SPLITTER ORCHESTER/FELIX KUBIN - Shine On You Crazy Diagram
"Triggered by the 2015 edition of the Labor Sonor Festival Translating Music" in Berlin, this split album between the Splitter Orchester and Felix Kubin offers two sides of the same coin, sometimes appearing like the rendering of an identikit picture. Taking up side A of the album, the Splitter Orchester remains faithful to its trademark technique of improvised composition. Their sound carries the spirit of artists like Jani Christou, John Cage, Franco Evangelisti, and the Gruppo di Improvvisazione Nuova Consonanza, taking it further to the 21st century and strictly avoiding any scores. Specially built and prepared instruments add to the complexity of sound layers that slowly unfold, filling both an imaginary and physical space. Starting with a short piano loop, "Diagram 1" turns into a darker drone cut by crashing glasses, giving it an almost H_ɬ_rspiele-like character. "Diagram 2" is a piece about transformation and metamorphosis which starts with airy highest tones that unravel into a sort of chanting before slowly descending downwards, reaching deeper realms of rumbling which culminate in brutal noise. On side B, Felix Kubin reinterprets these tracks, creating a physically closer and blunter atmosphere, which turns the distant dreamlike atmosphere of side A into a state of awakening. His two versions present a more systematic technique, counteracting the subconscious swarm composition of the Orchester. For his take on "Diagram 1", under the title "L_ɬºckenschere", he uses a sequenced sample of the piano loop which generates different dynamics, spiraling over sequencer variations. Much rawer and with aspects of minimal music is "Lichtsplitter", a pure electronic blueprint of "Diagram 2", that involves a black and white score drawing turned into sound with an eight-channel light scanner. The Splitter Orchester, founded in 2010, is a Berlin-based collection of internationally respected composer-performers which draws inspiration from many genres, most noticeably contemporary/improvised music. Splitter Orchester originates from the "Echtzeitmusik" scene, which emerged in Berlin in the mid-1990s - a locally based and globally networked experimental music scene and long-term platform for the exchange of artistic ideas." - Gagarin.
After nearly a decade of false starts, multiple game plans veering off the rails, and a handful of shattered hopes and/or dreams, the odyssey is finally complete—the new Fusetron site is here.
This is the first phase of a multipart rollout that will span the next few months: the currently browsable stock includes miscellaneous new releases from the past 8+ months (we have a lot of catching up to do), plus approximately a third of our backstock. Note that we’ve reduced/slashed prices on many titles and will continue to do so in order to make room for new stock. We’ll also be expanding / tweaking / improving / debugging the site itself (for example, we still have work to do on the automated international postage system, not to mention the inevitable inventory discrepancies that come with transferring an ancient and massive database to a new system).
Over the next few months, as we take inventory, clean house, and delve into our storage, we will be uploading thousands of additional items, gradually, on a near-daily basis. This will include the majority of the LPs, as well as many titles, in all formats, once thought long-gone. Many currently “sold out” items are likely to resurface.
Finally, once our general backstock is up (probably in the next two or three months) we’ll begin making our extensive stockpile of rarities available online for the first time: tons of random out-of-print titles, "deadstock," warehouse finds, secondhand collectibles, etc., accumulated over the past few decades.
Frequent/returning customers will be getting early access to these items. Details to follow on how this will work (a priority mailing list? a 'frequent flyer'-like program?), but it will not be based on dollars spent. We want to reward those who consistently support us, especially in the discogs marketplace era (to those who show up trying to poach five copies of a one-off rarity, and nothing else, ever… ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ).
So—we suggest you take some time to dig through the site—even we’ve been surprised by what’s been turning up, and there’s much more to come.
