released January 3, 2019
REVIEWS
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STELZER/MURRAY - COMMUTER (cassette by Humanhood Recordings)
It should be no secret that I know Howard Stelzer pretty well and that I am quite the fan of his
work. Lesser known, perhaps, is the fact that I am also always very pleased to hear new work by
Brendan Murray, even though he doesn't seem very active at the moment when it comes to new
releases. He and Stelzer live in the Boston area and know each other for quite a long time and
they have been working together. It is quite the meeting of two opposites when it comes to
technology. In the left corner, we find mister Stelzer with his cassettes and sound effects and in
the right corner mister Murray with his laptop. When we listen to the three pieces on this cassette
(two on the first side, one on the second) we hear all the familiar elements of both musicians.
Stelzer's use of cassettes with field recordings from electrical currents, factories and magnetic
resonances mingle nicely with the heavy charged drones as cooked up by Murray. In the opening
piece, 'Foliage Capital Of The World', these drones are still quite harmonious, even melodic, but
with a gritty undercurrent, a menace coming towards us, which in 'Molina' has fully arrived and
wiped out everything in vast nuclear blast, leaving wind to have free play over barren land in a
highly charged atmosphere of collapsing factories. Everything comes together in 'Let the Children
Guard What the Sires Have Won'; one massive drone that over the course of twenty-seven minutes
slowly fizzles out, and along the way it is guided by a set of nervous clicks and beats, that towards
the end sound like something Pan Sonic or especially Goem could have done; that final bit takes a
bit too much time, methinks, but then it penetrates right into your skull. If you think 'industrial' music
is all about heavy rhythms and synthesizers, then check out this release, which I think is a much
truer sound reflecting the decay of the post-industrial society. A dystopian soundtrack! (FdW)