VITAL WEEKLY

Martin Taxt still plays 'microtonal tuba' on the release with a trio named Muddersten, but it's  without any specific note mentioned and also electronics. The other members of the trio are Havard Volden (guitar, tape-loop) and Henrik Olsson (objects, friction, piezo). Muddersten we learn is 'a  type of mudrock whose original constituents were clays. It looks like hardened mud and, depending  upon the circumstances under it was formed, ut may show cracks or fissures, like a sun-baked clay  deposit'.  Still flowers can grow on this. The seven pieces here are improvisations and we also learn that the titles don't mean that much. The music is quite different than that of Microtub. It is hardly minimal and has lots of bigger and smaller events within each piece. Somewhere along the lines of (obviously) improvised music with the two instruments and the electro-acoustic approach of all the acoustic stuff used, along with the electronics into which these are fed. It moves back and forth, ranging from the quite (yet not complete) silent and the louder, chaotic (and yet never noisy) bits that are also to be found here. Their sounds bounce around completely without effects at points and then pick them up, move them around, through delay, reverb or whatever else there is, and they apply that to whatever it is they are doing. Sometimes there is no instrument to be heard and it seems an 'all-acoustic object' bash, but then the guitar and tuba pop up, out of nowhere it seems and their pieces move into something entirely different. I thought all of this was quite vibrant music, and that Muddersten plays it with some fine energy. Excellent work.