Damon Holzborn - "Adams & Bancroft"
Though he's no stranger to the studio, this is the first disc of Damon
Holzborn's to come my way. On this outing, the founding member of the
experimental/improv Trummerflora collective abandons his guitar for the
world of solo electronic manipulation. From a video game in hyper drive to
what could easily be mistaken for closely mic'd kitchen appliances, he
crafts sounds into what even the electronics-skeptical might identify as
music despite themselves. Though his compositional pedigree includes
Frederic Rzewski, Brian Ferneyhough, Will Ogden, and Rand Steiger, I
couldn't help but imagine a closer alliance with the work of Nicolas Collins
while listening to tracks like "O/Radio." The piece is a ten-minute struggle
to tune in not this week's Top 40 hits, but more likely the communications
of extraterrestrials or maybe even God. Regardless, John Cage must be
smiling down and maybe even phoning home.
- Molly Sheridan, newmusicbox
DIGITAL ASHES IN A DIGITAL STURM
California improviser Damon Holzborn's Adams And Bancroft (Accretions) is
computer noise at its most candid. Although it's a stomach-turning
jet-engine blast, every digital corner, computer glitch and clinical edit is
nakedly audible. Rumbles, field recordings and silence provide a bed for
grungy digital accents to noisily bonk the air, undressed and robotic. They
are startling and infuriating, but the open space provides a wide arena to
discover the color and mood of Holzborn's misshapen punctuation-the album
reading like random bursts of typewritten gibberish, the perfect template to
admire the stateliness of a font.
- Christopher R Weingarten, CMJ
Damon Holzborn's 'Adams & Bancroft' is a rough ride through the contemporary
sonic landscape, a random and sizable assortment of sounds plucked from the
air like WiFi spillage siphoned from routers by drive-by sniffers. Though
he pays little if any attention to musicality, at least in the extremely
traditional sense, Holzborn is highly attentive to sonorousness and rhythm,
and even his most outward-bound excursions are kept to a song-like length
(with the exception of one 10-minute piece). What could be a field
recording of mall traffic, on "Adams & Bancroft II", is folded until it has
the comfort of routinely worn cotton; when it gives way to verbal refuse
that only a mystic could interpret, it emphasizes a slow modulation that
registers in all but the least inclusive ears as tonality. "Field and
Stream" starts with the latter and builds quickly to long tones and traffic
noise; in just under five minutes, you experience suburban sprawl
secondhand. "DDDsc" takes electric piano sounds and tosses them like a high
velocity riff on the more introspective minimalism of Terry Riley and Steve
Reich; the cut has no immediate metrical core, but one develops over time,
coming to view like an image buried deep in static. Other tracks venture
closer still to straight-ahead composition, as on "DDDs", a quarter-speed
epiphany for what sounds like solo organ, and "Clutch", which resembles a
cheap microphone overwhelmed by the intense sonic toxicity of a rave.
Throughout, Holzborn moves from sonic element to sonic element, rarely
repeating himself, and avoiding anything familiar--like, say, a guitar, the
instrument with which he was previously most closely associated.
- Mark Weidenbaum, e/i
This founding member of the Trummerflora collective is a favorite of
chin-strokers, and even a cursory pass through his improvisational
electronics bears that out. These are closer to sound experiments than
songs, with gurgling digitalis and pulsating tones creating an expressway to
LSD island. It'll scare kids.
- Bucky Dent, URB
Subtle and quiet but somehow aggressive. That's the direction my mind went
upon hearing Damon Holzborn's Adams & Bancroft a strange and slightly spooky
drifting exploration of experimental soundscapes. A dark ambience pervades
while textures buzz and flow. It's not exactly white noise; it's more of an
electronic stir fry, like the recorded sounds of cosmic transmissions run
through some kind of random filter operated by a Martian experimental
artist. Of course, that's an odd description but hopefully an evocative one.
Some audio of this variety defies ready description and it's easier to
convey a tone, a feeling, than it is to simply say, "it sounds like this."
Holzborn's Adams & Bancroft falls into that category. It ebbs and flows in
the most elongated way, with extended crescendos and reversions to quietude,
electronic lifeforms stretched to non-recognition, thus reformed into new
beings entirely, much in the way your brain might be once this audio journey
is completed.
- Kristofer Upjohn, Raves.com
Damon Holzborn appears on a range of San Diego/Trummerflora releases, and
has an album of solo electronics, Adams & Bancroft, out on Accretions
(ALP035 www.accretions.com). And it is very much electronics - much of it
is hard edged and scrabbly, processed sounds vying for foreground. The title
track (part 1) opens it with a cycling thud which sounds likes processed
guitar, fast squiggles propelled over (possibly voice - there are a few
voicey components through the set), squiggles sweep at the end (part 2 is
more silvery and buzzing). Or the slow controlled explosion of hissing
harshnesses, swirling, thereminish sweeps that builds through Summit; most
extremely in O/Radio which is a scrawl of noises that sounds like a trawl
through radio-space, with a very occasional hint of speech. Between these
and other electronica are the DDD series - four tracks with a different
suffix (eg DDDp) which are based on more musical elements (computer music,
layered tones) which seem to change randomly, some fast some slow, but are
much lighter elements. And then there is the pairing of If we're all going
to get it and Field to stream - both of which are much subtler and
incorporate obvious and extensive samples. This could in no way be described
as a pretty album, but an initial uncertainty is tempered by repeated
listenings that reveal subtle complexities.
