Manafonistas

 

Was Ihnen mit ihren Drehbüchern gemeinsam mit den Tatort-Teams gelungen ist, sind fast schon film-künstlerische Experimente. Wie etwa der Tatort „Meta“, für dessen Buch Sie den Grimme-Preis 2019 erhalten haben.

 

»Der Tatort ist, weil er so erfolgreich ist, eine Spielwiese. Innerhalb von diesem absolut funktionierenden Tatort-Kosmos kann ich versuchen, Dinge, die mich persönlich interessieren, umzusetzen. Ich war vorher kein großer Tatort-Fan, kannte ihn gar nicht richtig. Ich bin zu diesen Produktionen gekommen aus Notwendigkeit – ich musste arbeiten. Es war schwierig, da hereinzukommen, aber bei dem Frankfurter Tatort Das Haus am Ende der Straße mit Joachim Król, den ich zusammen mit Michael Proehl geschrieben habe, unter der Regie von Sebastian Marka, war es das erste Mal, dass ich wirklich einen Film so schreiben konnte, wie ich es wollte – mit Themen, die mir wichtig waren.«

 
 

Erol Yesilkaya schreibt Drehbücher für die Tatort-Reihe. Aktuelle Projekte waren „Sløborn“ und „Exit“.

www.wz.de Drehbuchautor Erol Yesilkaya „Muss mich in viele Köpfe versetzen“

 

 
 

Most self-taught musicians analyze the music they love and have loved, trying to understand how the music found its final form.

There is music that I adore and have some understanding of. Hendrix’s “Moon Turn the Tides” is one of the first compositions in the realm of popular music that used the recording studio as an instrument in itself.  It is complex and groundbreaking, but I do comprehend the moving parts; I see Eddie Kramer and Hendrix moving faders on a mixing console, one hand on a tape recorder feeding delay into the console, another hand manipulating an Echoplex, the analog mixer dotted with pieces of tape marking EQ and volume levels.  Musicians like myself have had the thought, “Maybe I can do something like that.”  We’ve tried and failed.

Then there’s music that can be appreciated, but is understood as being outside the musician’s musical capabilities.  “A Love Supreme” is much more than just Coltrane, it’s Coltrane-Garrison-Jones-Tyner as a hydra-headed musical animal with decades of passionate, luminous experience to draw from.  They spent an enormous amount of time with their instruments and each other.  Musicians hear that music and think, “Well, maybe I could do that, if I could only go back in time 50 years and practice 10 hours a day and find the right people to work with.”  Not possible, and even if it were, doomed to failure.

Finally there’s music that seems to come from nowhere.  It’s music created by a fellow creative human, but for many of usit’s difficult to comprehend the mind and the setting of conventional time and space that could give rise to something like “Kommt, ihr Töchter” from Bach’s St. Matthew Passion.  

Years ago we played a gig in Leipzig and had a day off to wander the town.  I walked past St. Thomas church and wondered how a writer or composer would converse with J. S. Bach’s about his creative process.  The opening chorale to St. Matthew Passion seems opaque to inquiry.  What questions could even be asked?  “Did the music come all at once, was it a struggle, were there lots of revisions, did you just sit in a room with only a pen, ink and staff paper, did you ever despair?”  It seemed slightly incredible that there was a time, several hundred years ago, when this work did not exist, and then a time, several hundred years ago plus several months, when it did.  

“The Suspended Harp of Babel” (Cyrillus Kreek / Vox Clamantis – ECM New Series; added by M.E.) seems to be in this third class of work, or close to it.  This year, 2020, I came back again and again to this music from nowhere, especially the compositions Päeval ei pea päikene, Jakobi unenägu / Alguslaul and Issand, ma hüüan Su poole.

 

Steve Tibbetts

 

 
 

Gute Unterhaltung!

