Tomas Korber/Keith Rowe/Gunter Muller - Fibre

For4Ears 1657

One of the things I most enjoy about this area of music surfaces during “Fibre”. I come to it knowing the work of all three musicians reasonably well and so, slipping disc into player, I have what I imagine is a generally decent idea of what the music will be like. Indeed, on first listen, not too intent, it conforms to my prejudgment: fairly steady-state, a range of staticky washes, some degree of “roundness” attributable to Muller’s presence (a kind of air brushing of edges that he tends to impart to improvisations). However, subsequent listens reveal not only extraordinarily thick and rich layers of sound and relationships between same that eluded me first time through, but an appreciation of how the three pieces themselves sit in fine apposition to each other, contributing subtly toward a larger reading of the disc as a complete, delicately dramatic work.

Three pieces, a shortish opener and two lengthier ones, the first and third with the entire trio, Muller sitting out the middle one. Again, going in, I found myself looking most forward to track two, having a general bent toward what I suspected would be the rougher, grainier texture likely to manifest there. The first cut adhered to my expectations somewhat, beginning with a blast of steam quickly accompanied by undulations beneath which I (properly or otherwise) assigned to Muller, balancing out the harshness above. But very soon, there are several quick stop/starts, a restlessness making itself felt, before the work settles into a texture somewhere between the hiss and the hum about halfway through its nine or so minutes. At this point, a dark propeller roar emerges, offset by faint, frantic whines and other troubling clatter, riding to an almost seamless transition into the second track, as though Muller had simply gotten up and left the room for twenty minutes. There is, indeed, a more particulate aspect to the Rowe/Korber portion, an intensification of magnification, if you will, a deeper exploration into sound-layering without the “oil” that Muller normally provides. The play between electronic drones and the extremely palpable and various surface abrasions is especially gorgeous here. Korber (I’m guessing) establishes several loops that materialize and disappear throughout, lending a vague rhythmic character to the piece. At first gloss, I didn’t hear the enormous amount of “stuff” occurring here as it was partially masked by the drones; I had to readjust my ears a bit to take in the multiple strands at one time—very rewarding when I was able to do so. It gets excitingly violent for a while, including some guitar thwanging, before settling back into those good old static hums…

There’s a decided break between the second and third tracks, the latter dropping into the world with a solid crunch, Muller back in the fold. After the relative rigor and asceticism of the prior track, his presence comes as a welcome touch of lushness. Indeed, there’s something of a jungle character present right from the start with echoing chirps and feral cries abounding. This fibre contains dozens of threads, all manner of sound-worlds unexpectedly blipping into existence including, early on, what seems to be a loop of some Baroque pipe organ. Several more minutes on, there’s a guitar chord that’s rather astonishing for its normalcy. Things coalesce into a whirlpool of white noise that’s allowed to gestate for a good while before evanescing into a lovely tick-tock with chime that, very gradually, fades out to the end of the disc.

An early favorite of 2006. Check it out.

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