Genre: Experimental
01 – Haifa Hi-Fi
02 – Figure of Failure ii
03 – Tuesday on Sunday
04 – for i.d. ii
Improvisation in music is language, ask any Jazz musician – who are without peer in terms of the structured spontaneity of sound – and all language is internalized before being externalized; think before you speak (subconsciously or not), sing within before you sing without. However, Brekekekexkoaxkoax, despite the voluminous scenes and quotes on improvisation present “we used to be such good friends” as less language than demonstration in exponential experimentalism sparsely presented in whispered menacing free jazz form.
Brekekekexkoaxkoax’s “we used to be such good friends” is a performance group of considerable sonic divergence. The four tracks metronome, from the aforementioned free jazz (tracks 1, 3) to the darkly smothered performance (tracks 2, 4) of Josh Ronsen, whose compositions divagate unexpectedly. This dichotomous dovetailing presents quite the offset and one that is trying on the senses.
This Brekekekexkoaxkoax jam session (tracks 1, 3 ramping up an est. 50 minutes) embarks tangled. Guitar is scraped, harmonically diced, violin pizzicato prickles like a flurry of the many-legged running late, snare drum softly cachinnates and squirreling clarinet and oboe rummage for synchronicity... With all this squirming one could imagine little rest, but the ensemble proves patience and disengagement is best for breath: places ‘tween the scampered chaos is redolent with panoply of scents and space. Slighting the freeform exposition is the dark instability that runnels the belly of the conglomerate’s sonorous output as the pursuit of experimentation burrows unexpected organic tunnels. There is certain post-modern appreciation of the first electronic/sound experimentalists here, the blurts, the faltering, the jerking, the whispering, the spooling, the tightening, the wavering, the upswelling, the festering. “we used to be such good friends” is resolutely peppered.
The pairing against Ronsen’s solo productivity breaks first with a four minute gorge of; turntable, vocals, electronics and computer delineating his squeezed wedge of dark ambience. Almost an afterthought given another score minute of the ensemble’s metamorphosing before Josh returns with haunting dominance of a bowed bass guitar and nothing else. No effects. No overdubs. No electronic processing. It spooks. Caterwaul of moans and squeals, where feedback filaments further layers of sound, peel from the sawn low-end strings, a didgeridoo of thickened bass.
If “we used to be such good friends” is indeed improvisation, a language, it is unlikely to ever be successfully translated.
A jewel-case with laser printed CDr bears the group’s lengthy and unpronounceable moniker. Plastered inside the aesthetically middling four-page colour booklet is text on the aforementioned “improvisation” and liner notes. Uninspired vivid saturation colours the cover’s artwork, though for a CDr at least there has been attempt at providing something other than a computerized burn.
