VINYLAND ODYSSEE
by Falter Bramnk
Turntablist/composer Falter Bramnk hails from France on this album that attenuation circuit is happy to co-release with the music magazine Bad Alchemy. Falter’s seemingly effortless blending of styles and moods, building the tracks around excerpts from vinyl records and transforming them into something completely different, has a lot in common with the philosophy of both attenuation circuit and Bad Alchemy, where musical genre boundaries are subverted, or, at best, simply ignored.
As one would expect from an odyssey, as mentioned in the title, the musical protagonists – Falter Bramnk and his guest artists Dave Willey, Laurent Rigaut, Patrick Guionnet, Xuan Mai Dang, Sébastien Beaumont, and „vocal presences“ Jeanne, Loïse, and Clémentine – encounter a wide variety of storms and calms on their cruise through the album. The hand-sampled fragments from records can form the base/pretext/springboard for slightly off-kilter dub tracks as well as high-energy hardcore freakjazz outbursts, with all sorts of other phenomena in between, and – as on the open sea – the atmospere can change very suddenly as one short track gives way to the next. But as this collage/cut-up structure (also visible in the cover art by Falter Bramnk and Lady Sonance) runs through the whole album, it feels remarkably of one piece.
File under: turntablism, experimental
ACU 1088
factory-pressed CD in Digisleeve
Released in 2025
limited to 200 copies
price: 10.00 EUR (excl. postage)
this is a joint-release by
Bad Alchemy
badalchemy.de
attenuation circuit ° ACU 1088 ° 2024
attenuationcircuit.de ° attenuation-circuit@web.de
Falter Bramnk : handling selected vinyl records, piano, guitars, zither, synthesizers, percussions, drum kit, harmonic pipe, trumpet, voice, loops here and there
Laurent Rigaut : alto & tenor sax (3 ; 7), clarinet (15)
Dave Willey : accordion (14 ; 16), bass guitar (14)
Patrick Guionnet : voice (1 ; 2 ; 6 ; 8 ; 18)
Xuan Mai Dang : voice (14 ; 15 ; 17), recorder (15)
Sébastien Beaumont : electric guitar (19)
Jeanne, Loïse, Clémentine : vocal presences
Digital recording, editing and mixing : Falter Bramnk, G2F studio, Templeuve, France, 2023-24
Except : reeds recorded by Laurent Rigaut, Patrick’s voice by Patrick Guionnet
Also available here: http://www.discogs.com/seller/dependenz?sort=price&sort_order=asc&q=attenuation+circuit&st
VITAL WEEKLY
I reviewed a few of Falter Bramnk’s previous releases, and he dabbles with various instruments and genres. On his latest CD, it’s the turntable. On the cover, he gets credit for “handling selected vinyl records, piano, guitars, synthesisers, percussion, drum kit, harmonic pipe, trumpet, voice and loops here and there”. There are a few guests playing accordion, bass guitar, alto & tenor saxophone, clarinet, voice, recorder, electric guitar and three people get a credit for ‘vocal presences’. There are 19 tracks on this CD, spanning 47 minutes, but just as easily, you can perceive this as one track that is 47 minutes. Bramnk takes a collage approach here, going through many moods in each track, and it’s never easy to say where one piece ends and a new one begins; at least, if you aren’t looking at your CD player. Vinyl plays the primary role in the music here, with crackles and speed changes. There’s quite a bit of spoken word in these collages, which makes it a crossover between a radio play and musique concrète. Sometimes Bramnk gets stuck in a groove, and there is a bit of a dub-like music or a free jazz explosion, but it’s never too long and doesn’t always create a too-coherent piece in such a genre. Maybe because it’s in this sea of sounds and ideas that such things get easily lost, but it also means if one thing isn’t for you (for me, that would be the free jazz elements), it’s never too long, and before you know, we’re somewhere altogether very different. Solid stuff.
www.vitalweekly.net/number-1495/
BAD ALCHEMY
Mit Leif Eriksson nach Terre-Neuve? Mit Thomas Pynchons “Vineland” nach Kalifornien? Definitiv mit Falter Bramnk in die plunderphonischen, 'pataphysischen und pop-mechanischen Gefilde. Das französische Chamäleon mit seinem Faible für Chansons pathétiques, Radiophonix und Un Drame Musical Instantané'sche 'social soundscapes' und seinen vielsagenden Portraits von Jac Berrocal, Luc Ferrari, J.-F. Pauvros, Dominique Répécaud, Martin Tétreault hat einen immer wieder verblüfft und beglückt mit wehmütiger Hauntology und zugleich surreal gehisstem Jolly Roger. Hier surft er (handling selected vinyl records, piano, guitars, synthesizers, percussions, drum kit, harmonic pipe, trumpet, voice, loops here and there), ähnlich wie bei “Beyond” als globaler Plunderphonie in Hommage an die Voyager Disc, durch von John Oswald, Stock, Hausen & Walkman, People Like Us & Ergo Phizmiz aufgetane Surfurbias. So wie er bisher schon mal ein deutsches 'Heimweh', 'Abschaum', 'Für Ulr_Mhf' oder 'Der Ball der Irren' von Georg Heym einstreute, erklingen da 'Berliner Requiem' und 'Dingsda', während der Wind einen vorbei an 'Xanadu' und den Sirenen treibt. Nach einem katzenmusikalischen 'Prélude' schlingert die Musik mit Klimperei, Harfenarpeggio, merkwürdigen Stimmen, schreiendem Saxophon, eiernder Verzerrung, maunzender Zeitlupe, xylophon, flötend, als Blasmusik, rhythmischem Staccato, gedehntem Gesang, kuriosem Lalala. Sie dreht sich zu langsam, zu schnell, mit randalierendem Geschrei, keuchender Panik, pianissimo, klassisch vergeigt, wehmütig verklimpert. Kinder schreien, Hunde bellen, Stimmen gurgeln, dadaesk, lethargisch, delirant, mit kindlichem Lullaby, in träumerischer Absenz. Posaunen geistern, ein Bass dominiert, auf die Sirenen wird gepfiffen. Do you like good music? Im Cut-up aus over pop, under rock, sideways folk, mit jazzigen und klassischen Streuseln, wechselt diese Stripsody so gewitzt zwischen Valium und närrischem Ohrenzupfen wie es der grassierende 'kapitalistische (Sur)realismus' kaum noch verdient.
www.badalchemy.de
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