JODI
CAVE "FOR MYRIA" (12K1043)
to translate languages, paste text
here: http://babelfish.altavista.com/babelfish/tr
BLOW UP (IT)
Terzo esordiente su 12k, dopo Seaworthy e Pjusk, a venir fuori
dalla più recente antologia-manifesto dell'etichetta
di Taylor Deupree "Blueprints" (BU #104), il britannico
Jodi Cave firma un album di astratto fascino elettroacustico.
Un armeggiare di suoni naturali, slavine di ghiaia o pietrisco,
affiorare di delicati tocchi strumentali (clarinetto, harmonium,
chitarra), macchinazioni tattili, detriti di melodia come intoppi
casuali e processing digitale che sfilano l'uno dopo l'altro,
lentamente nello spettro stereofonico, come davanti ad una macchina
da presa. Ed è come lo svolgersi di un'enigmatica pellicola
audio il cui flettersi, contrarsi e sfarfallare rivela, quasi
d'incanto, un seducente carattere di ragionata casualità.
(7/8) - Nicola Catalano
BODYSPACE (ES)
Ajuda à relativização da mensagem que possa
veicular For Myria tudo aquilo que o afasta de um forma regular
própria de objecto de série. Contribui para isso
o facto de For Myria ser um disco até certo ponto incomodativo
na destabilização e fragmentação
microscópica do que poderia ser uma unidade sólida:
à superfície dos seus exercícios, é
frequente encontrar, como espuma em desintegração,
tudo o que laptop possa manipular virando do avesso sons captados
à fricção (parece) de pedras, metais vários
e fiel recordings. Responsabilize-se por tudo isso o clarinetista
Jodi Cave que, por altura de um segundo disco que o promove
ao catálogo da 12k, vai já merecendo lugar entre
os estetas discretos que deixam presos pelo anzol todos os que
desenvolvem atracção pela sua produção
sem saber expressar exactamente porquê.
Jodi Cave nem parece particularmente preocupado em responder
aos "porquês", que também brotam da insinuação
elegíaca presente no título do álbum e
faixas. Sem deixar de soar ao resultado de um labor cumprido
em alegria, For Myria faz-se de batalhas amigáveis organizadas
em forma de sobreposições sempre sujeitas a um
volte-face interno, que garanta prolongamento isolado às
manifestações da acústica efervescente
ou então aos mais melódicos jogos tonais, após
embate em rondas de 3 a 4 minutos. Quando o resultado entre
esses pólos é o empate, entram em cena os mais
neutros drones e a esterilidade fria de outros sons contínuos
que, caso se aproximassem mais do letal rigor técnico
da sine wave, poderiam mesmo ser confundidos com os habitualmente
produzidos pelos terroristas Pan Sonic.
Rigor e terrorismo não combinam bem debaixo do turbante
de Jodi Cave que só coloca travão na carga física
da sua música por altura de um mais automatizado "Untitled",
uma espécie de ensaio enigmático sobre o contacto
directo entre as goteiras e a base que as recebe (representada
pelo tal som continuo). Como essa, as restantes peças
de For Myria assemelham-se a raras orquídeas cuja apanha
em condições ideais só ocorre em dada estação
do ano. É disco para manter por perto na esperança
de que desabroche um pouco mais. - Miguel Arsénio
CHAINDLK (.COM)
Another fine product on 12k and if you’re into the style
of the label you c bet you won’t be disappointed by Jodi
Cave. Soft, gentle, ambient electronic not so far from other
bands of 12k’s roster and I’m talking about Minamo,
Fourcolours and also Taylor Deupree himself (even if his last
album is more and more “poppy”). I think you already
know Deupree loves japanese musical aesthetics and even if this’
not “japanese electronics”, the zen (apparent) simplicity
of the music is definitely oriental. The sound of this “for
Myria” is a blend of electro-acoustic and ambiental processed
sounds on which he superimposed some sweet/simple childish lullabies.
