Brainwashed (USA):
This four-track, 16-minute CD marks the first collaboration between two of the prime movers of experimental sound. The brevity of the album makes it somewhat difficult to get a handle on. Over the years, I've come to expect long-form, immersive soundscapes from both of these artists - whether the long, shape-shifting textural drones of Organum or the multiple-part conceptual movements of Z'ev. At about four minutes each, each of these tracks seem oddly truncated, resolving themselves just as they begin to become interesting. With artists as intelligent and purposeful as these, I'm not ready to assume that this was a miscalculation or just plain laziness. Rather, the brevity of Tinnitus Vu may be a reflection of its theme, which in this case appears to be hearing loss. Tinnitus is an affliction of hearing in which the sufferer hears persistent buzzing, high-pitched ringing, television static or wind noise. David Jackman and Stefan Weisser both apparently suffer from intermittent tinnitus, and this work can be seen as an attempt to accurately reflect the experience of this hearing disorder to the unafflicted listener. Each piece begins and ends with a few bars of piano, but in between is an electronic storm of thought-canceling white noise, curling metallic drones, and undifferentiated swarms of what sound like tiny robotic gnats. The effect is quite brilliant at moments, especially towards the end of the third track, when for a moment I thought that my hearing actually had dropped out for a moment, as sometimes happens the day after a particularly loud concert. This was merely an auditory illusion borne of the cleverly rendered production of the track. There is none of Z'ev's trademark percussion in the mix, at least not in any recognizable form, so the album ends up closer in sound to Organum's work, which is not a bad thing. In the end, I was left wanting more from this collaboration, and it looks like I may get my wish soon, as a full-length collaboration is planned for release soon on Die Stadt. [Jonathan Dean]
TMT (USA):
The art of the collaboration must be a tricky process indeed; two performers coming together for the mutual understanding of combining forces (musically speaking) to create something hopefully greater than the sum of its parts. Putting aside differences and delicately bringing their ideas to the table without dismissing the other, collaboration is a tight-rope that rarely brings the results intended. Not being completely familiar with either artist's individual recorded output, the collaboration between the two electronic musicians, Organum and Z'ev provide me with an opportunity to judge the material as a single piece on its own merits; without comparing it with what has been produced in the past.
Tinnitus Vu begins with electronic textures that sound akin to ice crystals jangling into one another. With a minimalist drone in the background, a sparse piano chord, a la AMM alum John Tilbury, reveals the beauty hidden within the track - and for the EP for that matter. The piano chord finds itself at the beginning and the end of the second track, sandwiching a textured piece reminiscent of a field recording, a kind of field recording of pieces of wood being bundled together. A stray tambourine shake breaks up the monotony before the piano chord closes the piece.
Track four finds the EP coming full circle. It continues the icy textures that opened up the initial track, along with the beautiful piano chord once again. While this release has many memorable themes that work in and out of the EP, it begs to ask whether this would have benefited from being edited together into one piece rather than four smaller arrangements (nearly all of the four tracks clock in at the four minute mark). Collaborations and improvisations aside, Tinnitus Vu is nothing earth shattering, but rather, an interesting example of minimalism and repetitive themes that demand a full-length release to gives its ideas room to stretch and grow. [Jean-Pierre]
Pitchfork Media (USA):
There are few artists more elusive than David Jackman. The only interview of his I've ever read was in ND Magazine, featuring a photograph of a little shrew in lieu of a portrait of Jackman. Active in modern music since the early 1960s, Jackman took part in British composer Cornelius Cardew's crucial Scratch Orchestra, which at various times has featured luminaries such as granddaddies of noise AMM, composers Howard Skempton and Gavin Bryars, and the legendary Brian Eno. Since then - either under his own name or under the more recognized moniker, Organum - Jackman has released countless records that exist on the peripheral edges of industrial and experimental music. Whether on cassette, LP, or single, these transmissions are usually cooked up in editions so miniscule that within weeks of their release their average eBay price is greater than the number of extant copies.
As private as Jackman is, his list of collaborators reads like a who's who of experimental heavyweights: Jim O'Rourke, Nurse with Wound's Steve Stapleton, Current 93's David Tibet, Main, Eddie Prevost, The Haters, The New Blockaders, and Christoph Heemann have all had roles in his ongoing Organum project. This new release stems from a 1999 dinner date between mutual acquaintances, at which Jackman handed tapes over to prototypical sound pounder, Z'EV. It's an apt pairing considering that Z'EV's ear-bleeding early work laid the I-beams for folks like Einstürzende Neubauten and Test Dept. (He also kept the klangbeat on "anvil" for an early Glenn Branca symphony.) Despite both men's love of muscular and metallic drones, natural sound decay, and endless mechanistic churning (Jackman has released singles of machine gun fire and tank engines), this new alliance leans more towards Organum's propensity toward maddening brevity.
