1998 she set up the Musical Electronic Studio. Her works is both for chamber ensembles, solo instruments aswell as electronica. This nicely packed CD contains five of her works, of which the title piece is a strict electronic composition in the best IRCAM composers tradition. On the other end of the spectrum is ‘Gravitation’ for two violin-cellos and ‘Sans L’Eloignement De La Terre’ violin, guitar and accordion and for both no electronics. The two other pieces combines instruments and electronic. The nicest piece there is ‘Pagode’ for block-flutes (which I thought were called ‘recorders’ in english) and live electronics. Here both elements blend together and acoustic instrument becomes one with the electric charges – or perhaps vice versa. The serious composing of the aforementioned ‘Sans L’Eloignement De La Terre’ and ‘Gravitation’ is probably done nicely, but the kind of music is never well-spend on me. I guess it just makes me nervous, but perhaps this works better in a concert auditorium. ‘Heromeya’ works stylistically in the same way, but the electronics take over and makes this into a highly complex but great piece. The title piece is a bit of an odd-ball in this collection with it’s serious connotations, but it works well. I guess a good introduction to Zagaykevych’s work and surely I’d be interested in hearing, especially the electronic work. (FdW)