Moor Mother—Black Encyclopedia of the Air

Black Encyclopedia of the Air finds Philadelphia performance poet Moor Mother (Camae Ayewa) surrounded by uncustomarily restrained accompaniment. Where Ayewa’s previous albums spat in the face of their listeners—at times pulling at the fringes of noise music—Black Encyclopedia hushes things up; gargles with potential energy.

This may sound like a defanging. It’s not. If anything, Ayewa’s confrontational performance is vitalized by the vacuum which surrounds it. Writing is one thing—delivery altogether another. To my mind greatest compliment an artist can receieve, which is certainly true in Ayewa’s case, is that no-one else could deliver their material. Moor Mother is a singular voice in every sense of the word.

Its's not the first time a more subdued approach has appeared this year. Recently, Rhode Island noise musician Lingua Ignota stripped things back for her album Get Ready Sinner. As an unfortunate side-effect, the lyrical and thematic one-dimensionality of that album’s lyrics stumbled into unavoidable relief. The opposite is true here; Ayewa is a considered, thoughtful and fantastically intelligent lyricist whose work only reveals greater riches the closer we scrutinse.

But Ayewa is not the only voice on Black Enclyclopedia. Unfamiliar voices explore unfamiliar territory and give this album a broader perspective than had Ayewa, skilled as she is, chosen to make it a one-woman show. These guest performances, which feature on around half of the album’s tracks, are cannily used. You never know what to expect: features range from sweet, melodic vocal hooks to jittery verses exploring lockdown paranoia and sinister governmental duplicity.

The most persistent motif of Moor Mother’s work—a gathering together of history, a collision and entanglement of past and future—is just as present here as it was on her stunning debut Fetish Bones. What truly impresses, though, is her ability to explore this concept from so many angles; to so consistently refresh and defamiliarise a theme, to the extent it feels unprecedented every time.

Black Encyclopedia of the Air is available for purchase and streaming here.

Words: Andrew O’Keefe

Best Available Technology—Inscape Routes

Inscape Routes, the new album from Best Available Technology, is a nostalgic and unpredictable collection of ambient dub. The whole album feels oddly lyrical, provoking easier comparison to the quixotic likes of Micachu, or Archy Marshall’s A New Place 2 Drown, than any artists working more firmly within the genre. The fundamentals are obviously there—beefy subs and scratchy, delay-laden percussion. But they’re just the foundation for something altogether stranger. Most of what Inscape Routes has to offer is half-song, half…something else. The album’s plaintive instrumentals speak as forcefully as any lyricist you might think of—but they are also as delicate, tremulous, and spare as the skeletons of dead leaves.

Inscape Routes recycles some well-worn sounds of the 1990s, and some of its synth splashes will leave listeners soaked through with nostalgia. But this album re-contextualises those sounds, deliberately strips them of their vigour and leaves them stilted and struggling. The result is something bittersweet. It’s the last embers of an optimistic fire, one that was lit some decades ago, finally fading into the inky air. Inflatable armchairs rotting on a tumulus of the Packington Landfill. And yeah: it’s become quite trendy to write rave culture eulogies recently—2017 Bicep weepie ‘Glue’ is testament to that. But as you might have guessed, Inscape Routes commits harder to the abstract—and to having ideas of its own—than most deconstructionist club stuff.

About halfway through, Inscape Routes even deconstructs itself. Mid-album track ‘Arc Stoked’ is demolished, to segue into quasi-concrète sketch ‘Observation Hill’. The transition is as wonderful as it is surprising—and is just one of many breathlessly inventive displays of musicianship on the album.

Unconcerned with evoking a specific time or place, Inscape Routes is instead the sound of transience. Like a bullet, it moves through, punctures, and distorts the tissue of its subject. Inscape Routes scrunches some of the last few decades’ musical styles into piles of tangled tape on the floor, and invites you to have a little dance on them. It’s a thoughtful, generous and really fun album.  

Inscape Routes is available for purchase and streaming here.

Words: Andrew O’Keefe

Liars—The Apple Drop

Recent Liars releases have felt like acrimonious breakup albums between founding member Angus Andrew and his own band. 2017’s TFCF was particularly difficult to get on with and, despite having its fans, felt at times like an uncomfortable, messy and spite-fuelled vanity project. For new album The Apple Drop, Liars’ mojo is restored by a talented selection of new blood; especially drummer Laurence Pike and lyricist (and Andrews’ wife) Mary Pearson Andrew.

The Apple Drop is not only more ambitious than its immediate predecessors, it’s more accessible. Liars’ typical weirdness takes the backseat in an album propelled by more infectious (and more conventional) melodies than the band has ever produced before. Edgier fans won’t be thrilled to hear “Liars go radio-friendly”—but they’d be turning their backs on some impeccably constructed material. Andrews’ knack for putting together a great, straightforward tune—and to incorporate others’ ideas—is a surprise that’s both revelatory and welcome.