As a result, Tinnitus Vu is four tracks long and clocks in just at 16 minutes. Named after a garden lunch discussion they had about each other's loss of hearing, initiate listeners might not quite understand what they're hearing, either: In Jackman's oeuvre, sound sources are impossible to approximate. A resounding piano chord - stretched and morphed beyond recognition - introduces each shift in the drone. Even with all the manipulations, these suspended strings carry through the buzzing din. The record's sleeve art, which features an x-rayed boxspring on its cover and stretched-out coils strung along a snow-coated fence in the countryside on its back, suggests these too could be the source of the drone. As always with Organum, that metal-scratched drone is dangerous, hypnotic, brutal, and beatific. "II" creaks like a squeaky bed and a wind-blasted ghost ship, while "III" glowers with menacing Vader-esque breathing until the ringing piano returns.
Tinnitus Vu is more widely available than most of Jackman's intriguing and defining work, much of which has been released on smaller imprints such as Germany's Die Stadt, the U.S.'s Robot Records, the UK's Matchless, and Japan's Siren Records. But even if it's impossible to completely capture or collect all of Jackman's output - even the ones that feature his best work - each of his droning soundsc(r)apes is still a treat. [Andy Beta, April 8th, 2004]
Dusted (USA):
It's actually surprising that these two artists haven't collaborated before, given that both have long histories in the world of experimental audio. Both have been active since the late ’70s, but have traced their own paths. Z'ev, while placing his emphasis on metal percussion, has also released more textural works as Stefan Weisser, as well as collaborating with Glenn Branca, Psychic TV, Rhythm & Noise, and others. Organum, a.k.a. David Jackman, began his career with the notorious Scratch Orchestra. Since then he has released a string of noteworthy albums under both his own name and as Organum, including collaborations with Robert Hampson (Main), Christoph Heeman (HNAS), Nurse With Wound, and others.
Given this pedigree, perhaps the most disappointing thing about this collaboration is its brevity. With just four tracks in 16 minutes, each piece feels as though it hardly gets started before it finishes.
The collaboration apparently originated with Jackman giving material from a recording session to Z'ev, who treated and mistreated it. The idea itself grew out of a discussion of their respective losses of hearing, hence the title of the EP, which would lead one to ask just how closely these pieces are intended to mimic the sounds of tinnitus. Whether intentional or not, there are certainly similarities: low moaning sounds, static, hiss and distant rumblings are all symptoms mentioned by those who suffer from tinnitus.
The original recordings seemingly stem from recent piano-based recordings by Jackman, though the piano appears clearly only as an indicator at the beginning and end of each of the four songs. Without that clue, a listener would be hard-pressed to identify any definite source for the sounds here.
The four pieces, which all clock in around five minutes, are untitled but have distinctly different personalities. The first and third are on the calm, ambient side while the second and fourth are denser and noisier. The first piece introduces glistening tones and glacial synthetic sounds, moving into heavier tectonics during the second track. Distant ambience fills the third piece, while busily overlaid sounds remain in constant motion during part four.
As with any collaboration, there's a tendency to be a bit of a trainspotter and try to identify which elements came from which participant. Overall, this feels more like an Organum work than a Z'ev work, perhaps due to the ongoing textural adventures that I'm accustomed to encountering in each Organum release. In any case, though, it doesn't really matter – only the listening matters, and with that in mind, I'll repeat my earlier wish that these pieces lasted longer. But of course, a little of a good thing is better than a lot of a bad thing, and the former is certainly what we have here. [Mason Jones]
VITAL (The Netherlands):