- Jeremy Keens, & etc.
Der Gitarrist und Elektroakustiker DAMON HOLZBORN ist einer der
Hauptaktivisten des Trummerflora-Kollektivs, etwa als langjähriger Partner
von Hans Fjellestad in Donkey und in Quibble, einem rein elektronischen Trio
mit Nathan Hubbard & Marcelo Radulovich. Adams & Bancroft (ALP035) ist sein
Solodebut, ein am Laptop entstandenes Konstrukt aus Fieldrecordings und
Samples. Holzborns Knowhow ist akademisch hinterfüttert, neben Gitarre hat
er Improvisation studiert bei George Lewis und Komposition bei u.a. Rzewski,
Ogden und Ferneyhough. Seine kollaborative Seite zeigt neben dem Schwerpunkt
bei der Trummerflora-Familie eine Spannweite von M.R. Abrams und Blaise
Siwula über das Left-Coast-Left-Field bis zu Musiken für das Tanzensemble
Lower Left. Sein elektronischer Gestaltungswille zeigt eine Neigung zu
Beweglichkeit und Agilität. Selbst wenn - ganz selten - erkennbare Reste von
‚natürlichem‘ Klangmaterial so etwas wie eine verfremdete Landschaft
andeuten, sind Holzborns fünfzehn Laptop-Etüden weit davon entfernt, sich
ambient hinzubreiten. Charakteristisch für seine Verlaufsformen ist vielmehr
eine mobile Unruhe und eine gewollte Unregelmäßigkeit, die ausbricht aus
Programm und Loop in dynamisch zuckendes und splatterndes Noisepollocking
und, programmatisch beim zentralen und mit 10:50 längsten Track ‚O/Radio‘,
in splittriges und zerhäckseltes UKW-Browsing. Selbst wenn Holzborn mit
Repetitionen operiert, bei ‚If we‘re all going to get it‘, das hinkend ein
Bein nachzieht, oder den Quasifortsetzungen ‚Field to Stream‘ und
‚Watermill‘, Plunderphonien mit Hagelpercussion, Regenguss, Aquaplaning und
siffendem Geplätscher, Stimmengewirr und Verkehrslärm, dann transportieren
die Loops etwas Aleatorisches, den Wildwuchs von Geräuschen gerade im
urbanen Raum. Auch im harschen Impulsgeprassel von ‚Classic Football‘
durchbrechen Störungen den dröhnminimalistischen Fluss. Programm hört man am
ehesten noch in der Variations-Serie ‚DDDp‘, ‚DDDsc‘, ‚DDDs‘ & ‚DDDl‘ als
algorithmisch sich abspulende ‚Keyboard‘-Melodien.
- Rigo Dittmann, Bad Alchemy
Ondas de extasiante exploração electrónica abrem amplo espaço visível diante
do campo auditivo do destinatário de Adams & Bancroft, a mais recente
aventura de Damon Holzborn. Holzborn é um criador musical que trabalha
primordialmente as fontes electrónicas, com as quais manipula sons gerados
por guitarras e field recordings. Estudou com George Lewis, também ele um
esteta da electrónica, com importante obra neste campo da investigação
sonora.
Fundador do colectivo Tummerflora e do portal zucasa, um dos mais
importantes e influentes na divulgação da nova música experimental e
improvisada, membro do duo de improvisação electroacústica Donkey, que há
mais de 10 anos criou com Hans Fjellestad (o produtor de Adams & Bancroft),
Holzborn pôs de lado a guitarra eléctrica neste trabalho, privilegiando a
versatilidade de desenho e confecção musical que o laptop permite ao nível
das mutações tímbricas e texturais.
Experimental na sua essência, a música não perde, contudo, a coerência e o
fio condutor que liga as diferentes modulações por que passa ao longo da sua
lenta e demorada exposição (62’), tornada quase imperceptível pela
capacidade de se transformar e de criar tensão/distensão em permanente
sensação de movimento.
Estamos no domínio da electrónica híbrida, distante de objectivos comerciais
ou outras funcionalidades que não passem pelo puro prazer de produzir um som
estimulante e de o comunicar com o público, captando-lhe a atenção.
