Whilst we get cracking on a full review of the upcoming JUV release on Miasmah Recordings, Monique over at Sonic Pieces was kind enough to give us the heads up on this fantastic interview compiled by Erik Skodvin…

When I first got sent the material for the Juv album I was completely blown away, especially by the fact that this was made almost 14 years ago, while you guys were nothing but youngsters. Can you tell me the brief history of how you came to work together?

We met in high school where we were in the same year. We started talking about music, trading CDs and went to concerts. When I went to the US as an exchange student we started writing to each other and when I got back it had grown to a tight friendship. The first summer after high school we went around Europe by train to make field recordings, recording hours and hours of audio. I built a makeshift studio in my parents’ garage and started working with music there. A year after we both got into the art academy in Oslo and it became our full time studio, gradually taking over the loft in the tower of the old building.

ARM came together around this time too, which we started with Alexander Rishaug, Øyvind Stoveland Berg and Steven Cuzner. ARM was our main focus in the beginning, and we envisioned ARM as a collective with multiple outputs. I guess Juv was part of that, one of the many beginnings that were a result of the sheer joy of discovering sound and music. Whereas ARM was based in improvisation I was making compositions both on my own and with Marius. I remember that we formulated a vision of our own quite early. We were collaborating quite intensely for three years, from 1996 through 1998. We were about 19 when we started.

You say you never got to finish the album when it was made back then, your friendship abruptly ended just before its completion. What exactly happened during the making, and how come you never spoke again until now?

I will spare you the details but I think it was bound to happen at some point – as with many early collaborations. Starting that young it is no wonder that we would undergo a lot of personal change along the way, part of which required us to define a personal space at one time or another. For three years we were working constantly together, sharing studio, equipment and eating most meals together. It was an all or nothing attitude, so the moment we tried to do work individually it fizzled out quickly. Add some personal drama to that and you have twelve years of silence.

Also, our ambitions were sky high and quite abstract– and at the same time we were just getting into the basics of sound and recording. What really gets me today is the sense of time we had back then. No deadline for an album, endless recording sessions, an extreme patience and curiosity in listening back to recordings and the sound of the surroundings. A lot of what is on the record was considered studies – the REAL work we always assumed would come later. We must have imagined always working together.

You had to cut down hours of recorded material to fit it into the album format. How was it to work on the music again after all those years?

Very ambiguous! Being so long ago I was in many ways removed from it and therefore could edit it with more ease than when it was fresh. At the same time my main motivation was to somehow honor that time and reconstruct something that in reality was fractured and fragmented – and in doing that there is always a danger of projecting current preferences onto the work. Also, the distance to the work was somewhat an illusion – I found that the music still resonates strongly with me and I still enjoy working with self-imposed limitations similar to the ones in Juv.

What prompted you to go back to it?

The sad ending of our collaboration stuck to my memory of the project as a whole, and it just seemed a big failure. We knew little about production back then so I just assumed the sound quality was crap too, especially since some of it was made on a 4-track tape recorder. But listening to things like minimal metal and early tape music triggered my memory; it seemed familiar and close. I finally got the DAT tapes out of storage and started listening back to it. I did not realize the sheer quantity of music we had made over quite a short period. When I started compiling the album I it was only natural to make contact with Marius again and he has joined me in the completion of the album.

The album feels to me almost like an occultist, droned out version of early black metal, or like mourning, dragged out classical music made with blackened guitar sounds. What is your own interpretation of the Juv sound?

With Juv we wanted an organic, minimal and ever changing sound. We tried to rid the instruments of their signature traits, for example by removing the attack and looping them, to make them more undefined as well as constant. We were looking for a ringing, vibrating sonic presence of an anonymous orchestra or abstract entity. We wanted to equal the status of the sound sources, mixing our own recordings with field recordings and sampled music, both “low” and “high” culture. A deep listening band (we actually met Pauline Oliveros while we were making the album, and were inspired by her deep listening music).

What is it about?

To me it is music awaiting some sort of dramatic change. Death awareness, awareness of self, of time passing. Mourning the end of innocence, maybe. Transitory music. It was music that we needed to do, almost like a sonic shelter, something to be surrounded by. Releasing it, having a name, was secondary, which is why it never came out. Finding the name was the last thing we did, and that was only a month ago!

Having been talking to Marius these last months I have discovered that to him it was addressing the outside world more directly. Kind of an emotional output or transcription of the experience of political realities into sound: imperialism, wars, and environmental disaster. The dark sides of this civilization, really.

How did you make music with Juv? What kind of sound sources did you use?