Quietness is overflowing from every track but though its relaxed
atmosphere the whole listening is far from getting boring. In
some ways this’ a good mixture of ambient music and electronics
and though Jody Cave’s touch is very light, if listened
via headphones you can’t but notice there’s an accurate
sound research/rework behind this cd. Vibraphones and keyboards
are the main instruments for the melody, while an organ drone
creates the corpus of the song “untitled”. Sometimes
you have soft noises to color the canvas or even a “percussive
sound”, but don’t worry, label dogma has been respected:
there’s still no rhythms. Cave decided to use a main instrument
for every song and he concentrated on simple melodies and on
sound processing where needed, the resulting album is quite
homogeneous then. Without any doubt this music is deeply influenced
by minimalism but weren’t minimalists influenced by african
and oriental (gamelan) music?. If you’re into relaxing
music you’d better give a listen to this as well as to
other releases on 12k, it’s music for the soul. Melancholy
will prevail...somehow.
E|I
(US)
For Myria is a personally inscribed universe awash
in swathes of expressionist tone color and arpeggios that scatter
like a flock of birds. As on her contribution to 12k’s
Blueprints compilation, Jodi Cave exhibits tacit concern with
these delicate pulses and pings that stairstep into the stratosphere,
shaded by harmonium, guitar, and clarinet. Here, however, they
are presented in an altogether more musical setting. The same
thumps, skips, and gurgles recur in varying formations, establishing
clear patterns, in relation to which the listener can orient
themselves. Such a structure does not defy any expectation,
but its sense of fluid motion and aquatic ping and delay is
defined and sinewy enough to support one’s attention for
the duration of the tracks, which, on a whole, range from two
to seven minutes in length. With this foundation established,
Cave focusses all the more on developing a strong polychromatic
suite out of her small palette of sounds, collaging together
small melodic scraps that, although they bear little trace of
their original context, are nevertheless imbued with a nostalgic
aura that remains like a residue hidden within the shimmer or
hiss of the respective works. "Untitled", for one,
is a stately, strangely pastoral blend of smooth, artful guitar
figures and fluttering electronic tones. Taken as a whole, it
is a piece of some beauty and sensuality, which is all the more
satisfying for having been arrived at unaffectedly, without
much calculation. The album presents a lightness of touch in
the arrangement of brittle, flinty sounds; and, in general,
pleasing tones fade into each other or fold back on themselves
in a casual, almost playful, yet refined manner. Against the
continuously flowing arc of blips and burbles, then, a stimulating
encounter develops between intention and happenstance, abstraction
and anecdote. These dialogues thereby extend the otherwise admittedly
short life-span of such a record, ensuring the cerebral is counterbalanced
with pleasure of a more sensual kind.
GAZ-ETA (PL)
British sound artists/musician Jodi Cave takes a slightly different
approach on his debut "For Myria". For one, save for
one track that was processed by Taylor Deupree, the album is
a solo venture. Another thing is Cave is more obsessed with
the micro-tones. Larger picture is that of an overlapping of
electronic and acoustic instruments. Sound of vibes, bells,
organ, guitar, clarinet, harmonium is interwoven throughout.
Best of all, Cave utilizes field recordings to add a further
dimension of humanity in his work. "For Myria (One)"
contains water dripping inside of an old toilet tank [at least
that's what I'm picking up] and sounds of melting icicles inside
a remote cave. "Untitled" is an extended harmonium
solo that features a singular tone, with the pitch being altered
ever so slightly. Taylor Deupree does a fantastic job in adding
additional processing on "Rara. C", which gives the
piece a more eclectic, more knife-sharp feel. Cave's compositional
muscle lies in the fact that he chooses to do a lot with very
little. Only a few sounds are ever present in any given piece.
This allows listeners to truly concentrate on the work at hand.
Rich debut and one that I predict will open the door for bigger
and greater things in the future.
