PLINKITY PLONK release
MIRROR - VIKING BURIAL FOR A FRENCH CAR
Plinkity Plonk 018
CD only
SOLD OUT!!!
Through the past few years Mirror have gained
a wide reputation for some of the most beautiful unearthy drone
music. Mirror is usually regarded as a duo of Christoph Heeman
and Andrew Chalk, but on various records they are assisted by
Jim O'Rourke. Since late 2004, Vicky Jackman and Timo van Luyck
have more or less joined the ranks. Their 'Viking Burial For A
French Car' consists, partly, of a recording made by Mirror in
Dundee, Scotland in October 2003, where Mirror was extended with
David Keenan (author of 'England's Hidden Reverse'), Gavin Laird
and Alex Neilson. The concert was an accompaniment to the film
'Haxan', about witchcraft through the ages. In an epic thirty-seven
minute Mirror extends beyond the drone music and comes up with
an orchestral piece, in an almost Xenakis style: building a large
crescendo and in the middle an explosion afterwards the piece
slowly follows it's course in descrescendo. A surprising piece
for Mirror, that would not have worked on a LP release. It's length
requirs an uninterrupted listening.
'Viking Burial For A French Car' is one of the rarer CD releases
by Mirror, who usually release their work on LP, and will surely
appeal to those with a limited music budget. Packed in the usual
Plinkity Plonk sleeve. Design by Andrew Chalk.
reviews
MIRROR - VIKING BURIAL FOR A FRENCH CAR
(CD by Plinkity Plonk)
Mirror is a quintet led by Christoph Heemann and Andrew Chalk
and 'Viking Burial for a French Car' is a live labor of love recorded
between 2003-04 in Scotland. The first minute is a silent piece
paving the way for a field of open ambience. Played loud it provides
some low-fi hiss from the soundboard, but the tonal drone blurs
most of it. Could it be a Hitchcockian séance taking place,
or perhaps something akin to brain candy if it had layers of sweet
and sour that alternated as it disappeared into your system. Mirror's
career has afforded them many beautiful recordings, not unlike
this one, with its peaceful interlude of hovering sadness. In
the wake of 9/11, the Asian Tsunami and all that has but destroyed
the Middle East and foreign relations, this is an inquisitive
soundtrack for our world in and out of bedlam. It quivers with
at its shallow core. Without being
preachy or bold this funeral song of sorts just pauses for a breather
of reality while suspending atypical disbelief. (TJN)
Address: http://www.kormplastics.nl (Vital Weekly 475)
Mirror - Viking Burial For A French Car
(Plinkity Plonk)
Das Label mit dem niedlichen Namen releast hier ein Stück
(laaang) dass definitv eine Freude für jeden Minimalisten
ist, denn es dreht und wendet sich mit wenigst Kraftaufwand, dafür
aber cleverer Kleinstmodulation und das klingt, entgegen vielleicht
manch anderer Dinge von ihnen, aber Mirror ist eh ständig
im Fluss und man weiss nie ganz genau wer jetzt da nun eigentlich
mitspielt, so gar nicht dronig, obwohl es dronig ist. Enstanden
zu einem Film über Hexen zelebriert es eben einfach die Unheimlichkeit
des Langsamen.
http://www.kormplastics.nl
bleed ·····
(DE:BUG)
MIRROR - Viking burial for a French car
(Plinkity Plonk)
One of the most atypical Mirror releases, this beautifully ethereal
composition is also among the best works by Heemann and Chalk,
here with the help of David Keenan, Gavin Laird and Alex Neilson
during live segments recorded in Scotland in 2003. After a long
silent introduction, a gaseous matter formed by superimposed loops
and sparse, distant clatterings by percussives and guitar establishes
its presence to stay throughout the piece, its pleasing malady
spreading all over the place in a deep-laid plan to take over
our consciousness. The flutey chimes of these repeating circles
assume an appearance of tranquil demeanour at first, but slowly
and incessantly transport their recipients in a semicontrolled
state of proportionate magnification of the deeper self, something
that Mirror lovers know extremely well by now. This is not territory
for ombrophobous creatures, but the luminescence of this infrasonic
revelation constitutes another message that's there to be comprehended.
(www.touchingextremes.org)
.... Damit nicht genug. Unter dem reichlich
seltsamen Titel Viking Burial for a French Car (Plinkity Plonk
Records, plink 18) habt MIRROR einen weiteren Dreamscape eingespielt,
der teilweise auf einer Performance im Oktober 2003 im schottischen
Dundee basiert. Chalk & Heemann spielten bei dieser Gelegenheit
,Film'-Musik zu Haxan, einer Dokumentation der Hexenverfolgung,
und wurden dabei unterstützt von Gavin Laird, Alex Neilson
& David Keenan, dem Autor von England's Hidden Reverse. Das
Material wurde zu einer Dröhnwelle geformt, einem wie aus
einem einzigen Orgelcluster anschwellenden Crescendo, in das sporadisch
Gitarrenklänge und perkussives Hantieren, ein metallisches
Klopfen und Knarren eingestreut sind. Diese wischenden Schläge,
wie von einem eisernen Besen, und ein schepperndes Gestöber,
ähnlich ominös wie bei verwandten Klang-'Bildern' von
Organum, wirken als Spurenelement menschlicher Aktivität.