In Juv we had some self-imposed limitations that affected the music profoundly. We never used synthesizers or electronic effects, even though we were surrounded by those possibilities. However, we did use the sampler, and massively so. It was the central tool since it allowed us to distill sounds from improvised and found recordings, tune and loop them to form a constant flow of sound. The limited memory of the sampler forced us to think about music in an economic and minimal way, a limitation we enjoyed and cultivated. We gave the loops uneven lengths so that they would gradually shift and create constant variation within an otherwise static sound. We sampled ourselves as we improvised in various settings, field recordings from our surroundings and existing music.

A lot of the improvised recordings became compositions of their own, or simply layered with the sampler-derived work. These sessions were small rituals, and often done outside of the studio. Like the vocal part on Sut; it is part of a one-take recording we did in the woods on the city border of Oslo. We took the train to the last stop one night, walked into the woods until there were no more light from the city and screamed our throats sore. On the title track Juv the wailing tones are chairs dragged along the floor of massively reverberating Emmanel Vigelands Mausoleum (which you have also done, Erik!), which was situated right between Marius and my house back then. The vocals and grass whistle sounds on Undergang were recorded in Berlin in a tunnel underneath the Siegessa?ule monument. On the opening track Los the sound came from a sound installation we made where we strung up metal wires between the walls of a room, playing them with a violin bow. Midway in Verk there is the sound of pressure air on guitar strings. In general we used a lot of abstracted guitar sounds.

The field recordings also give an idea of what kind of places we visited. There is the bomb signal from a construction site, the standing wave in a bus riding to Experimental Television Centre in upstate New York, the sound of passing cars from the interstate highway, the sound of the brakes on our friend’s bicycle.

Are: I was told that you were Varg Vikernes ? (Burzum) neighbor as a kid. Is this true? And in that case, what were your conceptions of his music and the early metal scene back then?

Yes, that ?s true, although I knew him as Kristian Vikernes back then, his birth name. He was one of the first people I knew who were doing music and I remember visiting him at his parents place and he played what I think was Metallica covers for me. I borrowed a tape from him with his early band, Old Funeral, and I liked it since I was into Iron Maiden, Kreator and such.

I was never that close to him but respected him because he was nice to my sister and he was an individualist. I heard that he rebelled against his teachers by purposely doing badly on tests, but in a way that made it clear he knew the answers. That made an impression, this sense of having your own standards and not falling into the prescribed paths of rebellion, such as being a slacker. That is how I perceived it anyway.

I moved to Oslo in junior high school and didn ?t see anything of him until I remember realizing that the anonymous interview with him in the Norwegian music magazine Rock Furore, was with him. The scar from a skiing accident and the mention of Old Funeral gave him away. Shortly after all hell broke loose, so to speak. However, I was not into black metal in the 90 ?s.

And Marius is oblivious to it to this day (in spite of having the best black metal vocals I have ever heard!). I did not like the theatrics of it, it was hard to find and the people I borrowed records from were probably too politically correct to own it. Therefore I never heard much of it, even though I listened to hardcore, punk and death metal. My teenage revolt consisted of not dressing according to a code, not drinking, not doing drugs, not being part of a scene or community. Which eventually led to social isolation, of course, but that is another topic.

The music that was influential for us in the late 90s was the sampler-derived minimalism of Deathprod, the microtonal music of Giacinto Scelsi and Tony Conrad and the minimal works of groups such as Swans, Neurosis, Sonic Youth, Codeine and the Melvins. It was only when I got into experimental black metal and doom many years later, and especially the minimal and atmospheric work of bands such as Paysage D ?Hiver, Brenoritvrezorkre, Sunn O))), as well as Burzum, that I started seeing the musical connection to Juv.

What about the politics of black metal?

In the recent documentary Until The Light Takes Us, Varg is talking about his idyllic childhood and how black metal was a way to experience extreme emotion through music, a more real reality – to pierce through suburban numbness. I think this is true for a lot of young music. It comes from a need to claim your own body, which is transforming, and to call for personal change in oneself, through music. So I think it is largely an individual quest. It is trying to get access to spirituality when all spiritual institutions seem dead and diluted, and yet the only language in your vocabulary is of that origin. So it is turned upside down, noise is added to the music but the harmonics are largely the same, the images of churches, crosses and Jesus are abused, demons are angels and angles are demons. This poverty of language is very interesting to me, to fetishize the enemy rather than to replace it with something new altogether. To me black metal is contradiction mixed with extreme passion, so it is hard to see any factual politics coming out of that, except the act itself.

So what did it mean for you to do Juv?

Making music was a very real way to break out of the social isolation we were in, to access the outside world, make friends through music and eventually choose the life of an artist. This was some of the first music we made and in that age it was a radical thing to do. Only gradually did we meet others who were doing the same.