GO
MAG (ES)
Minimal ambient, De todos los proyectos a los que Taylor Deupree
dio la alternativa en el recopilatorio Blueprints (algo asi
como la cantera de 12k), los noruegos Pjusk y el inglés
Jodi Cave eran los más cercanos a un tratamiento 'concreto'
de la música. Hablamos, pues, de "escultores sonoros",
tipos que situan en la espina dorsal de sus temas grabaciones
de campo maniupladas, densos juegos de capas que luego se recortan
y horadan, que se estiran y se puntean, se filtran y se deshilachan,
hasta convertirlos en un magma grumoso e informe, sobre el que
es posible comenzar a esparcir melodias y chicharra digital....Más
experimental, más osado, Jodi Cave utiliza instrumentos
acústicos (guitarras, clarinetes, un harmonio) para dar
la réplica a las brumosas grabaciones de campo que gusta
de utilizar. Y con semejantes mimbres, le queda un For Myria
delicado y sutil, de trazo neoclasico y vocacion minimalista,
en cuyo interior resulta un gustazo perderse. Material sensible.
- Vidal Romero
HIS
VOICE (CZ)
Pred par lety se Jodi Cave vydal do sveta s klarinetem v ruce
a touhou venovat se pine umeni. Vzory jako Yves Klein, Ad Reinhardt
nebo Agnes Martin odkazuji sice ke sfere vytvarneho umeni, nakonec
se vsak Cave priklonil k hudbe. Pouzil kytaru a harmonium, zapojil
do tvurciho procesu laptop a vydal se s citlivym mikrofonem
na lov prirodnich zvuku. Vysledkem je deska, ktera stejne jako
uctivani malifi inklinuje k minimalismu. Dva az tri tony vzdy
staci ke vzniku kolazi kde glitchovany pocitacovy background
(tekouci voda, skrabani na kamenech, tlumene udery do dreva)
organicky prorusta skrz pomale tony ci jemne hluky klasickych
instrumentu. For Myria je intimni postmoderni zpoved muzikanta,
snaziciho se...
IGLOO (US)
Opening in a gorgeously processed title track filled with wavering,
glowing tones and sparkly crackle Sheffield's Jodi Cave makes
a stunning debut. Equal parts Kim Cascone and Nobukazu Takemura,
the blend is something freshly toothy to the touch, and bits
of a lullaby. Incorporating samples and field recordings he
uses music boxes and the meandering of a toothbrush(?) on "Rara.C"
which sounds dreamy and exploratory. There's a train whizzing
by atop a twinkling flash of tiny clicks and a daydream harmony
that is residual from “For Myria (Two)” which is
a sleepy piece that sounds a whole lot like labelmate Skoltz_Kolgen.
The “Unititled” tracks seems oddly different from
the rest here. Contemplative, drawn, paced like a gauzy funeral
dirge. Throughout Cave conducts a whole ritual of moving physical
objects about with the additions of peculiar birds, breath and
other vestiges emanating sound in her surroundings. For Myria
is so full of emotive, tones in a multitude of strange hues,
dark and light, and everyday.
LOSING TODAY (IT)
L'etichetta 12k la conosciamo come una delle più avanti,
sempre in prima fila per le produzioni avanguardistiche moderne,
fregandosene dei trend. E così non stupisce trovarci
ad ascoltare i piccoli fragilissimi passaggi di musica elettronica
che sono i mattoni che compongono il primo album per Jodi Cave.
Egli riesce a fare a meno del ritmo, della cadenza e abolisce
ogni (sovra)struttura nota. I suoi suoni giacciono in un iperspazio
sensitivo, come nella lunga 'For Myria (one)' che apre l'album.
Jodi Cave sa che è essenziale concentrarsi sulle pause,
sui silenzi e sulle assenze di suono per avere un minimalismo
concreto. Così accade in 'For Sine and Breath Tones'.
Più sperimentali le incursioni nel field-recordings dei
tre pezzi 'Rara.A-B-C' che ricordano alcuni esperimenti di Kim
Hiorthøy, anche se meno concreti. "For Myria"
non è un album facile, e di certo non per tutti; ma sarà
apprezzato da chi è alla ricerca di tappeti sonori fragili
e delicati.