‘Big Appetite’ is probably the purest example of The Apple Drop’s M.O. It’s a bit like a Stereophonics song, except it’s written and performed by people who are actually trying. And on the other end of the scale you have ‘Sekwar’, which mixes a Baxter Dury drawl and the sort of instrumental you’d expect from Thom Yorke (better than it sounds). In all instances Andrews’ collaborators absolutely make this album. Laurence Pike’s drums are brilliant without exception and slot neatly into a canvas of performers who sound like they’ve known each other for years.

Special notice must be given, too, to the album’s engineering. The vastness of its sound belies its modest budget, like Andrews and company hijacked Kanye’s ridiculous pop-up studio in the Mercedes-Benz Stadium changing rooms and made use of all his very very expensive computery things.

The sum of these parts is a fresh, vibrant and approachable course-correction for Liars—a band who, just a few months ago, were on the ropes. The best comeback since Rocky IV.  

The Apple Drop is available for purchase and streaming here.

Words: Andrew O’Keefe

Dylan Henner—The Invention of the Human

Dylan Henner’s The Invention of the Human feels like mallsoft of a deserted future. It is a suite of synthesis, which sings in garbled voices to empty rooms. Its new-agey choral minimalism can best be described as glacial. This owes not only to a measured pace, but a powerful tension as chords slide over each other in creaking and reluctant transition. There is such stillness to this album that its each greedy moment seeks to hold you forever.

It’s useful to discuss The Invention of the Human through its vocals. Voices are ever-present but computer synthesised, and then even further processed into abhuman weirdness; slowed, downpitched or swamped with delay. It’s like listening through thick water; recognisable, but refracted, askew and alien. The sound is organic but equally suggests transhumanism—a chorus staying its breath in anticipation of the future.

Vocals also recall some works of the past. Closer ‘We Could Hear Them Singing…’ surprises with Daft Punk-style vocoder effects—but supplements its sound with faint ecclesiasticism, shades of a prayer bell burbling beneath the surface.  ‘The Peach Tree Next Door…’ and ‘The Lake was Covered in Lilypads’ both feature staccato vocals as percussion, in the style of Philip Glass. ‘…Lilypads’ impresses in particular, its peppering of vocal delay mimicking the perpetually-accelerating rhythm of a bouncy ball. The track disintegrates at its midpoint, before reforming for an acidic and overdriven coda. It is anchored by a gorgeous chord sequence, the sole element of the track which continues throughout its length.

This happens a number of times in The Invention of the Human, a sole thread sitting concrete amidst amorphous elements.  The album subtly evolves and self-corrects, undergoing slow but drastic and sometimes painful changes—but you don’t really notice it happening in the moment. You could see this as an optimistic reflection of our natures—both on a personal and a global level. Our history is a long series of misguided acts, some species-wide endemic flaw forcing our errors. But follow the thread and we see change and development blossoming around the mistakes. The album’s cover encapsulates this idea well; a machine-learning replica of pre-Guttenberg illuminated text. As the internet hastens a second incunabula, how will humans of five hundred years from now regard us?

The Invention of the Human is available for purchase and streaming here.

Words: Andrew O’Keefe

‘Doing Our Best Is No Longer Good Enough’ and Youtube’s War on Danish Music

The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in the text belong to the author, and not necessarily to the author's employer, organization, committee or other group or individual. This is a damage-control disclaimer because tech-giants are lawsuit-happy parasites who will happily bankrupt normal people to add another few thousand to their trillions in capital.

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No-Wave recently received an email from Danish musician SØS Gunver Ryberg. It contained her powerful new track, ‘Doing Our Best Is No Longer Good Enough’ (review below). But in the same email, Ryberg stated Youtube may take her track down, as they are removing all Danish music from their website. Yes, all.

Since 2013, Denmark’s music has lived on Youtube according to an agreement between the site and Danish copyright collective KODA. But recently that’s changed. Copyright collectives like KODA (a U.K. example being PRS for Music) are organisations who license and manage copyrighted works. Royalties are delivered to the copyright holders. The amount recieved is determined by the artists' foothold in the industry, and the popularity of their work. Such collectives are either union-style opt-in organisations, or NGOs established by statute. Pocket-lining notwithstanding, the aim of these collectives is to ensure the fairest possible payment to copyright holders for their work.

It comes as no surprise that some collectives have histories of documented corruption, delayed payments, and dishonest distribution of revenue. In serving out slices of the pie, organisations labour under the self-deception that they themselves baked it, glutting before feeding others. To some, they're self-appointed moneymen and bully-boys who operate legally-sanctioned shakedowns. Others see them as a welcome security net; preventing piracy, thievery, and the hosting of non-attributed work. Denmark’s KODA seem to fall into the second camp, with no high-profile controversy to their name. Denmark's lively and experimental music scene doesn't feel like it could be made by the discouraged.