What does the word Juv mean, and how do you feel about that the material is about to finally be released?

Juv is Norwegian and similar to the English word abyss, it means a sort of bottomless hole, that deep space between two mountain walls or a inside a deep underground cave. It also brings to mind the echoing and reverberation of sound.

Releasing it feels great. Like reuniting with a young version of yourself and being able to have a good conversation. Or retrieving lost memory. And finding back to my old friend, Marius.

The front cover is a picture of a mountain being buried by the shadow of another mountain, showing just a small strip of light left on the top. There is also a picture of you both in a cabin, exposing your identities as two young guys sitting quietly staring at the camera. There seems to be less of the typical theatrical approach found in the dark ambient/metal genre. How do you see the connection between your music and the photos?

When releasing something that was made that long ago I wanted to keep it as close to the source as possible, so to speak. The easy thing would be to dress it up as some obscure underground artifact, to drape it in anonymity and mysticism. As much as I can enjoy myth in music it is obvious that a lot of privileged youth are dumbing down and acting up, posing as sub-cultural cavemen so to speak. Myth is a collective product, it is the sum of many tongues – not the press release. So I wanted it to be a straightforward affair and let the music speak for itself.

The two pictures were taken in the same place and at the same time, in Vindstad in the Lofoten islands in the north of Norway. The photographer was the artist Ane Hjorth Guttu, who we were visiting. We did some recording in the abandoned school where the picture was taken. A few months later the collaboration collapsed. The cover is showing how one mountain is slowly being covered by the shadow of another – behind the photographer. I think it is a perfect image for the whole project, of growing up – especially since I remembered it for that long. Fortunately we found the negative in her archive.

When we were in Lofoten that landscape became such a representation of the music we had been making in the city. It was a surreal experience, like the time when we walked around on the large, white Bunes beach between these two mountains, and found a beached whale, rotting away. The place was always rainy and foggy, and on rare occasions: short bursts of sunlight.

You told me that the only track you made using a computer, was the last track you ever made together and it is also the last track on the album, Verk. How did you mix before that?

All the mixing was done straight from sampler or multitrack down to DAT tape. As with a lot of tape music the composition happened in the moving of the faders, there and then. This limitation demanded a lot of concentration and made the whole process of mixing feel in time with the sound.

With the non-linear digital editing of the computer this huge realm of new possibilities opened up, but at the same time closed off another. The focal point provided by our limited means was lost and in many ways ended our Juv paradigm. Verk was not considered as a finished piece and is included on the record as we left it. The last sound, the feedback, was actually the last addition we made to it and well illustrate the sudden death of the project.

How is the approach to music making in Juv compared to your current projects like KILLL, Single Unit and Arm?

Those projects are based on the possibilities of the computer and electronics, and have other conceptual and methodological limitations. KILLL is a live-only band with collaboration over short time periods, ARM is improvised electronic music and Single Unit is composed collage music.

Already knowing about your background in visual art, experimental electronic music and noise, it ?s fascinating to hear this album in context with your other work. How do you yourself see your artistic and musical progression over the years since the Juv album was made?

As I mentioned earlier there is a link between Juv and my work of today in that both are using self-imposed limitations. It is a methodology that is less about strictness and discipline, although it is required, and more about accessing something beyond the scope of preference and habit.

With Juv these rules were not stated as a dogma, but indirectly agreed on as we were working. The sound sources, the minimalism of the sampler and the real time mixing. Basically what did not fit in with Juv became ARM, or the other way round. Today I am working more consciously with limitations that direct source materials, visual tools, formats and modes of abstraction. The collage series ION is perhaps the closest to Juv, especially as I have come to see it as a teenage aesthetic. Like Juv, ION is transforming a readily available aesthetic into something of a more archetypical nature, inverted and intensified.

I ?ve gradually come to enjoy reading work, my own and others ?, in a less linear way. Likewise I am less interested in the linear reading of art history and more attuned to the individual and methodological. So, going back to Juv, while making new work, I found really rewarding. That one project does not have to succeed the other, and that one can be into multiple sensibilities at a time.

Marius, while still working with sound as part of his works, moved into theatre, politics and writing. Now, he refers to his work as contemporary manifestos. So for him there is a connection to our old work, as he always experienced the music more attuned to the political somehow. He has done some very controversial work that got him into serious trouble with the theatre, actors and audience. It was confrontational to say the least. He has also done less rancid work such as when he placed a living forest with a stream inside a gallery, or when he made an underwater listening installation in a pool. Whereas his productions used to push towards an almost self-destructive direction, where the level of ambition towered way above the level of performance, he has spent the last years doing smaller productions and writing. He might not agree with me but I have always seen that trait of him as similar to Werner Herzog ?s drive towards the clash between man and nature, between ambition and reality, culture and chaos.