LOST
AT SEA (UK)
Efforts made at comprehending artists who operate within the
tiniest of musical sub-niches can warp the mind. Par exemple:
For Myria isn\'t an album you can throw on while showering
before a night on the razz; nor is it ideal dinner-party background
music. Multitasking, dwindling amounts of attention, distractions
and interference can often misplace the minimalism, subtle instrumentation
and randomness of this field; if For Myria's appeal
is to be truly uncovered, it demands the listener to surrender
his or her absolute attention.
Like much of 12k\'s repertoire, newcomer Jodi Cave has chosen
to focus on tones and textures rather than melodies with For
Myria, his debut full-length. His compositions tend to
ebb and flow in terms of structure, consisting of sparse glockenspiel
tinklings, muffled hums and ground failure noises, coming together
as a delicate, transcendent patchwork of sound. Though melody
tends to play second fiddle, Cave keeps things warm and fuzzy,
positioning For Myria on the brighter end of the minimalist
electronic spectrum.
The album's nine-minute opener, "For Myria (One),"
sets the scene, emerging with a collection of processed whirrs
before a torrent of pattering electronic noise takes over. "Rara.A"
sounds like the result of a microphone being scraped with a
coin, with Cave\'s chiming glockenspiel and enveloping sine
waves frolicking in the background, while "For Sine and
Breath Tones" ends the record with the digital manipulation
of a sustained hiss.
Though bright and affable, For Myria falls some way
short of spectacular. The instrumentation works well, but Cave
tends to stumble over the noisier elements, which lack the experimentalism
and diversity of, say, Sebastien Roux. For Myria marks
another noteworthy episode for 12k, exhibiting the potential
for Cave\'s to elevate his recordings from proficient to distinguished.
He has some ground to make, but For Myria shows promise.
MAPSADAISICAL
(.COM)
Being on 12k, I can probably be economical with the word count
here, as the following can be taken for granted with each of
these two releases: minimalist, microscopic attention to detail
(extending to the moody landscapes on the covers, as you can
see below) and fanatical obsession with the qualities of sound.
Jodi Cave’s record is the more nature-fixated and minimalist,
overlaid with all manner of tiny scrabbly sounds, a few of which
I’ll somewhat misguidedly try to describe. “For
Myria (One)” sees him cooking bacon in a tent on a rainy
day (probably), all delicious crackles and spatter. After this
comes “Rara A” during which Cave takes label heid
bummer Taylor Deupree for a stroll through the park, kicking
stones at birds as they go; stopping off for an ice-cream (of
course). “Untitled” is a churchy drone, while “For
Myria (Two)” features beautiful music box tones.
OCTOPUS
(FR)
Après une contribution sur la compilation Blueprints
en 2006, voici sur le même label 12K - maison-mère
américaine de nombreux artistes évoluant dans
des univers électroniques minimaux aux frontières
du silence - le 1er album de l'Anglais Jodi Cave. Suivant les
canons de l'écurie 12K, Cave travaille à partir
d'une palette réduite, faite de collage entre instruments
acoustiques (clarinette, guitare, harmonium), field recordings
et manipulations électroniques, s'inscrivant dans une
démarche minimaliste, conceptuelle et abstraite. Cave
cite d'ailleurs comme principale influence les peintres Yves
Klein, Agnès Martin ou encore Ad Reinhardt. Ces courtes
compositions picturales sont à ranger aux côtés
de nombreuses autres références de ce même
label, dont le catalogue présente une grande cohérence
: bien agencée et produite mais n'offrant rien de particulier
ni d'étonnant, cette réalisation s'avère
finalement, comme beaucoup d'autres, dispensable. - Aymeric
Lozet
ROCKERILLA (IT)
Con l'ennesima uscita di glitch minimale dai toni dolciastri
e sognanti, la 12k compie un mezzo errore pubblicando un album
a tratti scontato. Sebbene si posa ritenere impeccabile nel
suo strutturare con gusto ed attenzione gli elementi elettroacustici
e le sollecitazioni di cristallo, Jodi Cave mostra un approccio
di maniera che poco puo ispirare ascoltatori gia introdotti
alle meraviglie di questi micro-mondi sonori. Gli spazi per
i silenzi o per i field recording si propongono come baluardo
a questa musica dal carattere aleatorio, un incrocio di passioni
e stati di riflessione che pero puo sfiorare la stasi delle
idee originali. Un lavoro troppo in linea con un percorso di
ricerca di una labl che fino ad oggi aveva sempre dimostrato
una sua chiara identita.