So what’s changed since 2013? In April of this year, KODA’s licensing agreement with Youtube expired. Polaris Nordic, a sort of pan-Scandi alliance between KODA and Finnish/Norwegian collectives TONO and Teosto, have since been negotiating a replacement.

In the interim, Youtube offered a temporary extension to its deal with KODA. The trouble is, according to KODA, Youtube proposed a new condition which required a seventy per cent reduction in payment to KODA’s clients. KODA assert that Youtube were already pretty miserly before this move. Youtube pay out out far less on average than any other streaming service, and KODA have rejected their deal. As a result, all Danish music has been pulled from Youtube in Denmark. This blanket ban has even affected Danish musicians unaffiliated with KODA. Amidst a global pandemic, and resultant dearth of live performance, this move threatens further financial instability to an industry already on its knees.

It’s hard to see Youtube’s actions as anything other than the latest example of twenty-first century tech giants’ monopolistic power. Complaints of copyright collectives’ stranglehold on art funding seem antiquated and quaint. Now we contend with shameless, nauseatingly corporate one-upmanship and power-play; the multi-billionaires’ version of “this is a knife”.

Youtube now positions itself as a music streaming platform—something it never did in 2013. The site even flogs its own ‘Youtube Music’ service through useless self-serving spam every time you visit it. In 2018, the IFPI’s Music Consumer Insight Report found that forty-seven per cent of music consumption now streams via Youtube. This is marginally shy of anything warranting investigation by a monopoly commission. The question is: can the arts afford to allow its most dominant representative to withhold funding, globally centralise copyright policy, and dictate artists’ royalty payments? Because that’s the way it’s going—greedy guts wants the entire pie.

For these reasons, No-Wave will host Vimeo and Bandcamp links to SØS’s music video below. We decline to host links to any Youtube content going forward. We also maintain that fans of music should—wherever possible—support their favourite artists through Bandcamp or physical purchases instead of streaming.

With that said, here is a review of SØS’ track:

SØS Gunver Ryberg—‘Doing Our Best Is No Longer Good Enough’

AD 93, Aug. 2020

Earlier in the year, SØS Gunver Ryberg released a surprise EP on the label formerly known as Whities (now AD 93). Whities 030 was a clear standout among the label’s already-stellar catalogue. According to our review, the release “[reaffirmed] Ryberg as one of the best producers about”. This month, she releases a bonus track, ‘Doing Our Best Is No Longer Good Enough’, and its accompanying music video.

A natural extension of her work on Whities 030, the track tempers techno sensibilities with modern edge. Unlike than its 90s antecedents, which mined an imagined future apocalypse for drama, ‘Doing Our Best…’ occupies the apocalyptic now. This thing sounds like Greta Thunberg piloting an attack helicopter. How fitting that it releases the same week we discover Greenland is past the point of no return. The kitschy cool of the apocalypse has evaporated in the heat, and “anthropocene” has entered public lexicon. The problem is now so immediate we’ve invented a way to say it fast.

The track's panicked urgency extends into its video, a Weirdcore-style electronic amalgam from Push 1 stop’s Cadie Desbiens-Desmeules. The video depicts a globe, which disintegrates to reveal its core flickering like a dying flashlight. It continues to centre on various dissolutions and disintegrations of this globe, iterating and reiterating the world’s final dying gasps.

The music’s form follows; a garbled and muscular gut-punch of chaos in the style of late Autechre. It’s the full-body experience that Ryberg excels in, this time inducing a fight-or-flight response to a crisis in which it’s futile to do either. Climate change is a massive and horrifying subject. As a species we coast on the idea that “we haven’t gone extinct yet, so we probably never will”. We aren’t hardwired to examine our own mortality, and doing so takes courage and conviction. It’s commendable that Ryberg could even stand to create a track this immediate.

You can’t drop the ball with subject matter this intense—and ‘Doing Our Best Is No Longer Good Enough’ knows that. It’s a track of enormous power that feels like it could shake ice floes loose and rattle the Earth in its cage. While not easy listening, this track has a fair claim to contextualising the impending apocalypse better than any others. Try ignoring it after this.

Whities 030 is available for purchase and download here. Watch the video for ‘Doing Our Best Is No Longer Good Enough’ below.

Words: Andrew O’Keefe

Music: SØS Gunver Ryberg (https://sosgunverryberg.com/) Video: Push 1 stop (push1stop.com/) Mastering: Joel Krozer, Six Bit Deep 'Doing our best is no longer good enough’ appears courtesy of AD 93 on Whities 030. https://sosgunverryberg.bandcamp.com/album/whities-030 Video is commissioned by Strøm for Strøm Festival 2020. strm.dk Thanks to: Statens Kunstfond, Ekko Festival, Norberg Festival, Radar and Intonal festival.