I heard a live recording of your project recorded a long time ago. Will you do more live sessions now that the album is finally finished? In that case, how would you approach it?

Probably not, unless some great occasion comes up, some special place that would make sense to perform in. It is hard to know whether to tamper with the past or just let it be what it was. As far as I remember we only played live twice with Juv.

Will you collaborate in the future?

Apart from Juv, probably not, as we are doing very different work in different fields. But who knows? I like keeping things open ended. Anyways, there is probably at least one more album of Juv to come, given all the music that did not make it on to this record. So we will collaborate on that for sure, when the time is right.

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Release date: Feb 17, 2011

www.miasmah.com

On November 29th sonic pieces presented a label night in Cambridge. Erik Skodvin played his first solo show under his own name and the recording of the performance is available for free download thanks to the guys over at Sonic Pieces…

www.sonicpieces.com
www.miasmah.com/eks

Erik K Skodvin at the Sonic Pieces night in Cambridge, Monday 29th November 2010 was absolutely incredible. “Flare” was the framework, but he completely improvised for 45, splicing guitar, bow, laptop, loop machine and piano in dense psychotic texture. Choral voice interludes washed over the layers of analogue to digital feedback, and periodically it was as if watching a veiled spectacle: when on the pianist’s seat the keys were so submerged it transposed that guitar was being triggered; his lauded alter egos Svarte Greiner and Deaf Center (with Nest’s Otto Totland) forebodingly pressing over his shoulder, but with no ability to predict what outcome Skodvin’s personalised moniker would take. By the end it was over all too quickly.

Type’s Ryan Teague, meanwhile the main support, was joined by Gareth Davis for a showcase of works melding the saxophone virtuosity of Emanem Disc’s John Butcher with the jazzier meanderings of Matmos. The introduction of drums in the Unitarian Church was surprisingly effective, with Teague’s guitar careening like driftwood across a foreground of melodious processing and impacting key flotation. The shared classical training on their instruments provided ample space for juxtaposition, collage and chance, with nothing veering into slow-motion pastiche or noodling fixations on singular sound sources. Proof once again that technology and temperance can be beneficial if in the right hands.

The catch 22 of all this, however, is that if an audio interface goes screwball for just a second, you’re left with a crumpled palette for which to handle your performance, and no amount of visual or compensatory airbrushing is going to change that. Simon Scott, organiser of this event, certainly wasn’t in luck for the opening set, where after 20 minutes of blissful electric guitar layering into an amorphous drone, his laptop’s speaker connections went caput. Humbly apologising for the hardware malfunction, the audience nevertheless proceeded to clap, and that prompted the duo of Teague and Davis to extend the boundaries of their contribution.

What’s aforementioned also happened to Christian Fennesz in 2009, and is testament to the reliability of organic materials as a whole. Scott’s history as the longest ever drummer in British shoegaze pioneers Slowdive is well documented, and it’s a shame that he wasn’t able to expose his songwriting and non-percussive talents that he told me he had prepared especially for the 80-accommodating, intimate venue spectators. Still, all in all this was an excellent evening of engrossing soundscapes and multi-instrumental vigour, and one reason why the flame in contemporary classical, ambient and fusionist forms isn’t dimming in integrity from where I’m standing.

- Review by Mick Buckingham for Fluid Radio

www.keshhhhhh.com
www.sonicpieces.com
www.miasmah.com/eks/index.html
www.myspace.com/o3o3o
www.myspace.com/ryanteaguemusic
www.myspace.com/davisgareth

Competition: We are offering up a pair of tickets for the Sonic Pieces label night in Cambridge on 29th November. The lucky winner will also receive a signed copy of Simon Scott’s upcoming new 7″ release ‘Depart Repeat’…

For your chance to win simply answer the following question:

How many copies did Sonic Pieces make available for their first release?

Answers to be sent in using this contact form

Closing date for answers will be 19/11/10

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Kesh Presents…a Sonic pieces label night.

Erik K Skodvin (UK Debut show) + Simon Scott, + Ryan Teague with Gareth Davis + Sonic Pieces dj’s (Monique Recknagel)

29.11.10 @ The Unitarian Church, 5 Emmanuel Road, Cambridge: Next to Drummer St Bus Station. 8pm doors.

Tickets: £6 adv/£7- door > www.wegottickets.com

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Born 1979, raised in Langesund / Norway. Currently lives and works in Berlin after a long period in Oslo. Works freelance as graphic designer (miasmah design) mostly for record labels, artists and within music business. He also makes music himself under the aliases svarte greiner & deaf center + runs the record label miasmah recordings.