I must admit I like unlikely collaborations, and I could have never believed that Z'ev and Organum would be together in the studio. Being a big fan of Organum and a keen follower of Z'ev (but without liking everything he did). They met in 1999 for the first time and in july 2003 they meet again, just about as Organum was going back into the studio to record new works. Z'ev joins him and here are the four results. We hear the recent piano works by Organum with the addition of thickly layered, highly processed percussive sounds of Z'ev. In the second piece, it seems like a field recording of wood splinters washing ashore. I'd say this music is probably more Organum sounding than Z'ev sounding, but altogether it's an excellent release with only one problem: it's way too short. Would have loved to get the double portion. [FdW]
Stylus Magazine (USA):
Organum and Z’ev have chased the white rabbit further than most artists ever dream of. The sacrifice was worth it if their tinnitus sounds like this. Mine is just thin and annoying. Tinnitus VU is immersing your naked body in a pool of cotton and floating haphazardly into tuffs of sticky milk weed; elsewhere, the amplified sound of snowflakes being crushed. At just over sixteen minutes, it’s an angel that appears only to vanish. Each track is anchored by one traditional piano chord struck once, perhaps twice. Barnett Newman where are you? The ice in my veins just got colder. [Bryan Neil Jones]
Microview (USA):
Organum (David Jackman) and Z'ev (Stefan Weisser) are two of the most elusive and enigmatic characters in all of the contemporary experimental music circles. Therefore, it is a pleasure to find that they have joined forces of discontent and dissonant folly on Tinnitus Vu. After meeting back in 1999, they harmonized their minds and chords and compositional detritus in 2003. The result is a ghostly ep that runs for a too short, but bliss, fifteen and a half minutes. But when you got it you GOT it! And they have. This moves like a freaking apparition, a translucent drone and sandpapery mist behind which lurk some grueling, wild beasties atop which an occasional piano stroke appears and echoes. This is a sorcerer's stone cracked open wide to glean the gutted random, peculiar contents. My only complaint is the skimpy length of material - this is a harmonious union of like minds, and I could sit easily for an additional hour taking in the peculiar scapes created by these true artists. By far, one of the most highly effective CD tray cards by Jon Wozencroft yet, the lackluster x-ray of skeletal coils and winter scene are foreign, distant, removed emulating its innards. [TJ Norris]
Gonzo Circus (Belgium):
BJ Nilsen/Hazard
(Touch/Konkurrent)
Organum/z’ev
(Touch/Konkurrent)
Various Artists
Sound Chambers
(Staubgold/Lowlands)
Bij voorkeur thuis te gebruiken / schudden voor gebruik. 2004. Feiten en fictie. Er is nog steeds geen betere muziekvorm te vinden waar DIY zo een pertinente rol speelt als in de elektronicawereld. Platen en parels worden geboren op de slaapkamer en experiment is nog steeds gemeengoed. Muzikale creativiteit die vaak niet vertaald wordt in het livegebeuren, want hoe goed er ook gezocht wordt naar een volwaardig liveconcept, de achillespees van de elektronica blijft het liveconcert. Twee opvallende actuele releases zijn Bj Nilsen en Sound Chambers. Beide cd’s zijn opnames van live-concerten. BJ Nilsen concerteerde, onder de vleugels van Fennesz die curator van de Touchavond was, op het Weense Generator Festival. Nilsen start vanuit natuurelementen, de plaat opent en eindigt met een onweer en het zoemen van een bij kondigt het tweede deel van de plaat aan, maar buigt het geheel soepel en efficiënt om tot een soundscapelandschap. Nilsen stuurt de hele plaat en speelt subtiel met het geluidsvolume en met de opbouw van het stuk. De opname verrast vooral door zijn evenwichtige en strak gehouden opbouw. Het slotstuk van de plaat, een openzetten van alle registers, refereert duidelijk naar de Touchrelease ‘Organ Works Past Present & Future’, waarop diverse geluidsarchitecten het typische geluid van de orgelklank interpreteren. ‘Soundchambers’ brengt drie meesters van de elektronische improvisatie, Ekkehard Ehlers (laptop), Joseph Suchy (gitaar) en Franz Hautzinger (trompet), samen. Sound Chambers is een architectonische, grafische en muzikale installatie die opgesteld staat in het Museu Serralves in Porto. Bin [Peter Deschamps]
Urbanmag (Belgium):
