geekent’s stuff’n things

The problem with laptop music is ironic: there’s too much freedom to make music. As a result, the ability to finetune samples, cut’n paste loops and micromanage the music to the point that the performance is lost and somehow, the songs all sound the same if they don’t outright suck. Maybe everyone’s using the same software or they’re trying to copy or outdo other people’s sound.

For well over ten years, the Finnish duo Pan sonic (which I will still call Panasonic to the very end) have been going ultra analogue yet insanely hifi. Using handbuilt instruments, Mika Vainio and Ilpo Väisänen turn their dials and fade their switches to make their music live. No keyboards, no loops, no dropped beats. The closest thing you could label it would be "experimental techno" but that doesn’t even begin to describe how utterly alien their songs are. Although they recently moved to Berlin from their recent base in Barcelona, their sounds always bring to mind the splendid desolation of the Finnish winter and the pent-up frustration of vicious loneliness.

Their latest release is Kesto which is Finnish for permanence or something that lasts a long time. Kesto consists of 4 full albums, each coming in its own cardboard slipcase and each with its own style. This is like no multi-album release you’ve run into before, unless you happen to find a cheap used box set somewhere. Kesto lives up to the alternate definitions: endurance, strength, quantity.

The first disc’s got the heavy beats. Massive square sound waves against distorted percussion lead the way, hammering the senses like a construction site planted in your skull. This harkens back to their days organizing raves, doing the pure techno beat. Then again, they never really cut the wax live, preferring to punish the floor with unrelenting sounds. Listeners beware: listening to any of Pan Sonic’s music at high volumes will cause ear and stereo damage. Listening to their music live may cause bowel disruption. (Seriously — I’ve seen them live twice and I’ve been thankful I had earplugs, based on what happens to those in the audience who forgot.) At the same time, this is Pan Sonic at its most conventional where the two layers of sound guide each other, moving through section with slow monumental buildups.

Disc two is less intense, although it maintains its industrial roots with the first disc. The melodies are clearer and less distorted, adding some serenity with the constant menace. It’s occasionally as pastoral as Boards of Canada, although there’s no nostalgia involved. At times, there’s a charm harkening back to the early sound pioneers Throbbing Gristle, who get their own dedication on this disc. Pan Sonic is fairly aloof although they rightly manage to get themselves out of the way of their music and leave the explanations elsewhere. All the song names are blunt and carry no sentimental attachment: even in its original Finnish language, the words are technical in nature ("distance", "current transformer", "telemites", etc.). Still, the songs have their own internal logic and build up their drama accordingly.

The odd disc out is the third one. This disc is an abstract tease; it starts off with a processed noise, then a toilet flush before spending the next few minutes in very quiet static that often leaps out with a different mood before going somewhere else. The entire disc sounds like an art installation soundtrack with its random moments of sound. There are moments of apparent silence and volume changes are more extreme. As opposed to the other parts of Kesto, this disc requires the most conentration. If you don’t have the patience, yet somehow got this far, it might be wise to skip to the last disc. Once you have the time, listening to CD 3 allows for some startling mood swings.

The fourth and final disc consists of a single hour track (Säteily or Radiation) which sounds like crystal glass slowly being rubbed together in a monstrous cavern. If you ever heard Aphex Twin’s slower works or Brian Eno’s ambient music, imagine slowing them down past a glacial speed and freeze time to its most languid pace. Turn out the lights, close your eyes and lean back when listening and you could almost feel your body hurtling through space or submerged thousands of metres under the water. From the hearts of tubes and wires comes a whalesong piercing through the stillness.

It had been three years since Pan Sonic released an album, but they’ve come back in a large way. The way they strip a song or arrangement down to its complete minimal essence without ditching the meaning is unparalleled. Based on the sheer size and scope of the project, newcomers may be overwhelmed by the four plus hours of music here. However, if you want to listen to what music in another dimension sounds like, brace yourself for what the other planets may be hearing in their dreams.

Mixing the raw feel of rock’n roll with the heathen vibe of dance shouldn’t be thought of mixing two completely different tastes together. It may sound crazy but people used to dance nonstop to a live band playing hedonistic tunes. Somewhere along the way, a line was drawn in the sand and rock dropped the roll and strove for authenticity, so the head could bang and the angst could thrash.
At least, that’s how the generalization goes. Don’t bore us, just get to the chorus. The hips and the butt got spurned so they went to the discotheques and warehouses to find the beat.
I forget where I’m going with this.
!!! (try running "chk chk chk" through your preferred search engine) are a wily octopus of a band where the tools of your favourite live band fit into a James Brown style, where each instrument fits a certain rhythmic role and they play against each other, providing their own tension. There are no verses; each song charts its own course, leading a path through different acts.
When the big mess works, it lets loose. When the going gets tough, the tought get karazzee starts off the album with the wooziest bassline hook that you’ll have injected to your booty and then glides through deranged guitars and disco drums. Pardon my freedom kicks the dance floor with warped steel drums at the beginning, sinister bongos at the end and a potty mouth throughout.
And it goes without saying, the epic dance single from last year: Me and Giuliani down by the school yard (a true story), nine minutes of top notch, floor filling action. If you have not heard this song, this should be compelling enough for you to pick up the album. Both Graig and I considered it one of the best songs from 2003, so it stands as a high water mark for the rest of the album.
However, there are patches of shoddiness. Occasionally, the inane lyrics often cripple some of the songs. Sometimes, they lay low and punctuate the polyrhythmic wonderment, but the odd phrase sounds dopey and really yanks you out. Shit scheisse merde is perilously close to prog wankery with the textures sloppily piled together and every bad 1980s new wave cliché put on display. Like leg warmers over your parachute pants in the pantheon of bad taste. An awkward piece, considering you get two parts and an instrumental reprise, but maybe they’re just anticipating the next wave.
You can tell that their reputation for being all dancepunk is wearing heavy, so they could be making their first tentative steps towards a new sound. The few short pieces interspersed throughout the album suggest some further outtakes where they run wild far from their dance roots and somewhere more cinematic.
As breakout albums go, Louden up now passes the grade, but maybe the club band lost something along the way from club land. Or the tectonics are shifting already and it’s time to hit new heights. Somehow, your butt must get moved.