Simon Scott is the former drummer of Slowdive who released his debut album “Navigare” on Miasmah Recordings (run by Erik.K.Skodvin from Deaf Center) on October 12th 2009. “Traba”, a vinyl only mini LP was released summer 2010 on Immune Recordings.

Ryan Teague is a composer/producer working in the field of electro-acoustic composition. His music is an exploration of the possibilities between more traditional instrumentation, techniques and arrangements, combined with electronic treatments, sampling and manipulations. His distinct musical style first came to light through his debut release Six Preludes on Type Records.

Gareth Davis plays clarinets of various shapes and sizes, and on occasion, some other instruments. Sometimes they sound like clarinets, sometimes not so much. When not playing he amuses himself by alternate means. That more or less sums it up.

www.keshhhhhh.com
www.sonicpieces.com
www.miasmah.com/eks/index.html
www.myspace.com/o3o3o
www.myspace.com/ryanteaguemusic
www.myspace.com/davisgareth
www.sonicpieces.com

Finally available: Flare is the most recent project of Norwegian Erik K. Skodvin, otherwise known as Svarte Greiner, or as one half of Deaf Center…

Skodvin is pretty prolific (the CV on his website is vast), and would certainly be familiar to anyone with more than a passing interest in the Miasmah label, as he runs it, as well as doing graphic design and web work for this label and others to boot.

Flare opens with a brooding, percussive “Etching An Entrance”, great exercise in layering – plenty of implied melody and a staggering amount of instrumentation fading into solitary piano part. As far as opening tracks go, it a great foreboding piece that welcomes you inside and draws you in further.

The piano continues on with the introduction to “Matine”, slowly accompanied with some further stringed percussion. At this point the expansive mix becomes apparent – there’s a lot going on here, and it fills every corner of the speaker. That’s not to say cluttered either – the placement of all the parts is strong and everything is audible. There’s what sounds like bird noise or high-pitched strings as the track peaks, then recedes.

“Pitch Dark” follows, with some thumping and aggressive tones mixing in with some ethereal vocals drenched in reverb. The record has the all the characteristics of being recorded in an abandoned castle, deep underground in the desert.  You can fairly hear the sand shifting…

“Failing Eyes” swirls around the speakers with plenty of bottom end, weight and depth. The track seems to go BACK a fair way, almost echoing off a distant wall.

“Neither Dust” is an insistent slow arpeggio with high tones creeping in from the edges to accompany sparse vocals and strings. The main instrument tone is intriguing – the first hint of any effects on any instrument that I could guess at.

“Graves” presents as treated percussion, with hiss dripping off it. Some guttural bass tones flicker in with more layers, building to an almost triumphant peak midway. For my money the standout track, and seemingly the heartbeat of the record, distinctive and menacing.

“Escaping The Day” lightens the mood somewhat, a spacious piano based affair with occasional sweeping and scraping strings.

“Stuck In Burning Dreams” is almost groove based, a byzantine mix of hammered strings and guitar tones. Dissonant and piercing, an incredibly assured bridge from track to track.

“Vanished” has the most outwardly drone like intro, before further chiming piano notes lift it out from itself, before submerging and rising again.

Closer “Caught In Flickering Lights” is a fairly maudlin and evocative piece to start, before again dropping into some fairly heavy hammering bass tones again. It’s quite a note to go out on.

The album as a whole bears the hallmark of someone who is not experimenting per se, but has a VERY CLEAR VISION of what is to be achieved at the end of the creative process. This record did not happen by accident, nor could it. I’d be curious to find out where and how it was recorded, as it has a really strong character of sound.

It is mentioned fairly regularly on articles on the net that this record represents a “friendlier” side to the artist, and is “only moderately dark”. I’d suggest to maybe not taking that statement at face value, as it is by nature pretty brooding, heavy and pensive.  Those of you familiar with his work would not be surprised by what is on offer here, but those coming to it for the first time may find that it is not quite what they were expecting.

In saying that, it is a work of some considerable skill, and those not afraid of a few cobwebs and shadows will find the musicianship on offer rewarding. A perfect cinematic accompaniment to someone lost in the desert at night.