Anonym zwar und schwer zu deuten. Ritzzeichnungen von unbekannter
Handschrift, rituelles Geklapper unbekannter Absicht. Die Dröhnwolke
über den Köpfen flaut nur ganz allmählich wieder
ab, so wie die Sonne sinkt und im Untergang erst noch alle Nuancen
von Abendrot als sublimes Decrescendo ausblutet. Unter dieser
dröhnenden Hyperbel, die den Horizont überwölbt,
hält jemand den Blick auf Nächstliegendes gerichtet,
stöbert nach Brauchbarem, Werkzeug oder Waffe. Andrew Chalks
Covergraphik zeigt nur amorphe, zementgraue Verlaufsformen, wie
Schnitte durch Hirnmasse. Mirror wirft die Imagination auf sich
selbst zurück wie ein Bild von Magritte, irritierend ver-rückt,
verdoppelt, spiegelverkehrt.
(Bad Alchemy 47)
MIRROR
Viking Burial for a French Car
(Plinkity Plonk)
Mirror, the longstanding duo of founding HNAS member Christoph
Heemann and noted British sound artist Andrew Chalk, is tough
to parse. Not just because the group can expand to include friends
like Jim O'Rourke or Andreas Martin, but because the type of diffuse,
illumed, organic drone that the group trades in is usually only
released on LP in beautiful hand-colored sleeves. And in absurdly
small batches.
So it's a coup to have one of the most cinematic and dynamic pieces
from Mirror come out in a quantifiable edition. Based around a
rare 2003 live performance by the band in Scotland where they
provided the soundtrack to the film Haxan, the group expanded
to include David Keenan, Gavin Laird, and Alex Neilson. The celestial
drones that Chalk and Heemann always bring to the table has been
girded by the extra folk, and more percussive textures and bowed
cymbals help their ability to crescendo and descend deftly. The
intense sections bring to mind sections of Hermann Nitsch's aktions
or prime AMM and Organum, as much as they do Tarkovsky's films.
Recommended. [AB]
www.othermusic.com
MIRROR
Viking Burial for a French Car (Plinkity Plonk) cd 19.98
It may seem like a curious title for Mirror, who are best known
for simple if anthropomorphic allusions in their titles rather
than something more fitting for the Icelandic absurdists Stilluppsteypa;
yet one cannot forget that Mirror's Christoph Heemann began his
musical career in the Nurse With Wound obsessed ensemble Hirsche
Nicht Aufs Sofa, which translates as Moose Without A Sofa. That
is not to say that Viking Burial for a French Car recalls the
surrealistic meandering of HNAS, rather it sounds much like all
of the other Mirror recordings -- tranquil, somber, and hypnotic
dronescapes that hover like a wintery fog. With the inclusion
of a few Scotsmen (David Keenan, Alex Neilson, and Gavin Laird)
alongside Andrew Chalk and Heemann, the Mirror sound is altered
a little bit. At first, Mirror unveils a sonorous tone of what
could be a thousand car horns bleating into a canyon. This undulating
mass of sound gradually gives way a post-AMM / Organum clamour
of drum kit improv tumbling and textural growling, before dissolving
back to the introductory funereal timbers that drift onward to
oblivion. (from: www.aqarius.org)
Mirror - Viking Burial For A French Car
CD (Plinkity Plonk)
Ambient gelida che ammanta un panorama glabro con un velo intessuto
di pixel in bianco e nero. Il movimento qui e ridotto ai minimi
termini, flebili manifestazioni di vita in cellule digitali che
si addensano spontaneamente formando cristalli di brina sonora.
Frutto del lavoro congiunto di alcuni nomi "noti" nell'ambito
della sperimentazione piu radicale (Andrew Chalk, Christoph Heemann,
David Keenan, Gavin Laird e Alex Neilson), "Viking Burial
For A French Car" da seguito alla curiosa immagine contenuta
nel titolo, evocando una celebrazione sacrale dell'inorganicita.
