A collection of .aiff audio from digital sound designers around the globe.the structuring code for the future of synthetic environments.

.aiff is a brief look into the near future of 12k showcasing new artists and samplings of upcoming full-length releases. This compilation is also an important landmark in 12k’s evolution: it explores more experimental sounds and compositions alongside the minimal, synthetic post-techno for which the label is known.

(all tracks are previously unreleased)

Taylor Deupree: USA: 12k

Owner of 12k, Taylor Deupree offers “Kita,” a cyclical experimental track built up from not-quite-synced loops of tiny sounds and rhythmic elements. All of the sound generation and composition was done in software on a macintosh computer. “Geo” picks up from where 1998’s Comma, full length cd left off with minimal, synthetic techno although not quite as clean and straightforward as its predecessors.

*0: Japan: Mu-Label

*0 is Nosei Sakata from the Shibuya-Ku area of Tokyo. He runs his own cd-r label called Mu and has caught the attention of many of his contemporaries with his debut release “0.00.” “Psi” is a stripped-down exercise in frequency and rhythm using raw sinewave computertones. *0 is part of the new wave of Japanese minimalists exploring this computerized anti-music.

Komet: Germany: Rastermusic

Frank Bretschneider is well known as a founder and artist of the Raster.Music label in Chemnitz, Germany. “Street,” originally composed as part of a project called ‘Manhattan,’ has mellow ambient washes that slowly morph into rhythm. “Linien” lays a bleepy triplet beatbox rhythm over stark tones and modulations. Komet’s clean, precise sound and synthetic rhythms are a perfect match for the 12k aesthetic.

Shuttle358: USA: 12k

“Gone” is a glimpse into the sound of Shuttle358 and the upcoming full-length release, Optimal.LP. Dan Abrams, an art student from california, superbly blends soothing and sparse ambient tones with bursts of noise and other digital interruptions creating a very listenable ambient/experimental hybrid. Optimal.LP (12k1005) will be released in the spring of 99.

Klip: Greece: 12k

Klip is Savvas Ysatis from Athens, Greece. Known for his past work as Omicron (KK (Belgium), Instinct (USA)) and collaborations with Taylor Deupree as SETI, Futique, and Arc, Savvas now records for the world-renown Tresor Records in Germany. “Lowlands” is from a never-released Omicron album of stark alien soundscapes.

Kim Rapatti: Finland: Dum Records

Founder of Dum Records in Finland, Kim Rapatti’s “Mainio” is a perfect blueprint of the Finnish techno sound; a minimum of icy sounds woven together in loopy, hypnotic form.

Goem: Netherlands: Audio.nl

Goem are Frans De Waard, Peter Duimelinks, & Roel Meelkop. Creating compositions with usually no more than a kick drum and simple oscillators, their productions explore rhythm and negative space. “Comp Drie” is a brooding piece with distorted high frequencies and a rumbling low end.

The packaging for .aiff was mechanically designed and laser cut from translucent mylar by Dan Abrams based on the 12k floppy disc logo. The package contains a clear insert card with the track listing and credits.

Artists

Taylor Deupree

Technology and imperfection. The raw and the processed. Curator and curated. Solo explorer and gregarious collaborator. The life and work of Taylor Deupree are less a study in contradictions than a portrait of the multidisciplinary artist in a still-young century. Deupree is an accomplished sound artist whose recordings, rich with abstract atmospherics, have appeared on numerous record labels, and well as in site-specific installations at such institutions as the ICC (Tokyo, Japan) and the Yamaguchi…

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Savvas Ysatis

A native of Athens Greece, Savvas Ysatis began with a fascination for synthesizers at the turn of the 80’s. Inspired to pursue his own electronic identity, at age 15 he left Athens for New York where he remained until the late 90’s. His work both solo and in collaboration has appeared on labels such as Instinct, KK, Plastic City, Caipirinha, V2, 12K, Tresor, Sony/BMG, and Nuevo under a multitude of aliases such as Omicron, Seti,…

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Frank Bretschneider

Frank Bretschneider is a musician, composer and video artist in Berlin. His work is known for precise sound placement, complex, interwoven rhythm structures and its minimal, flowing approach. Bretschneider’s subtle and detailed music is echoed by his visuals: perfect translated realizations of the qualities found in music within visual phenomena. Bretschneider (1956) was raised in Karl-Marx-Stadt (Chemnitz since 1990), where his aesthetic developed as he listened to pirate radio and smuggled Beastie Boys tapes in…

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Goem

Goem started mid 1996 when Roel Meelkop gave Frans de Waard a smallelectronic device, which he found in a thriftshop in Rotterdam. Thedevice was called the Student Stimulator. Until today it is unknownwhat it was used for, but most likely it was part of a researchprogram exploring the mysteries of human sleep. The machine justgenerates pulses, of which speed and intensity can be changed. Fransdabbled around with the machine using Steve Reich’s Phase Shiftingtechniques and…

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