 
 

 

Wann sah ich den Film das erste Mal? Unvergesslich. Im Audi Max der Uni Würzburg, in den wir fast jeden Mittwoch strömten, um uns von einem begeisterten Cineasten einleitende Worte erzählen zu lassen, und dann einzutauchen, in kühne, experimentierfreudige Filmwelten jenseits des Mainstreams. “The first time I talked about it with Robert we said it should look like the late 1800s,” erinnert sich Robert Altmans legendärer Kameramann Zsigismond. Und dazu sollten sich (dachte Robert) verdammt zeitlose Songs gesellen, die uns Hippies sowieso schon ewig begleiteten, gerne mit Räucherstäbchen. Aber es war genial, dass Cohen auf einmal in einem Western auftauchte (die ich schon als Kind liebte, als ich jeder Folge von „Am Fuß der blauen Berge“ entgegenfiebete). Und Leonard war in mancher Hinsicht der unsichtbare Erzähler von „McCabe & Mrs. Miller“. Was für ein anderer, radikaler Western. Es passt, dass die Texte der drei Cohen-Lieder surrealer sind als die erzählte Geschichte – die Handlung wird bereichert mit Symbolen, die Figuren gewinnen an Tiefe durch die Perspektive der Songs. Alle stammen aus dem ersten Album des gebürtigen Kanadiers – Robert Altman spielte die Platte so oft, dass er das abgenutzte Vinyl immer wieder ersetzte. Die Songs schleichen sie sich ein wie Erscheinungen, verbinden sich mit der „inneren Erzählung“, alles klingt an – Dankbarkeit, Trennung, Zärtlichkeit, Vision, Bedauern. Ein in aller Langsamkeit berauschendes Abenteuer für Augen und Ohren.

 

Wenn ich an meine Kindheit und frühe Jugend denke (die späte dauert noch an), waren zwei Filme Fixpunkte an vielen Weihnachtsfesten, „Ist das Leben nicht wunderschön“, mit James Stewart, und „Wer die Nachtigall stört“, mit Gregory Peck. Allein die Gegenwart solcher Filme stellte ziemlich sicher, dass eine Kindheit keine rundum unglückliche sein konnte. Hier ein paar weitere alte / neue Lieblingsfilme meinerseits, die auch ohne Happy End-Garantie weihnachtstauglich sind, naja, zuweilen ab 18 (FSK) – und mit jedem Sehen ein wenig mehr preisgeben, quer durch Genres und Dekaden: The Duke of Burgundy, The Jungle Book (2017), Der wunderbare Mr. Rogers (besser im Original: A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood), Barry Lyndon (aus dem Soundtrack spiele ich etwas in den Klanghorizonten am kommenden Samstag), Blue Velvet, The Fog – Nebel des Grauens, Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019), Safety Last! (1923), Die 39 Stufen (ein wunderbarer früher Hitchcock nach einem Spionageroman von John Buchan), The Lady Eve (1941, einer meiner Top 3 von Preston Sturges), Amarcord (mein Fellini-Favorit), The Killing of Sister George (Robert Aldrich, 1968), Dirty Harry 2 (herrlich trashig, lief einst vorzugsweise auf RTL, wenn wie nicht die kuscheligen Filme wollten) & gerne, immer, Silverado (USA) &  Absolute Giganten (D).

 

 
 

Die meisten „2020-Sprüche“, die man seit zu vielen Wochen erst in den Kommentarspalten und sozialen Medien, dann auch in allen möglichen Jahresrückblicken und Interviews lesen darf, fand ich schon beim ersten Mal albern; beim 35. Mal sind sie so abgeschmackt, dass es echt nervt. Da frage ich mich beim Zusammenstellen meiner „Bestenliste“ ein wenig mehr als sonst, ob diese irgendwie von anderen Umständen als allein der Musik an sich beeinflusst ist. Hatte ich, wie einige andere Musikschreiber in ihren Rückblicken kundtun, ein besonderes Faible für introspektive oder ruhige Musik? Eindeutig nein. (Allenfalls Alva Notos Ambient-Epos Xerrox Vol. 4) Verbinde ich irgendwelche „meiner“ Alben mit besonderen Wochen oder Ereignissen im Jahr 2020? Nicht einmal das. Manchmal war zu lesen, Charli XCX habe mit How I’m Feeling Now ein „besonders markantes“ 2020-Album produziert, das aus der „Lockdown“-Stimmung im Frühjahr entstand und damit viele, viele (junge) Leute auf der Welt verbindend ansprach. Ähnliches haben nun u.a. Adrianne Lenker, Taylor Swift, Paul McCartney u.v.a.m. versucht, markanter jedoch spiegeln sich wohl die gesellschaftspolitischen Spannungen um Rassismus und Benachteiligungen in der Musik des Jahres 2020 wider: Leider habe ich die beeindruckend besprochenen beiden neuen Alben von Sault bis jetzt nicht, da sie als Tonträger de facto nicht zu bekommen sind. Run The Jewels’ 4 bzw. RTJ4 – ihre ersten dreieinhalb Alben habe ich und schätze sie sehr – habe ich einmal nach dem Download gehört, und es hat mir sehr gefallen, dann aber ist es, wie bei Download-Musik eigentlich immer, bedauerlicher Weise meiner Aufmerksamkeit entfleucht. Ich gedenke, dies nachzuholen. Sowohl Fiona Apples als auch Laura Marlings digital im „Lockdown“ vorveröffentlichte Alben haben mich erst so richtig berührt, als ich die LPs zu Hause hatte und abspielen konnte. Thematisch in diese Reihe passen auch die erstklassigen Alben von Sevdaliza (Album des Monats hier: „in einer gerechten Welt wäre Sevdaliza der vielleicht größte Star unserer Zeit“), Assata Perkins alias Sa-Roc, Lucinda Williams, Protomartyr, Irreversible Entanglements und der Wiener Band Culk.

