Reviews:
(Dead Angel) It takes a certain level of perversity to release a six-track album with no mention of the actual track titles -- some might say that's taking the concept of mystery a bit too far. Nevertheless, the tracks (which I'll helpfully give my own titles just because I feel like it) are interesting exercises in noise, drone, and feedback created by the duo of Michael Kimaid (percussion, electronics) and Gabe Beam (guitar, electronics). The first track, which we'll call "Sometimes at Four in the Morning When I Can't Sleep Because I Smoked Too Many Cigarettes I Fantasize About Nadine Jansen In Her Maidenform Bra," features draining sheets of feedback and bursts of crunchy, scrunchy noise that are occasionally emphasized by random drum hits, coming across like an incredible simulation of glaciers in the Arctic circle engaging in rousing acts of erotic telepathy. Machine-like squeaking and unexpected gales of tinnitus-inducing feedback just add to the composition's unnerving feel. On the second track (that's "Honey, Why Did You Leave Expired Milk in the Fridge Without Telling Me?" to you), simmering waves of feedback and lethargic percussion are overlaid with groaning sounds that are probably bowed strings but sound uncomfortably like a trapped person groaning in distress. The third track, "Pinballs in Heat," is a clattering collection of percussive sounds and twitchy guitar squeaks, while the fourth track -- "Merzbow and The Goat of a Thousand Young Give Birth To a Field of Radioactive Crickets" -- sounds like a vast field of crickets with efx boxes serenading a series of submarines being disassembled underwater. In the fifth track, "The Door Was Built So I Could Slam It Shut When Avon Comes Calling," irregular drum hits and inscrutable percussive noodling is offset by weird sounds of an indeterminate nature and the ghost-like texture of amp hum in the background, a sound only audible in the spaces between the chaos. The final track, a 25-minute epic of noise and deviance I like to call "Pictures of a Locust Colony Devouring Pictures At An Exhibition," is a seething superstructure of random percussion, hideous buzzing, and chaotic waves of sound that winds down about halfway through, turning more minimalist in structure and less chaotic in sound, until the density of sound builds up again, finally culminating in passage of amp hum, feedback drones, and doomed-out percussion that finally devolves into more minimalist clatter over the omnipresent amp hum. The total result is an impressive combination of drone, noise, and percussion that's surprisingly far more accessible than most Eh? releases, and one that's highly recommended. - RKF
(Killed In Cars) This release features the “principal agents” behind the KBD Sonic Cooperative, with Michael Kimaid on percussion and electronics, and Gabe Beam on guitar and electronics. This is the second Eh? release from these folks, minus Ryan Dohm who also appeared on the earlier “Four Plus One” album. This time around, we get six more untitled tracks of EAI, very cleanly recorded in a very “controlled” sounding, intimate room. The music is produced with percussion (including a lot of bowed cymbals/gongs), guitar (which mostly sounds like “tabletop guitar” with effects), and an arsenal of electronics. The music evolves slowly in these pieces, usually letting ideas overlap one another for a long time. The first two tracks focus on long tones and sustained atmospheres, and the third piece starts to introduce contrasting ideas, made mostly of short, pointillistic bursts. Polyrhythms of sorts are featured in the fourth piece, with oscillations against softly-repeated drums that come and go amidst subtle guitar manipulations. Like their previous release, the final track is a live performance around 25 minutes in length: while the album mostly works with gentle, carefully unfolding textures, things can get much louder and more intense in live performance, briefly building up to a wall of sound around the six minute mark. But that’s an exception, and most of the live set stays well below fortissimo as well, thoughtfully blending a variety of axillary percussion tools, cymbals, gongs, and occasional undercurrents of sizzling electronic drones. - Scott Scholz
(Kathodik) Agitatori sonori, con un cospicuo numero di produzioni alle spalle (nei più disparati formati), KBD(uo), proseguono nel percorso, intrapreso dal 2006, come KBD Sonic Cooperative, dove trovano ospitalità artisti della scena sperimentale di Toledo (Ohio). Questa nuova uscita, vede all'opera, i due membri fondatori del progetto artistico, Michael Kimaid (percussioni, elettronica) e Gabe Beam (chitarra, elettronica). "Any Port In A Storm", opta per una lenta corrosione sensoriale, cupa e fortemente evocativa. Elettroacustica impro, che si muove lenta e torpida. Un plumbeo svilupparsi di gassose, affascinanti sequenze, figlie legittime dell'industrial, quanto dell'isolazionismo (dalle parti circa, di Illusion Of Safety). Metalli sfiorati risuonanti nel vuoto, elettronica sfrigolante mai invasiva, piccoli grumi di noise, a rilasciar più marcate interferenze. Silenzi minacciosi ed aritmie free. Disgregazione ed apparizioni improvvise. Intensa e ben strutturata opera, "Any Port In A Storm". Esala ispida, bradipa eleganza. - Marco Carcasi
(Monsieur Délire) A duo consisting of Michael Kimaid (percussion & electronics) and Gabe Beam (guitar & electronics). Non-idiomatic improvisations of a certain appeal. Fine and original use of electronics - crude but successful. - François Couture
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