- Review by Alex Gibson for Fluid Radio

Available through the Sonic Pieces store

www.sonicpieces.com
www.deafcenter.net/sg/
www.myspace.com/svartegreiner

Last week I travelled to Berlin for a short 2 day break. I had always been intrigued by Berlin as a city, however had never previously visited. I’d purposefully booked an extra day to allow time to explore, as the trip was fundamentally to surprise my grandmother, who was celebrating her 85th birthday.  Little did I know that word, ‘surprise,’ was to become more relevant as my vacation progressed…

Though my prior knowledge of Berlin was largely confined to history lessons at school as well as brief insights into the city thanks to my love of central European literature, I was aware that contemporary Berlin was increasingly becoming a hub for musicians and other artists. As such, I felt it necessary to try and gain an understanding of why the city had become such a magnet for creativity and rather than partake in run of the mill tourist activities I took it upon myself to try and see the Berlin that these artists live. Thanks to Fluid Radio and a few unexpected events, I’d like to think this was achieved.

My first arrangement was to meet with Monique Recknagel, the owner of record label Sonic Pieces. The meeting had been set up as an interview opportunity with a view to gaining some insight into running an independent label.  Not only was this received in great detail, but was done so over a delightful breakfast and in the company of Erik K. Skodvin perhaps better known to us as one half of Deaf Centre, his Svarte Greiner guise and as label owner of Miasmah. What follows is a short interview with Monique and Erik:

Josh: Can you tell me you thoughts on Berlin as a city in terms of it being a place to live and your connections to it through music and the artistic community here?

Monique: Berlin is a city where it is easy to meet people who are into the same things and share interests. It may be easier than other places, certainly easier than other places in Germany.  In that sense it’s a little bit like an island within Germany. Where I grew up I was not really able to talk to people about the music I was interested in and here you can. There aren’t really any boundaries with learning the language either as the international community is so strong so you can get away with living here and not learning German!

Erik: It’s definitely better than a lot of cities in Europe. It’s so cheap to live here, as after the wall came down there was so much vacant space that living costs became so cheap. It’s also so open with the rules. As an artist, having a sense of freedom is really important so I guess it’s this and the cheap living that makes it attractive to artists. My other attraction to Berlin is the fact there’s a broader interest in what I want to achieve as a musician. I love the music scene in Oslo but it is perhaps a little narrow minded.

Josh:  One of the things as a fan and consumer of this broad genre of music is the attention to detail to the product, the sense that you are buying into more than just a recording and are provided with something really special. As label owners can you tell us about how it is to distribute music in such a way?

Monique:  We are both actually running the labels in very different ways!  Firstly, if I didn’t live in Berlin I wouldn’t run a label as everything mainly happened by accident. I was running a radio show before and started to organise concerts in Berlin. Nils Frahm had a tour last year with Peter Broderick and had released “The Bells,” on Kning Disk. He had this other mini album “Wintermusik” which I knew before and really loved and he wanted another record to sell on tour so he asked me to do some packages for it. He had wanted to put it out on cd-r, but I encouraged him against this. After I received his blessing to do a proper printed release, I knew I had to take greater care in the distribution.  So while it appeared that there was a new label on the scene it didn’t really feel like that!

Josh: Why do you choose to go for limited editions? Do you try to keep the releases as treasured pieces for consumers?

Monique: It’s not really a case of wanting to do limited editions; it’s just that with the packaging I do it simply isn’t possible to produce thousands of copies so it naturally happened that way. On the one hand I’d like to have the music available so we have digital distribution with Morr Music here in Berlin, but the special edition with the special package is something that people really want and I try to do what is right for the consumers.

Josh: Erik, what would you say are the key thought process behind Miasmah?

Erik: The label also came about for me by accident and although I’m not doing the limited edition style releases, I’m doing this because it’s something that I really love and I want to have an output to express this. I look for artists who can represent what I really love in music and most of these artists are turning out to be friends also which is great. I tend to release around 3 releases a year which is perfect for me as it means we can keep focus on making the music great.

Josh: What do you look for in an artist to make you think “I really want to put your music out there?”

Erik: I look for originality and for artists who have a personal touch to their sound. Anyone who knows my music would say it’s atmospheric and dark and while that’s what I love I also want to do different things within this. Some people may say “oh that has the Miasmah sound” but I also have some records coming out which are quite different. I think the new FNS record is a good example.

Monique: It’s funny, as a label if you are releasing a particular style, people automatically who are into that genre start sending demos. So for example I receive a lot of piano music!

The conversation continued for a while after this and we enjoyed croissants, scrambled eggs and cheese all from the comforts of a sunny balcony. Erik had to shoot off to meet with Nils Frahm, and before my departure Monique showed me through the Sonic Pieces collection and generously passed on a copy of the new F.S Blumm and Nils Frahm record to add to my collection.

I left the apartment humbled by the laid back and hugely welcoming nature that both Monique and Erik possessed. There was a refreshing quality in being amongst strangers who were so approachable and Monique’s delicious coffee set me up well for the rest of the day.