- Eduardo Chagas, Jazz Arredores
Selbst voreingenommene Geister werden verblüfft sein, mit welch schelmischer
Phantasie Damon Holzborn sein jüngstes Album "Adams & Bancroft" eingespielt
hat. Hier wird die Bühne zum Spielplatz der Töne. Der Klang der solo
Electronics, welche das im Einzelnen sind, ist nicht weiter angegeben,
entwirft ein emotional weit umfassendes Feld. Vor allem überwiegen
verblüffend witzige und in ihrer Dichte, Menge und Virtuosität ungemein
unterhaltsame Töne. Das ist Electro-Avantgarde, die nicht zu abgehoben und
schwer ist, sondern von anmutiger Struktur und fast schon konventioneller
Aussagekraft.
Vielschichtige Tonskalen umspielen sich, während melodische Soundfetzen
coole Muster darunter setzen. Dann wieder blubbern und flattern konkrete
Töne aus den Boxen, hier und dort an bekannte humoristische Motive
ansetzend, um verspielt zu verklingen. Die Töne könnten einem Synthesizer
entstammen, so klar und gewohnt ist ihr Klang. Und dann verwischt im
nächsten Stück die Struktur und wird zu sphärischem Lauschen in das Weltall,
etwas Phonographer-mäßig, aber gewiss künstlich erzeugt. Verfremdete
Soundskulpturen flattern echogleich aus den Boxen wie Gesprächsfetzen, und
es scheint, die Töne unterhielten sich.
Insgesamt ist "Adams & Bancroft" von breiter melodischer Fülle. Eher an
konventionelle Musikstrukturen erinnernd, werden sich gewiss auch die nicht
unbedingt am Abstrakten interessierten Electronicfreaks für diese CD
erwärmen können. Wer diese traumhaften Sequenzen mit aller tonalen
Witzigkeit und hörspielartigen Spannung beim zweiten Mal hört, wird süchtig
oder flüchtig. Und eben weil die Soundstruktur von "Adams & Bancroft" so
eingängig und harmonisch ist, kann die CD als guter Einstieg in die Welt der
abstrakten Electronics gesehen werden. Mein Tipp!
- Volkmar Mantei, Ragazzi
Robert M(ontoya) e Damon Holzborn sono entrambi musicisti provenienti dal
circuito indipendente della Bay Area e condividono da tempo la militanza
all’interno del mega-collettivo di musica creativa Trummerflora. I nomi dei
protagonisti non suoneranno nuovi ai lettori più attenti di sands-zine,
vista la loro presenza all’interno di “Rubble 1”, la compilation accreditata
all’intero ensemble californiano e approdata poco meno di un anno fa per
questi lidi. Percussionista e improvvisatore, attivo nella scena impro–jazz
di San Diego da oltre un decennio: Montoya con questo full lenght cambia
registro stilistico improntando una scenografia sonora elettronica. Una
sterzata nell'animo del ‘digitale’ ben delimitata, dove il tratto
caratteristico della musica si distoglie da quello solito dell’autore, il
quale, a risultato ottenuto, non dimostra di saper restare troppo a lungo
distante da superfici – elettro – acustiche classiche, senza incappare in
piccoli deja vù. Ragion per cui: chi nella raccolta aveva trovato intrigante
il triangolo elettro-acustico formato dai Mrlectronic, M in compagnia di
Lisle Ellis e Marcos Fernandes, resterà un tantino scottato nel constatare
un mood elettronico, a tratti pacato e a tratti agguerrito, modellato
secondo soluzioni scontate. You’re Soaking In It, Nebuloso 9, Tio Mate sono
attimi che condividono queste ‘flebilità’, ma svelate da un utilizzo
sfarzoso di correnti ritmiche etnico-tribali. Non resta che evidenziare la
larga veste che ammanta un po’ tutto, tessuta da registrazioni ambientali.
D’altra stazza, invece, si mostra Damon Holzborn, meno legato ai perbenismi
del collega, interessato alla creazione di rumori ‘smussati’ senza troppa
precisione, né grazia. Gli studi giovanili, tra l’improvvisazione di George
Lewis e la contemporanea del MEV Frederic Rzewski, come piccoli spiritelli
impazziti, percorrono tutto l’humus di “Adams & Bancroft”. Una percezione, a
prima vista, intuibile nella (ipotetica) logica che lega in un unico blocco
tutte le 15 tracce del disco. Una salita intrapresa con piccoli taglia e
cuci di suoni, quasi del tutto urticanti - Adams & Bancroft I , Summit,
Roll, l’analogica melodia di DDDp - che nel progredire acquistano
compattezza – Adams & Bancroft II e Clutch, sino alla creazione di
inconsuete suite minimaliste - DDDsc, fugace ‘parodia sintetica’ del Terry
Riley di “In C ”. Un gioco che, tra sali e scendi, prosegue per tutta la
durata di un CD dove, fatta eccezione per i tempi lunghi di 0/Radio, mix dai
manierismi noise, tutti i brani viaggiano su tempi brevi. In California,
forse complice il clima torrido, la corrente artistica legata alla
sperimentazione stenta a decollare con l’elaborazione di un suono ‘proprio’,
avvincente ed emozionante, che non sia legato alla tradizione jazzistica.
- Sergio Eletto, Sands
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