SILENT
BALLET (.COM)
“If a minimalist-ambient artist writes a melody, does
it make a sound?” This familiar adage (or possibly one
I just made up) enumerates the problem confronting most ambient
music – what is the line between a soundscape and a song?
Or more precisely: is a conglomeration of field recordings music
or just an artist’s view of the world around them? Trickling
water faucets, clinking bottles, wind chimes, and chirping birds
are among the ‘natural’ elements used to create
For Myria, Sheffield artist Jodi Cave’s first proper release
on the experimental 12K label. The album, which feels more like
an EP than a full-length, gently meanders back and forth between
subtle ambience and the various aforementioned field recordings,
creating a picture of Cave’s hopeful, yet melancholy world.
In the title and opening track “For Myria”, Cave
is able to adeptly toe the line between minimalist-ambience
and melody as the tones and blips quietly arrange to form the
outline of a musical pattern. Yet, he quickly falls off the
fine-rope into a repetitive soundscape abyss as “Rara.A,”
“Rara.B,” and “Rara.C” (which account
for almost a third of the album’s running time) all use
the same looped sample of wind chimes, clinking bottles, and
possibly someone eating soup. The final track brings For Myria
back from the void and redeems the previous monotony using an
unhurried progression of single notes on a keyboard which slowly
descend into an ambient drone, a tasteful ending.
Regardless of what side of the ‘ambient-field recording’
argument one is on, Cave seems to still be undecided as to what
degree melody and ambience will have in his music, leaving For
Myria with a lack of cohesion and direction. However, there
is much promise scattered in this short offering (notably the
first and last tracks), and his next release will be anticipated.
-Thomas Lloyd
SKUG
(DE)
Hier geht es um die präzise Wahrnehmung. Soundartist Jodi
Cave verwendet nur wenige Sounds, um intime Collagen zu erzeugen.
Harmonium, Klarinette, Gitarre, O-Ton_aufnahmen, Metall und
Steine sind die Klangquellen. Hier muss man genau aufpassen,
um nichts zu verpassen. Man sollte solche Artists mit Minimal-Techno
Produzenten zusammenspannen - das Ergebnis könnte reizvoll
sein. Trotz fehlenden Beatgerüsts wirkt das aufregender
als toll produzierte Minimal-Techno-Handarbeit. - Hans Kulisch
TOKAFI
(.COM)
Promising timelessness: A shower of summer rain gently pelting
down on the ears of the listener.
There is a scene in “Kill Bill” when Beatrix Kiddo
(Uma Thurman) and O-Ren Ishii (Lucy Liu) meet for their final
fight in a snow-clad zen garden. A miniature well is pouring
water on a hinged piece of wood, causing it to rebound in intermittant
intervals and creating a delicate rhythm to a scene otherwhise
filled with an intense silence. In just a few seconds, the white
of the snow will be sprayed with blood, but for the shortness
of the moment, the mood is one of peace and tranquility. It
is the place Jodi Cave is taking listeners to on his debut disc.
Cave is the sort of artist who likes to disappear completely
behind his music. He does not own a MySpace account. On the
site of record company 12K, whom he also released a digital
EP and a sampler contribution with, his biography measures roughly
four lines. His personal webpage doesn’t even have one
at all. In a world as secluded as this, every note is either
a personal statement or a friendly puff of wind, a shower of
summer rain gently pelting down on the ears of the listener.