I spent the afternoon exploring the city. It was strange to think that despite the countless cranes in the skyline, and with the fresh knowledge that Berlin really was a musician’s city, that it was also such a peaceful one. Despite the occasional drone let off by an airplane in the sky or the low hum of urban ambience, the streets were quiet. The clear blue sky was supported by a radiant sun, the occasional gusts of wind would bring with them blizzards of pollen and my resulting sneezes were about the only additional sounds to those already described.

After a spot of sunbathing by the river, albeit with beer in hand, I had to travel across town for my next appointment; a visit to Nils Frahm’s studio.  Here was a quite beautiful space filled with pianos, guitars, organs and computers. Erik was there from earlier and was working with Nils, who was donning his producer cap, on a new record. As Erik put on the headphones to listen to his latest work I had a chance to discuss Berlin with Nils:

Josh:  What does Berlin mean to you as a city and how does it impact your creativity?

Nils: I think Berlin has a special mark for me because since I’ve been here I can basically live from making music. The first six months I had day jobs in advertising and mixing; jobs that were all musically related. I’m not sure what creative impact the city has had on me, but what makes it really special is that there are so many musicians here now. You can hang out with them every day. It’s not all about making music with them either as most are really individual performers, but there is a strong feeling of togetherness, like a family. For artists in this electronic, new classical movement it’s a pretty great city. Berlin feels like a magnet right now, it’s cheap enough to give it a try and artists are coming from all over the world as you can get by without speaking German.

Josh: On that note what are your feelings about Berlin being this hub for international artists from all over the world? I find there to be this interesting juxtaposition here in that you have a multicultural, dynamic community in contemporary Berlin and historically ‘the nation’ was at the epicentre of German thinking, so how do you feel about the progressive nature of Berlin in that sense?

Nils: I think it doesn’t change too much for me as I come from a very liberal background. My father was an artist and I was always surrounded creative people from a very young age. So I’m not sure if there is anything extraordinary going on here. However I do think this is the only city that has the size to create a certain kind of energy which is unique for Germany at least. London and Paris have it to some extent, but from touring and talking to other artists I can tell you everyone is dreaming about this city because it’s a paradise. It’s half the price and there are many interesting places and options to make a living. The life here is different, particularly in summer time people don’t work as much, I’m always busy because I like to be that way, but you don’t have to work as much to get by as in other cities.

Josh: What do you think is behind this increase in popularity for music that uses traditional instruments in a modern context?

Nils: I try to avoid making a wrap around it because I really enjoy the heterogenic nature of music. It’s basically a group of friends who are into electronic music as well as instrumental music. Peter Broderick, for example, digs electronic stuff the same as he likes acoustic music. He experiments with both, as do I, but it’s a nice addition to the palette of possible ways to express oneself. It also allows you to pick up your old school instruments in a way that won’t have people laugh at you! I hope it’s not a fashion thing because it’s good to bring back the classical roots when it comes to the instruments but performing it to fans of underground music. I’m not a fan of totally classic music, but I think it’s really interesting to use these instruments to create something new. Perhaps the popularity of film music, like Amelie for example, has seen more people show an interest in this sound.

Josh: What impact does the feedback you receive from fans have on the evolution of your music and your creative approach to making music?

Nils: It kind of blocks me right now! Maybe it’s the nature of every second album, I count ‘The Bells’ and ’Wintermusik’ as a double pack of sorts, but it’s a challenge for sure. It was interesting to read the reviews. Some people loved ‘Wintermusik’ and didn’t enjoy ‘The Bells’ while others saw it as the opposite.  It’s interesting to see how a challenging album can be hard to reach a wider audience but the people who get it really love it as one of their all time favourites. So sometimes I think of all the ideas in my head and all the things I could or won’t say over 40 or 50 minutes on a record, but I tend to create variations of my sets when I tour so it’s not like I have a set of pre existing songs and collect and promote them. As such I don’t feel the need to record piano music as much, but I understand the fans would like to have something to listen to, and I need something to sell at my merchandise table! I take it really serious because I know what it means for ones future. I want to play nice venues and great pianos and it all depends on the quality of the record and how people think its put together. It makes it pretty difficult right now to be selective as I like so many different things. For example I really like atonal stuff but when it comes to selling records you need to find a way to make it interesting enough but not too ugly to put people off as it’s also a present for the listeners!

After the interview had concluded, I had initially planned to head back to my hotel, drink some beers and go to bed. Instead the next round of surprises were about to kick in. Firstly, Nils and Erik invited me to listen to their new recording in its entirety. The three of us sat back with drinks and each in our own mediatory states listened in silence. It was fantastic. I was then invited for a late night swim in one of Berlin’s famous lakes. We arrived after a 20 minute walk to the most serene of surroundings. Bearing in mind it was now after midnight, the warm evening air was enough to tempt us all to take a plunge into the lake which was lit only by the half moon and distant lights. We were joined by Erased Tapes owner Robert Raths and the conversation about Berlin continued at length, supported by a chorus of frogs who croaked in unison amongst the rushes.

