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Artist
Seltsam & Strahler
9+ albums
ambientexperimentalminimalglitchbauhaus
about
Listeners accustomed to the minimal techno sounds of past Source Records' material may be surprised by Seltsam&Strahler's debut album ^ö^ , though the unusual title alone offers a first hint of the change in style. It's a headphones album if there ever was one, with micro textures of crackles, clicks, ripples, and hums assembled into oft-hypnotic settings with the shortest a mere half-minute (“Dazwischen”) and the longest fifteen (“Waldschrat”). Only with headphones, for instance, does the listener completely experience the disorienting and destabilizing effect induced by the continual dropout of tones in the left channel during “Wasserleiche.” The music's meditative caste tends to camouflage the considerable amount of activity in play at any given moment. A good example is “Im Wasser Kurz,” a quiet drone-like setting of industrial loops that slowly rise and fall. But, belying such apparent simplicity, the volume level of that action changes subtly, plus a soft metronomic click slowly moves from the right channel to the left and back again; here and elsewhere, the music is never static, despite its placid veneer. The effect is even more pronounced in “Waldschrat.” During its first six minutes, the piece is a celestial ambient setting of distant rustles and what resembles a loop of quiet church bells but the track's character shifts when a bass pulse and hazy hiss appear, obscuring the bell loop below. In its last third, the rhythm dimension disappears, ceding the stage to an