De Zweed BJ Nilsen of Hazard is de jongste telg van het experimentele Touch-label. Nilsen wil op zijn albums zowat alles tegelijkertijd zijn: hij profileert zich aan de zijde van Fennesz of aan de zijde van veteraan Chris Watson. Hij verzamelt detaillistische opnames van extreme weersomstandigheden (zie zijn cd 'Wind') maar maakt ook opnames van urbane fenomenen (zie zijn cd 'Land'). Op 13 juni 2003 was Benny met Fennesz en de Touch-crew te gast op het Generator Festival in Wenen. Zijn liveoptreden werd voor het nageslacht vastgelegd op de cdr 'Hazard 06_12_03'. In iets meer een half uur krijg je een overzicht van waar Nilsen allemaal mee doende is. De eerste 15 minuten krijg je onherkenbare natuuropnames. Vervolgens een Fennesz-achtig laptop-middenstuk. Nilsen vond trouwens onlangs een nieuwe nevenbezigheid als curator van het Touch-nevenproject 'Spire - Organ Works Past and Future'. Hier hoor je hem tijdens de laatste 10 minuten van zijn optreden ook nog eens bezig met tot het einde toe uitgerekte orgelgeluiden. Al bij al geen wereldschokkend document maar een onderhoudende cdr met een mooie dwarsdoorsnede van alle activiteiten van de heer BJ Nilsen. Oudgediende Z'ev is ook zo'n muzikant, die je onmogelijk kan enten op één enkel genre. De kale percussionist is al bedrijvig in de underground sinds het begin van de jaren '80 maar kwam pas onlangs opnieuw in de belangstelling door zijn activiteiten voor het New Yorkse Tzadik (voor 'The Sapphire Project') en voor het Londense Touch-label. Hij leverde onlangs een bijdrage aan het 'Spire' project en ging onder meer in zee met pianist David Jackman aka Organum. 'Tinnitus Vu' is een korte mini-cd van nauwelijks 16 minuten, die onderverdeeld werd in 4 stukken. De cd kwam tot stand toen Z'ev toevallig in Londen was en zomaar de studio van Jackman binnenstapte. De vier piano-akkoorden, die door Jackman opgenomen als basis voor een nieuwe reeks Organum albums, vormen de spil van het album. Daarrond weeft Z'ev digitale bewerkingen van veldopnames en wat subtiele percussieve elementen. Al bij al een beetje een mager resultaat voor de boomlange kerel met de onverwoestbare reputatie. [Peter Wullen]
Tijd (Belgium):
De Brit David Jackman aka Organum en de New Yorker Stefan Weisser aka Z’EV behoren tot de meest prominente en invloedrijke namen uit de experimentele muziekscène van eind jaren zeventig, begin jaren tachtig. De klankwerelden van de heren liggen mijlenver uit elkaar. Zo profileerde de percussionist/ knoppendraaier Z’EV zich in zijn beginjaren met harde noiseflappen als een extremist binnen de New Yorkse no-wave-scène. De multi-instrumentalist en tape-manipulator Organum richtte zich op minimalistische, ingetogen drones en maakte deel uit van het Scratch Orchestra waar Cornelius Cardew ook toe behoorde. Het verbaast dat deze twee sonore tegenpolen elkaar vonden: na twee ontmoetingen (in 1999 en 2003) schonk Organum enkele studiofragmenten aan Z’EV voor digitale bewerking. Het resultaat daarvan heet ‘Tinnitus Vu’, vier relatief korte tracks, goed een kwartiertje muziek. Z’EV vertaalt Organums strakke, repetitieve pianowerk naar ondermeer een kluwen hoge tonen die op de rand van een zoemende diepte kronkelen of naar een orkaan van versplinterende clicks als een intens brandend haardvuur. Voor die geluidsintensiteit is de postproductie van Robert Hampson (beter bekend als Main) belangrijk: hij speelt het klaar ‘Tinnutus Vu’ glashelder te laten klinken. Doorheen de vier tracks lijkt het minialbum zich nauwelijks te ontwikkelen, net zoals dat bij het vaak als statisch omschreven werk van Organum het geval is. Schijn bedriegt: ‘Tinnutus Vu’ is een grandioze cirkelbeweging, een draaikolk van geluid die – ondanks de korte duur – de luisteraar onvermijdelijk kopje onder trekt. [Ive Stevenheydens]
Indiepoprock (France):
Rencontre énigmatique entre le très discret David Jackman qui sévit dans la musique moderne depuis le milieu des années 60 suivant les pas de Cornelius Cardew, Howard Skempton, Gavin Bryars voire Brian Eno et que l’on retrouve ici sous le nom d’Organum. Il s’associe au non-moins étrange Z’ev que l’on a plutôt l'habitude de croiser dans une électronique qui n’est pas sans rappeler celle de Einstürzende Neubauten ou Test Dept et qui parle de cette collaboration comme le fruit d'un naturel hasard. Fruit de rencontres, d'échanges qui se concrétise en un EP, "Tinnitus VU", errance sonore tout en nuances…
Travail de construction, de déconstructions et de traitements de Z'ev à partir de sources créées par Jackman lors d’un été de canicule. Piano, célesta (?), déformations de fréquences, résonances constituent le plat de résistance de cet opus à l'ambiant étrange et attirante. Travail d’autant plus passionnant que les deux compositeurs l’ont développé suite à une discussion autour du fait que les auditeurs et autres acheteurs de disques n'écoutaient plus la musique…
Ici, il faut avoir les oreilles grandes ouvertes pour saisir toutes les variations, nuances et mutations qui s'opèrent progressivement. Les instruments classiques évoluent vers le drone et reprennent parfois leur forme originelle. Mais en est-on bien sure ? On se laisse facilement prendre alors à ce jeu regrettant seulement que tout cela soit aussi court… [wqw]