The latter seems to be the case here. While the record may be
called “For Myria”, therefore, it could just as
well be titled “For You” instead. It is a work of
whisper, of quietude, of fragile structures, of sensousness
and sensitivity. It is like the soft aftertaste on your tongue
after sipping on a cup of Jasmin tea. It is music to fall in
love with - and the soundtrack for falling in love to. It is
a personal album with a universal message. It is outspoken,
yet wordless. Among the many wonderful albums the year 2007
has had to offer, it is one of those promising timelessness.
According to Jodi Cave, “it sounds yellow”.
What makes it stand out are three distinct qualities. Firstly,
its purity and minimalism with regards to instrumentation. Secondly,
its effective and loveable combination of organic and processed
material. And finally, the way in which Cave seagues his scenes
into a vivid and deep aural walk along the bank of a furtile
riverscape.
Each of the pieces collected on “For Myria” is a
moment or a mood, short and ephemeral and with as much beauty
as inner tension. The art, to Jodi Cave, lies not in the discovery
of new and unheard sounds, nor in sensational and extravagant
arrangements. To him, the key lies in describing an underlying
truth and emotion with as few words as possible. To this purpose,
his transformations are never complete, they always float silently
in between their original context and a new life. For a second,
you think you can hear birds chirping, mallets touching the
metal of a vibraphone, an accordeon inflating and deflating,
that hinged piece of wood rebounding with a warm thump.
But then the instant passes and the track grows into something
different, a metaphor maybe or simply into thickly sprayed paint
over a pencilled canvas of caligraphy. Even though there is
nothing much happening on the surface of things, these lapses
into a cosmos much bigger and brighter than our own continue
like chronic daydreams.
It is very unlikely that Jodi Cave was ever thinking about that
aforementioned scene in “Kill Bill” when writing
the material to this album. But if he did, he had his DVD player
on pause, freezing the peace and tranquility of the momemt forever.
- Tobias Fischer
TOUCHING
EXTREMES (IT)
Suspended between a slightly material kind of ambient music
- found objects and muffled aural particles disturbing carillon-like
melodies reminiscent of a residual innocence - and its character
of soundtrack for an installation, "For Myria" is
the recording debut of Sheffield's Jodi Cave, originally a clarinettist,
whose main influences are told to be artists such as Yves Klein,
Ad Reinhardt and Agnes Martin. Visuals more than notes, indeed;
no wonder that Cave just says that "Myria sounds yellow"
to describe what the title refers to. For each piece the author
chooses a minimum of hues, comprehensive of electronically treated
sources like the dripping water of the title track, to describe
something akin to that kind of involuntary physical activity
that human bodies exercise while sleeping, movements that are
not decided but prevent us from assuming those contorted positions
that cause difficulties to the circulation of blood in our limbs.
The record flows with a certain grace, at times letting the
listeners focus on fixed, if often pretty frail textures made
of adjacent harmonics and wavering resonances, "Untitled"
being the best example in that sense. Music whose subsistence
depends on the level of non-attachment to the surroundings that
the receiver brings into the equation: if one looks for abundance
of content, delusions wait around the corner. But managing to
deliver our head from interferences by escaping from the fear
of what could happen one hour later will brand this experience
an enriching one.
VITAL
WEEKLY (NL)
12K's compilation 'Blueprints' (see Vital Weekly 550) was supposed
to be the stepping stone of a bunch of newly signed artists.
Pjusk was the first to do their debut (Vital Weekly 575) and
now it's time for Jodi Cave from the UK. Unlike Pjusk, Cave
did leave an impression on the compilation, with some musique
concrete inspiration composition. On 'For Myria' this is continued,
but incorporated in a more musical setting. Cave is capable
of handling many instruments, such as harmonium, clarinet and
guitar, which he waves along side field recordings, stones,
scraps of metal, some of the recording at close range: the musique
concrete element. Seven pieces, somewhere between nine and two
minutes. The good news is that Cave plays some mighty fine music.