(6/7) Massimiliano Busti in Blow Up #88
Mirror
Viking Burial For A French Car
(PLINKITY PLONK/KORM PLASTICS)
Still Valley
Ora
Morgendämmerung
(DIE STADT)
Dankzij een slim amalgaam van kwaliteitsnamen, gelimiteerde vinylreleases
en stijlvolle vormgeving, is zowat elke release van supergroep
Mirror voorbestemd om op internetveilingen terecht te komen. Op
de digitale vikingbegrafenis stappen Andrew Chalk (Ferial Confine,
Ora), Christoph Heemann (H.N.A.S.) en hun gasten af van hun vinylliefde
om één lange compositie te maken die geen onderbrekingen
verdraagt. De basisdreun wordt gewoontegetrouw gekruid met gefilterde
natuuropnames en concrete geluiden, maar het invoegen van een
ijle spookmelodie (we gokken op een orgel, maar het kan evengoed
een klakson zijn) maakt deze cd donkerder dan gewoonlijk. We hebben
dan ook te maken met de soundtrack van een documentaire ('Haxan')
over hekserij. Met de lp 'Still Valley' komen we weer op vertrouwd
Mirror terrein: tweehonderd exemplaren reizen in transparant vinyl
om de mooie hoes (met een katachtige uitsnijding) maximaal te
laten renderen. De honorabele Jim O'Rourke komt nog eens langs
met een klankenpalet, en de zachte drone wordt gecontroleerd verstoord
door metalige feedback en iets wat bijzonder goed op een kortegolfzender
lijkt. Spits de oren als je houdt van de beginperiode van labelgenoot
Organum. Het meesterproject Ora (Chalk, Darren Tate en Colin Potter)
staat al een tijdje op non-actief, maar af en toe wordt ons nog
eens een blik in de archieven gegund. De gelimiteerde 10inch 'Morgendämmerung'
bevat nooit eerder uitgebracht werk uit 1997. De Zon werpt een
gouden traan op twee lange stukken, die de betere dreunervaring
koppelen aan schemerige elektronische manipulaties, de adem van
duizend geesten, en metaal op metaal. Intussen zijn de Goden toornig
en laten zij (een beetje voorspelbaar) hun woede op ons neerdalen
via veldopnames van een stevig onweer. In deze incestueuze dreunwereld
volgen de releases elkaar bijzonder snel op. Zo snel dat we ons
in een moment van wanhoop wel eens durven afvragen of ze onderling
wel genoeg verschillen om hun bestaansrecht te rechtvaardigen.
Maar de ochtendgoden luisteren mee, en geven ons een stevige elektrische
schok als we Ora's plaat van de pick-up willen verwijderen. (www.diestadtmusik.de)
(pv)
Gonzo Circus #71
Similar to the practice of Egyptian entombment,
Viking burials often included valued and practical objects alongside
of the corpse to accompany his or her voyage through the afterlife.
Another interesting feature of the Scandinavian burial practice
had to do with bodies being interred on boats, or if this proved
unfeasible, their gravestones would be boat-shaped, granting the
deceased with eternal marine passage.
As with previous Mirror albums and Christophe Heemann's work in
general, Viking Burial for a Dead French Car is an explicitly
cinematic and visually-oriented listening experience. Opening,
languorous horns eulogize in fanfare, blurred by coralline reverb.
Eventually, percussive metallic textures interrupt and bloom into
a subtle crescendo, and things revert back to the rich drones
Heemann is known for. This is not to downplay the role of Andrew
Chalk, who often seems to provide the long tones that constitute
Mirror's primary sound; it's just that Heemann is, perhaps reluctantly,
a consummate leader that seems to add focus and concept to the
players around him.
The music on this disc is yet another fascinating display of Heemann's
ability to produce an illusion (or mirror) of slow-paced musical
naturalism by stitching together disparate excerpts. Here, there
are substantial chunks taken from a performance in Scotland, several
years old, intended as a soundtrack for Benjamin Christensen's
1922 film Haxan: Witchcraft Through The Ages, a dark, faux-documentary
made in Denmark. Yet, the music, as the title suggests, ultimately
seems to come together with a different vision.
While Mirror often takes a bare-bones starting point, and through
disorienting, extended pitches distort time and structure, Viking
Burial almost begins amidst an already strange and dense listening
experience.
This might have something to do with the epic, orchestral quality
of the recording, described elsewhere as akin to some of Xenakis'
particularly swarming and opaque work. Yet, the repeating and
shifting horn motifs and shimmering chromaticism are very reminiscent
of Morton Feldman's later orchestra pieces, and "Coptic Light"
in particular seems to be a reference point. What's striking here
about Mirror is their ability to constantly create an evolving
depth and texture. While it is very cinematic, as mentioned above,
it's also keenly spatial in a way that films very rarely, if ever,
can invoke.
Mirror, while not obsessed with the surprise tactics of precursors
like Mimir and H.N.A.S., still seems to retain a sense of awareness
of the meaning of their musical gestures, an ability to blur the
obvious weight that a given instrument or sound holds. There is
a constant purposeful intent with all of Mirror's projects and
Viking Burial is an excellent example of this group at its most
colorful.
By Matt Wellins
http://dustedmagazine.com
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