Two days is not a sufficient amount of time to make an accurate assessment of a place. However the creative and bohemian qualities of Berlin were as clear to me as they are ever likely to be. I was also taken back by the approachable nature of the people whether German born or foreign inhabitants. With business set to expand and commercial investors lying in wait it remains to be seen how long Berlin can retain its charm in such a capacity, but as fans we should hope it long continues to exist in this form for it truly stands as the epicentre for output of the music we know and love.

- By Josh Atkin for Fluid Radio

Special thanks to Josh, Monique, Erik, Nils and Robert for your love and support.

www.sonicpieces.com
www.miasmah.com
www.miasmah.com/eks/
www.myspace.com/nilsfrahm
www.durtonstudio.com
www.erasedtapes.com

Hot on the heels of Svarte Greiner’s ‘Penpals Forever (and ever)’ comes the tour cdr featuring unreleased tracks and liveshows made/performed during 2009-2010…

Track List:

01. SISTER LEAF
02. BLEEDING LIGHTS *
03. MIDNIGHT FEAST **
04. LOST IN ENDLESS ARMS ***
05. MIDNIGHT FEAST PART 2 ****

* Unused material made for the dance piece “The Thief” by zero corp.** Live at Jesus Club, Berlin nov. 2009, on electric Guitar, looper, effect pedals *** Live at Musikk, Dans og Drama radio in Oslo may 2009, on Violin, looper, effect pedals **** Live at Jesus Club, Berlin, w/Brian Mitchell. Thanks to Brian Mitchell for recording and sharing stage with me, Ina Cristel Johannesen and MD&D. Special thanks to Monique Recknagel for handicrafts and help with cover, Music and Graphics © Erik K. Skodvin 2009-2010

Purchase through Sonic Pieces store here

www.myspace.com/svartegreiner

One of our favourite fellow blog/podcasters ‘Play My Tape’ have an exclusive performance of Deaf Center live in Moscow up for grabs. Go visit the Play My Tape web site and download this glorious performance…

This is made pretty much entirely live on mostly Guitar/Piano & about half the set is improvisations around certain rules made in rehersal. Also Contains an extended version of ‘Thread’ and a live version of ‘White lake’ (from the album Pale Ravine).

Erik K. Skodvin on Electric Guitar + Bow, Laptop & Effects, Otto A. Totland on Piano.

Mastered by Rafael Anton Irisarri.

Listen/Download here

www.playmytape.net
www.myspace.com/deafcenter

Svarte Greiner Exclusive by Fluid Radio on Mixcloud

There isn’t much of an introduction needed here as the music selection from Svarte speaks for itself…

‘An alternative 2009 summation based on image and sound rather than words.’

I was inspired to make a mix when asked, and used the last 2 days working on something that I think sums up my year 2009 in ways of music I’ve listened too, artists I have worked with, and songs that ended up beeing soundtracks to happenings in my life at the time.

Kreng – In de Berm pt. 3 (Miasmah)
Lyenn – Wistful Longer (Munich)
Nadja – Affective Fields (Crucial Blast)
Le Corbeau – Hypernoir (Fysisk Format)
Ulver – Lyckantropens Theme 1 (Jester)
Adam Pacione – The Channel Swimmer (Infraction)
Elegi – Råk (Miasmah)
Tiny Vipers – Life On Earth (Sub Pop)
Christian Naujoks – Young Blood (Dial)
Tim Hecker – Pond Life (Kranky)
Fever Ray – Dry and Dusty (Rabid)
Desire – Under Your Spell (Italians Do It Better)
The Sight Below – Shimmer (From “It All Falls Apart” on Ghostly 2010)
Andre Borgen – Standing Here While I Do (Humbug)
Simon Scott – The ACC (Miasmah)
Labradford – Accelerating On A Smoother Road (Kranky)
Svarte Greiner – Live Prague dec09 Excerpt (Unreleased)

(Field recordings done during 2009 scattered around the mix)

A photographic journey of Svarte’s 2009

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Svarte Greiner is Erik K. Skodvin, half of the Norwegian duo Deaf Center.

He labels his music as “acoustic doom”.

He utilizes both field recordings and computer generated sounds when producing his music.

The debut album, Knive, was released in 2006. His second album, Kappe, in 2009

www.myspace.com/svartegreiner
www.deafcenter.net
www.miasmah.com