The starting point for this transatlantic project was an idle thought from the British outsider artist Conrad Lambert, AKA Merz. He semi-seriously conjured up the mythic genre of “industrial-devotional”, one that combined spiritual music with the relentless grind of industry. When appointed artist in residence at the Dampfzentrale arts centre in Bern, Switzerland, Merz decided to explore this idea for a live show, drafting in the Pakistani-American musician Shahzad Ismaily, an old sidekick of his, and Laraaji, the mystic busker, laughter therapist and pioneer of a mbient music from New York. Both provide a twist on the “devotional” side of this equation, accompanying Merz across nine meditative tone poems.
The album unfolds like a film soundtrack, complete with dramatic drones and suspended chords that take an age to resolve. The central tension is between Merz’s guitar (a rough assemblage of Duane Eddy twangs and Black Sabbath growls) and Laraaji’s “cosmic zither” (an electrified autoharp which he bows, plucks and strums). It is a sonic battle between the profane and sacred, between industrial squalor and holy minimalism. Playing in between the gaps is Ismaily, on an assortment of other instruments, which often blur into each other to create a seamless mesh of sounds.
Chinese guzhengs and Persian santoors sound like manipulated autoharps or detuned guitars; the drones and bell-like effects could come from Moog synths, bowed cymbals or even from the rubbed rim of a wine glass.
On tracks such as the feedback-heavy Broken Shield (which sounds like an electric guitar being ritually tortured) or Cima Dome (where some pretty zither playing is overwhelmed by a terrifying buzzsaw synth drone) it sounds as if Merz’s discordant industrial dystopia is starting to assert itself. But Laraaji’s joyous, blissful autoharp flourishes win over in the end, as if to suggest that a spiritual utopia is possible – celestial joy to cleanse us from industrial grime.
Also out this month
Solo Collective Part Two is the second album by an intriguing Anglo-German trio, featuring pianist and composer Sebastian Reynolds, cellist Anne Müller and violinist Alex Stolze. It starts and ends with simple, pretty fugue-like pieces that recall Nils Frahm, but elsewhere you’ll find dissonant pieces of acoustic electronica, nods to ambient rave and even a passage from Catch-22 being read out over a barrage of discordant noises.
Félicia Atkinson’s The Flower and the Vessel is a mix of whispered French and English poetry and ambient music, using field recordings, gongs, vibraphones, marimbas and FX-laden guitars. It flickers and throbs and pulsates quite appealingly in places but never quite springs to life. Ellen Arkbro’s Chords sees the Swedish composer exploring textures on two lengthy, minimalist tracks: Chords for Organ sees her create tamboura-like drones from a church organ in Malmö, while Chords for Guitar sees her using digital synthesis to create intense, highly synthetic soundscapes.
