| Band Members | Alon Ilsar - Live Drums, MARU, Composition, Programing, Arrangements, Hebrew Gibberish, cranky time signatures
G.L. Seiler - Compostion, Programming, Arrangements , Sleeping in the studio, fear of driving |
| Influences | Many And Varied.....
Autechre
Dntel
Leafcutter John
Venetian Snares
Prefuse 73
Wisp
Fourtet
Mike Patton (as his various incarnations)
Sonic Youth
Squarepusher
Datachi
Allot of things.
REVIEWS.........
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The Australian experimental music scene has been well served of late with an adventurous album release from Pivot and also this intricate electronic collage from duo Comatone & Foley.
Trigger Happy was two years in the making, and a commited musical thoroughness is quickly revealed.
Each one of the many interconnected phrases on the 11 lengthy compositions has been carefully worked out. Precise melodic fragments are intergrated within shifting textures and the kind of messing about with time signatures that found favour with key electronic experimenters such as Aphex Twin and Squarepusher.
The result is an amalgam of displaced beats and sonic squiggles that suit the more contemplative chill-out room and qhich unravel over time, offering an enhanced sonic experience with repeat listens. The embracing ambience on offer is also warmer and more inviting than other work from avant-minded peers. It brings to mind the pleasant vibes working through the detailed and stylistically diverse playfulness of bands like Tortoise and The Sea and Cake. In this respect, Comatone and Foley display an imaginative confidence that is pleasing for a debut album.
Dan Bigna
Canberra Times
Whenever you see big goverment sponsor logos on the back of an album, the alarm bells usually start ringing.
My God, goverment-approved electronica. That can only mean two things: either saftey checked wallpaper for working family consumption or arcane weirdness that no record company in this country would ever want to spend money on.
With "Trigger Happy" it's the latter.
This 'itelligent' record of burbling, burping, bleeping broken up beats and soundscapes should definately be filed under abstract. This album calls to mind the kind of space that Warp records were trying to inhabit once upon a time, with its blend of Autechre, Aphex, Recoil and even Cabaert Voltaire. It looms over you, impassive and monolithic.
Typical of the album's oeurve is the eerie fluttering of 'Computer Rain', with its crisp, compressed sounds and insectiod shuffling momentum. This is the soundtrack to an imaginary David Lynch film, one set on an ice sheet, where lonely weirdos wander around in an hallucinogenic and vaguely melancholic daze.
Elsewhere, 'CF1' drops in chilly piano lines and a subtle jazzy drum pattern as it builds to a heavy, beat-laden plateau. 'Heifen' starts with rounded pulses before crashing into razor sharp beatsand mind altering backwashes of almost lush sweetness. "Electric Sheep' briefly threatens to be '80s electro funk but diverts into much harsher territory and ends up steely and glinting.
Comatone & Foley are clearly brining ideas from places as far apart as industrial noise and Nordic Jazz, and the result is a dangerously abrasive chemical stew of strangeness and alienation. If it were a book it would tell the tale of a Soviet-style dystopia. Taxpayer money well spent.
Paul Ransom.
Inpress
This is a challenging record.
I have taken longer than usual to decide what it does for me. I challenge you to decide what this arty, ad lib take on electronica does for you.
At first play, most tracks reminded me of a crashing 8-bit computer game from the 80s getting stuck in a sound loop. On subsequent plays, the complex intricacies of Trigger Happy start to unfold.
Indeed, the subtle everyday sounds and objects that Comatone & Foley seem to have woven in become more apparent, and you can really begin to appreciate the originality of the source of much of their percussion. Indeed, Prayer Bowl appears to have been played entirely on one object of the same name.
And it’s the percussive elements that drive this record for me, moodily set to a backing of Jarre-esque synth strings and acoustic mayhem. To complete the wide mix of moods, more mainstream dance beats take over on some tracks and couple well with the interesting timings and almost random syncopation.
Crazy rock guitar breaks out in Electric Sheep, demonstrating the duo’s desire to surprise the listener and blur the boundaries between musical styles.
This is one of the more marketable tracks in my opinion, though I base that on its slightly more melodic bent and a more traditional time signature. But to be honest this track is not the reason you would buy this record; it is everything else to be found contained therein, a lot of which does not become apparent until you’ve listened through several times. I like this re-play value.
Released nationally through Vitamin Records
Mark Godfrey
Mark Godfrey is a Melbourne based web developer, guitarist and singer-songwriter, and a veteran of the UK rock pub/club circuit. When not doing any of the above he enjoys stargazing and reading theoretical physics. |