The combination of the music side with the concrete sounds works
fine. The downside is that there is not much difference between
this and so many others. It's almost if there is a blueprint
(pun intended) out there, follow these seven stepsto create
this type of music. As such I really didn't hear much new in
the work of Jodi Cave. But as someone recently asked me wether
it's really necessary to have something new going on all the
time, or that it's my own person who wants that (perhaps as
a result of hearing so much of everything). That is a valid
question, I think, and one I can't answer too easily. Indeed
it might be the overkill of this (as well as other kinds of
music, say noise) kind of music that makes me a bit harsh on
what is released as such, but I realize one can't always be
original. Perhaps for some people, and maybe Jodi Cave is such
a person, it's good enough to make some music which is just
nice to hear. Cave certainly made such as CD. It's well made,
sounds great, but alas is not the most original one. (FdW)
WHITE
LINE (UK)
Yet another talent lifted from last year’s excellent “Blueprints”
showcase CD issued by American minimalist supremos, 12k. Jodi
Cave is the latest in a growing line of composers to get a full
length debut for the label from that collection. The enigmatically
titled, “For Myria”, is a kind of scratch pad of
loosely related ideas assembled by Cave from an economy of components
and limited instrumentation. Opening with For Myria (one), that
seeps into consciousness with lush, dappled sampling, threaded
with evanescent tones and tinklings, it comes over as a kind
of aural Jackson Pollock painting, splashed and spattered as
it is, with a spectrum of found sounds and disjointed instruments,
not unlike some of the more expansive moments exhibited by label
mate, Sebastien Roux.
In fact, on repeated listens, it becomes apparent that the whole
album has that textbook 12k sound, with occasional similarities
to several of the artists on the label. Delicate melodic sweeps
emerge on some pieces, that are not dis-similar to Motion or
Fourcolour, skippy sampling a la Sogar, or Sawako, and bleepy
tonal washes here and there very much akin to Annti Rannisto,
or Minamo. It would be almost impossible to imagine this collection
being issued by any other label, such is the strength of its
presence.
High points for me would be the three “Rara” pieces,
A, B and C, an intricately worked series of “barely there”
melodies that hover just below the itchy, visceral samplings
that sound like gently clinking wine glasses, or a contact mic
rasping over silk. Label master, Taylor Deupree adds his characteristic
touch to Rara C , but does not overwhelm the piece with his
presence. Closing track “For Sine and Breath Tones”
is a rich tonal workout, an exercise in compositional restraint
that trades momentary silences for slices of sublime minimalist
instrumentation, and warm, expansive chords on the keyboards,
that over 7 minutes, gradually swells and closes with a delicate,
glitchy skrim of found sound. It might be presumptuous of me
to suggest that this collection was created by Mr Cave specifically
with 12k in mind, or maybe he has simply discovered a niche
that suits the label’s general remit. More encouragingly
though, tracks like “Untitled” or “For Sine
and Breath Tones” would suggest that Cave also has the
imagination and maturity to explore, exploit, and experiment
with a slightly wider pallette, and this I look forward to very
much on subsequent releases.
Once again, we are treated to a fine debut from a promising
artist, who has produced a mature, and engaging slice of near-minimalism
that for the most part connects at the right level, and further
secures 12k as one of the most prominent and ground breaking
minimalist labels in the world at this time.
THE WIRE (UK)
This is the second album by Sheffield's Jodi Cave and it's an
unassuming, sweetly desultory collection of pieces, in which
field recordings and natural instruments are threaded together
by computer processing. Cave started life as a clarinettist
and he plays that instrument, plus harmonium and guitar alongside
various close-miked objects, which could be marbles, stones,
or bits of flint, pottering around in the mix. In its inconsequential
absorption, it suggests a man engrossed in some hobby of a late
afternoon as the light fades, whittling, rattling, sharpening
and polishing various cherished bits and bobs on a workshop
in a shed. There's a sense that, rather than create some ridigly
girded technological structure in which to house all of these
objects and elements, he's let them roll around as they please,
finding their own place and direction. The Myria of the title,
it seems, is not a female - Cave gives the air of being far
too preoccupied with music to have time for that sort of thing
- but a vague intimation of the colour yellow. - David Stubbs