 

»Run The Jewels’ fourth album proved to be the protest record the world needed. Recorded before the BLM movement gained its 2020 momentum, it was a prophetic – or painfully inevitable – portrait of a disjointed America. One where police brutality reigned and the people were demanding change. 2020 will be remembered for two things and Run The Jewels’ album, more than any this year, soundtracks the unrest felt on a global scale.« (the fortyfive)

»Conscious-Rap wird in der Trap-Ära, in der es oft nur um Bling-bling geht, gerne als Zeigefinger-Musik missverstanden, weil der Inhalt politisch und sozialkritisch ist. Sa-Roc ist das schnuppe. Sie hat auch keinen Song extra für die BLM-Proteste komponiert, sie will Kontexte schaffen in einer Welt, in der nur die lauteste Stimme auf Twitter gewinnt. Das ist eben doch revolutionär.« (taz)

 

Auf jeden Fall fiel mir beim Rückblicken auf, wie viele sehr gute Alben ich in diesem Jahr erworben und gehört habe; weit mehr als die unten genannten 30; ich hätte locker auch 50 nennen können, die mich sehr bewegt haben. Nur ganz wenige würde ich als „Fehlkäufe“ einordnen, die mich nicht packen konnten. Es gab zugegeben allerdings auch so gut wie nichts, was mich beim ersten Mal rigoros umgehauen hat. Franck Vigroux’ neue Platte ist eine markante Ausnahme. Nach dem Kauf eines neuen Tonabnehmers in der vergangenen Woche habe ich einige 2020-Platten zum Festnageln meiner Liste noch einmal durchgehört, und Ballades sur lac gelé hat mich erneut so umgehauen, dass ich es direkt ein paar Plätze nach oben bewegen musste. [Beim Suchen nach einem schönen Link stelle ich fest, dass über das im Sommer veröffentlichte Album nirgendwo etwas geschrieben wurde!] Alles in allem, das unerwartete und unerwartet große Album der Neubauten, und Lost Prayers, die erste Kammermusik-CD von Erkki-Sven Tüür sind zwei weitere Fälle von „Umgehauen beim ersten Hören“ und nach wie vor „Fünf Sterne“. Andere Alben sind mit der Zeit gewachsen, manche schnell und eindringlich (Waxahatchee, Oded Tzur, Charli XCX), andere langsam und schleichend (Phoebe Bridgers, Jon Hassell, Ambrose Akinmusire). Aber – da ich das Gespräch über „strategisches“ Listenschreiben gerade mit einem anderen Blog-Autor führte – meine Auswahl folgt allein und rigoros jener Musik, die mich von Januar bis Dezember am meisten und nachdrücklichsten bewegt hat. Die meisten dieser Platten habe ich wieder und wieder gehört [Saint Cloud habe ich sogar, nachdem ich zum Veröffentlichungsdatum die CD erworben hatte, im Herbst auch noch als angemessene Vinyl-Ausgabe gekauft, wie die übrigen Waxahatchee-LPs], und sie bewegen und berühren mich nach wie vor. In jedem Fall handelt es sich um Alben, die für mich persönlich in den 12 Monaten großen Wert hatten. Ein wenig hoffe ich natürlich schon, dass andere dadurch etwas Neues entdecken, denn wenn sich bei mir durch die Musik ein emotionaler Resonanzrahmen einstellt, können das ja auch andere erleben.

