Probably the name Carl Michael von Hausswolff doesn’t need much introduction. His conceptually edged releases on labels as Sub Rosa, Touch and Raster Noton deal with such subjects as architecture and voices from beyond. Here The Wonderful World of Male Intuition is the subject. To shed some light on it, he uses sine wave oscillators, field recordings (sea, land, outer space) but also the voices of persons important as ‘positive energies in a world that obviously is feasting on itself without knowing how to go to the toilet’, being the Dalai Lama, Willem de Ridder, Gregory Bateson, Alvin Lucier, John C Lilly, Albert Hofmann, Friedrich Jürgenson and Brion Gysin. Many of these voices are processed through the use of the sine waves, in some way or another, which makes the voices hard to understand, but of course that is not the intent anyway. Throughout the forty some minutes, I learned nothing much about the male intuition (if that exists at all), but purely as a work of sine waves and field recordings I must say that this is a particular strong work by Hausswolff. Not too overtly minimal, leaning on his sine waves, but it’s the combination of all three components works quite well, the sine waves, field recordings and voices. It might perhaps even the best Hausswolff I ever heard (despite not having heard all, he admitted straight away).

A couple of years ago, The Wire has a list (they love them) of “100 Records that set the world on fire (when no one was listening)” and the double Monoton LP (Monotonprodukt 07 [20y++]) from 1982 was one of them. I remember that LP with it’s striking minimal cover well from my early days, browsing through the weirdo section of the local record store, but never having the cash to buy it. In the words of The Wire this record “is so alive with the pulses that triggered many Electronicas to come, from Techno through Trance to Mego’s creeping music” and with it’s monotone sequencers, synths and alien voices (plus the sparse use of violin, saxophone and even steeldrum), this is indeed a more than welcome re-issue. The re-issue from 2002 is not at discuss here, but we do mention that another pressing has become available (thank god), but today we have ‘Blau’ [Monotonprodukt 02 [Blau — 26y++]] (meaning ‘blue’) a record from 1980 that is now released, along with three unreleased tracks from the archive. The tracks here see a continuation of Monotonprodukt 07 [20y++], even when it predates that record. The rhythms are slow, much slower than any early techno this is said to influence, feeding through a simple delay and somewhere in the background there is a minimal throb of the sequencer, or scratch on the violin. ‘Blau’ is an even more raw diamond than Monotonprodukt 07 [20y++], with more minimalism in the tracks. Usually a simple, single idea per track, which is worked over it’s course. My favorite pieces are those that are based on a sequencer rather than a rhythm machine, reminding me of the urgency of Deutsch Amerikanische Freundschaft or Liaison Dangereux, but in a less pop related way, and more in classical minimal music manner. Both Monoton records bridge gaps between pop and classical music, and as such they were indeed way ahead of their time, whereas today they still sound as fresh as then.

A member of Crackhaus (alongside Deadbeat), Stephen Beaupré, is the one behind the latest release from the Mutek_rec label, Foe Destroyer, an album both etheral and ferociously rhythmic. As for Guillaume Coutu Dumont (from the duo Egg), his LP Sélection surnaturelle is also propagating tasty pulsations!

The 6th BIMESP festival — directed by Flô Menezes — took place from June 10 to 17, 2006 at Villa Mariani in São Paulo (Brazil). Some of the concerts presented works from the 4th CIMESP 2001 (International Electroacoustic Music Contest of São Paulo) such as Vol d’Arondes by Francis Dhomont, Serendipities and Synchronicities by Pete Stollery, Rojo by Hans Tutschku, Silk to Steel by Mathew Adkins, and Éden by Robert Normandeau. One concert was dedicated to works from Sweden, including the recent Dreaming in Darkness by Åke Parmerud and works by Skog, Johansson, Hedman, Grahn, Sundin, and Liljekvist.

Electroacoustics will be heard at the 2006 World New Music Days in Stuttgart (Germany). Opening on July 14, 2006 the installation … raumKLANG raum… entgrenzend put together by Sabine Schäfer and Joachim Krebs explores the dimensions of sound, space, time, and movements with their music and works by Ferrari, Minard, Sistermanns, Schafer, and Westerkamp. The “Long Night” organized by DEGEM with music by more than 18 composers (including Tutschku) will start on July 21. Finally, the ZKM organized the Short Cuts: Beauty competititon for works of 3 to 8 minutes in duration. The selected pieces will be presented at the Chillout Lounge at the Kunstmuseum Stuttgart starting on July 18.

Åke Parmerud was invited to the Festival Internacional de Arte Contemporáneo in León (Mexico) which took place from April 25 to May 7, 2006. His solo concert on April 28 at Teatro María Grever presented five of his works: Dreaming in Darkness, Bows, Arcs and The Arrow of Time, The Beauty of Change, and La vie mécanique. Other concerts in this festival of music, dance, theatre, visual arts and cinema featured electroacoustics by Manuel Rocha-Iturbide, Kanata Horio, Roscoe Mitchell, and Roberto Morales Manzanares. Several artists (including Parmerud, Manuel Rocha-Iturbide, and Roberto Morales Manzanares) took part in the festival’s confence on art and technology.