Jason Kahn & Richard Francis–s/t
CD Monochrome Vision (MV-28)
Edition of 500
"Minimalist in approach...very fine in execution"
VITAL WEEKLY 698, September 2009
"Thinking of the Praise of the shade of Tanizaki...Penetrating"
LE SON DU GRISLI, December 2009
"...fragmented melodies quietly ripple well below the surfaces of noises, occasionally breaking through the hiss in oceanic swells of drone. Very nicely done!"
AQUARIUS RECORDS, December 2009
"The new album from two masters of electroacoustic improvisation, who are living thousands miles away from each other, but found some common aesthetic views and originality of artistic expression. This materials were recorded live during their collaborative performances in various locations, consisting of four long tracks, presenting the unique interaction between technology and intuition." –MONOCHROME VISION
"Just how many CDs did Jason Kahn release by now? Hard to say, but quite a fair bunch. He doesn't surprise me with his music that much anymore, but that has nothing to do with the quality of the music as such. Here he teams up with Richard Francis, once known as Eso Steel and running the CMR label, and these working under his own name. The two met for the first time in Auckland where they played together and then, a year later, again in Switzerland. Kahn plays percussion and analogue synthesizer, while Francis is on computer and electronics. Four pieces (between ten and sixteen minutes each) of great lo-fi humming sounds. A very special kind of drone music that sounds both electronic and acoustic. It seems to me that these are microphone recordings, which capture the atmosphere from the space they play their music in, and which adds a nice textured quality to the music. Minimalist in approach, but very fine in execution. Like said, Kahn doesn't surprise me with his music, but he sure knows how to please me." –VITAL WEEKLY 698, September 2009
"L’illustration de pochette et le nom du label, en sus de leur adéquation et de leurs convergences, semblent opérer comme une mise en condition : non pas un avertissement à l’auditeur, mais un accompagnement, au seuil de ce recueil de pièces enregistrées en public à Auckland, Zürich et Grenoble, entre 2007 et 2008 par Jason Kahn (percussion, synthétiseur analogique) et Richard Francis (ordinateur, electronics). Cette délicate suite – sablier qui chuinte et laisse le temps couler – qu’on écoute comme un continuum, tisse un admirable tweed gris de gouttes tambourinant, serrées à en disparaître, et invite à la contemplation, songeant à l’Eloge de l’ombre de Tanizaki. Lents panoramiques sans afféterie, parcourus d’ondes, paysages densément gris donc, mais jamais mous, puissants de toutes leurs résonances, de leurs nombreuses aspérités. Traînées anthracite, ardoise, rehaussées d’oxydations. Pénétrant." –LE SON DU GRISLI, December 2009
"Richard Francis is one of the quieter musicians to hail from New Zealand. His sparse productions opt for a restrained set of grey noises and tactile field recordings that softens the archetypal gnarled NZ distortion of folks like Michael Morley, Antony Milton, or Campbell Kneale. He's also not nearly as prolific as those three, which is a shame as Francis' work has proven to be amazingly consistent over the years. Here, he's presenting a collaborative body of work in collusion with a man who is nothing but prolific, the Swiss-based sound artist Jason Kahn. Given Kahn's studious use of particular noises (white, pink, blue, brown, etc.), Francis has certainly proven to be one of the more complementary musicians that Kahn has worked with over his lengthy career. The eponymous record presents four extracts from live performances the two managed in both Switzerland and New Zealand in 2007 and 2008. Kahn's set-up often involves pushing particular, restrained noises and synthesized frequencies through the body of a floor tom, and controlling the feedback that can accumulate within that small architectural space; and Francis goes for the virtual systems through the computer interface. But the two can achieve rather similar results with different tools. These gravely, tactile sounds percolate, scrape, and vibrate their way into shifting sedimentary layers which ultimately form a meditative set of broken minimalism. The opening track features a gong-like set of metallic reverberations that billow against an agitated data-stream, which builds through accreted layers of deep low-end drones. Elsewhere, similarly subterranean tones softly rupture with a low-impact distortion grating clouds of grey static. Like on Kahn's groundbreaking album Vanishing Point, fragmented melodies quietly ripple well below the surfaces of noises, occasionally breaking through the hiss in oceanic swells of drone. Very nicely done! " –AQUARIUS RECORDS, December 2009