 

Zu meiner eigenen Überraschung fällt mir auf, dass ich zum wiederholten Mal ein Album aus der US-„Provinz“ als Favorite des Jahres wiederfinde. Wie mich die aus Georgia stammende Mattiel Brown mit ihrer leidenschaftlich alle Moden ignorierenden Platte Satis Factory durchs Jahr 2019 begleitete und begeisterte, auch bei zahlreichen Langstreckenfahrten inklusive langen Autofahrten quer durch die Vereinigten Staaten, so wäre die Musik von Katie Crutchfield aus dem benachbarten Alabama, mittlerweile in Kansas City lebend, aber seit zehn Jahren vor unter dem Alias Waxahatchee auftretend (sie wuchs in der Nähe des Waxahatchee Creek auf), eine perfekte Begleitung für meinen für den Sommer 2020 gebuchten, knapp zwei Monate langen USA-Aufenthalt gewesen. Bekanntlich konnte ich die bereits bezahlten Flüge nicht antreten, hoffe daher dass sich diese investierte Summe in der Zukunft noch effizient nutzen lassen wird; ich habe die Ausgaben bis jetzt nicht zurückfordert. So gesehen ist meine Verbindung zur Kultur der USA sogar stärker, als sie mir bewusst war — zumal bereits 2018 und 2017 die Bands Low (aus dem nördlichsten Minnesota) und Algiers (aus Atlanta) Spitzenreiter der jeweiligen Jahresliste waren.

 

Die USA finden sich nun auch in dieser Bestenliste auffällig häufig wieder, in aller Vielseitigkeit: Washington, D.C. (Assata Perkins), Louisiana (Lucinda Williams), Detroit (Protomartyr), Chicago (Irreversible Entanglements), Oklahoma (Flaming Lips), Arizona (Avalon Emerson), Los Angeles (Phoebe Bringers, Fiona Apple), Oakland/ New York City (Ambrose Akinmusire), Memphis (Jon Hassell, heute in California beheimatet), auch die Kolumbianerin Gabriela Jimeno alias Ela Minus hat (nach dem Berklee-Studium in Boston) ihr Debütalbum während ihrer Zeit in Brooklyn aufgenommen; und nimmt man Prince dazu, dessen exzellente, umfangreiche Wieder- und Erstveröffentlichungen ich 2020 viel gehört habe, ist auch Minneapolis in der Liste. Die übrigen Alben sind in ihrer geografischen Herkunft äußerst weit gestreut:

 
 
Top 30:
 

1. Waxahatchee: Saint Cloud
2. Franck Vigroux: Ballades sur lac gelé
3. Einstürzende Neubauten: Alles in allem
4. Erkki-Sven Tüür: Lost Prayers
5. Fiona Apple: Fetch the Bolt Cutters
6. Sevdaliza: Shabrang
7. Sigurd Hole: Lys/Mørke
8. Ela Minus: Acts of Rebellion
9. Sa-Roc (Assata Perkins): The Sharecropper’s Daughter
10. Lucinda Williams: Good Souls Better Angels
11. Protomartyr: Ultimate Success Today   
12. Culk: Zerstreuen über euch
13. The Bug ft. Dis Fig: In Blue
14. Irreversible Entanglements: Who Sent You?
15. Kateryna Zavoloka: Ornament
16. Tricky: Fall to Pieces
17. Phoebe Bridgers: Punisher
18. Flaming Lips: American Head
19. Oded Tzur: Here Be Dragons
20. Jasper Høiby: Planet B
21. Tigran Mansurian / Kashkashian, Pogossian u.a.: Con anima
22. Charli XCX: How I’m Feeling Now
23. Meryem Aboulouafa: Meryem
24. Nubya Garcia: Source
25. Avalon Emerson: DJ-Kicks
26. Arca: KiCk i
27. Jon Hassell: Seeing Through Sound – Pentimento Volume Two
28. Shabaka Hutchings and the Ancestors: We Are Sent Here By History
29. Ambrose Akinmusire: On the Tender Spot of Every Calloused Moment
30. Laura Marling: Song for our Daughter

