Ekoclef - Tapeswap

Sometimes you just know a collaboration is going to come up aces, and such is the case of this latest pairing. Ekoplekz, who have in a very short span of time become rather defining in the world of eclecticism and Bass Clef, another shining example of what happens when the tape is left running after hours when no one suspects it's still on. Quite an honestly refreshing burst of free-form improvisations from our obscured duo, it runs here and there much like a mad mad hatter in search of the March Hare. Good thing this pair collided because when I heard each of them on their own, I couldn't help but think: these guys ought to work together, they'd really break through into another realm of expression. So many times I never get what I want but this time...

I did.

And so here it is, now out and stalking my ears like a feral cat in twilight fixated upon the last bit of rotting flesh on the bone. This work is lean, precise, confounding and above all, utterly place-less. I finally heard Ekoplekz's latest album and can make out some of it's impact on the proceedings but for the life of me, Bass Clef is operating in uncharted waters on this one. The heavy use of reverb and echoes is well appointed and believe it or not, it is what anchors this release to reality by the most tenuous of threads. At any point, you could lose your bearings and drift forever in the vortex Clef and Plekz have deviously fashioned. I would not recommend people sensitive to caffeine listen to this one as the errant tempos and spastic explosions of atmosphere will keep you up nights in a sleepless narcoleptic state of transcendental distress. I hear they have done a few shows in the UK, still waiting on word of the after effects. No one could walk away from seeing what I'm hearing here unscathed.

You'd have to spend a lot of time to accomplish what these guys have done, this is what I'd call expertise occult tinkering. The phone might sound as though it's gone dead but somewhere, not too far from what is on 'Tapeswap' there is surely a mouthful of wickedly grinning teeth glinting in the inky haze of the ether. These subconscious transmissions have been calibrated precisely; these are the harrowing results of two men who simply sat down and began swapping tapes, literally that is all that's going on here and this is what they came up with. The previously mentioned influence of Cabaret Voltaire and Severed Heads on Ekoplekz can be murkily heard, gagged and bound via magnetics but it's becoming fainter and fainter as time passes. The guy is growing into his own magnificently, it stuns me that a little over a year ago I had no idea any of this was going on.

Bass Clef, by comparison, continue to sound like no one. From one track where he showcases that trombone he holds so dear to another where he's plainly responsible for mangling sine waves into whimpering foundlings, this fellow is not going to win the Eurovision song contest anytime soon. Oh no, the horror. There might be more... His love of DIY cut and paste tape abuse is a wonder to hear, it's probably even more striking to witness the act of creation itself. As Greenidge is to his thumbs so these two say: give us a pair of scissors and we'll show you the universe. Oct 06 2011