 
 
Außer Konkurrenz:
 

• David Byrne: American Utopia on Broadway
• Neptunian Maximalism: Éons
• Sault: Untitled (Black Is / Rise)
• Run The Jewels: RTJ4
• Julianna Barwick: Healing is a Miracle
• Deftones: Ohms
• Vilde&Inga: How Forests Think

 
 
(Wieder-)Entdeckungen:
 

• Mika Vainio aka Ø: Kiteet (1993-95)
• John Surman: Such Winters of Memory (1983)
• The Charlatans: Between 10th and 11th / Isolation Live at Chicago Metro (1991/92)
• Underworld: Drift Series (2018/19)
• Prince: Rainbow Children (2001) — völlig zu Unrecht unterschätztes Album in bester Hancock-Tradition
• Prince: Sign ’O’ the Times Super Deluxe Edition (1985-87)
• Prince: Up All Night (2002)
• Nicolas Jaar: Sirens (2016)
• Alice Cooper: Love it to Death / Killer (1971)
• Spoon: Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga (2007) – nicht direkt Neuentdeckung, aber es gab wieder eine Neuauflage, und das Album ist einfach immer klasse!
• Brian Eno: Film Music 1976-2020

 
 

 

„Es gab viele spezielle Situationen im Studio in Lugano, während der Arbeit an „Discourses“ – die meisten drehten sich um die Arbeit. Sowie intensives Hören, kleine Kommentare. Stille. Die Sache ist die, dass das Aufgehen in der Musik, die Konzentration, enorm waren, Aber das erste, was mir in Erinnerung kommt, ist, dass ich Manfred eine Menge Schweizer Münzen schulde. Nach der Landung, oder auch früh morgens, ging  ich stets gleich ins Studio, ich bekam es nie hin, mein Geld in Euros zu tauschen. Und jedesmal, wenn wir eine Kaffeepause machten, nahe den Toiletten, ausserhab des Studios, ist der Raum mit all den Kaffeemaschinen, ich hatte nie passende Münzen und ein ums andere Mal öffnete Manfred seine Geldbörse und fand die richtige Anzahl Münzen und besorgte mir den Kaffee. Das passierte wieder und wieder, und mit der Zeit machte es mich doch etwas verlegen. Also schulde im ich ihm tatsächlich eine Menge Kaffee. Wir hatten so viele gute Gespräche dort, während wie wir an den hohen Tischen standen und unseren Kaffee tranken, aus kleinen Plastikbechern.“  

 

(Jon Balke – his solo album is one of four solo piano albums (from four artists) ECM has released this year, more them ever, and will be part of my year‘s end radio night next Saturday – it‘s at the same time a disquieting and  seducing album. Steve Tibbetts will speak about one of the other solo piano works, Benjamin Moussay‘s „Promontoire“, and a bleak American autumn.)

 
 

FIRST HOUR – NEW ALBUMS – talking 1 /  Gwenifer Raymond: Strange Lights over Garth Mountain, from Strange Light over Garth Mountain / Dino Saluzzi: Ausencias, from Albores („an exercise in haunted beauty from beginning to end, ‘Albores’ depicts the process of discovery as fluid, evolutionary, undying. This recital intimately portrays Saluzzi’s total immersion in the world of sound and his experience in it as the connective tissue of his life.“ – Thom Jurek, All Music) / talking 2 / Matt Berninger: Loved so little, from Serpentine Prison (produced by Booker T. Jones) / Dino Saluzzi: Intimo, from Albores / Lambchop: Reservations, from Trip / Loma: Thorn, from Don‘t Shy Away / talking 3 / Music from the album Super Heavy Metal (definitely not heavy metal as you know it)

 

SECOND HOUR – NEW ALBUMS – Sternzeit – Belbury Poly, from The Gone Away / talking 1 / Simon Kirby, Tom Perman, Rob St. John: Phonaestheme, from Sing the Gloaming / Roger and Brian Eno: from Luminous / talking 3 / Anja Lechner & Francois Couturier, from Lontano / Ian William Craig and David Lentz: Track 2, from In  a Word / talking 3 / Peter Schwalm & Arve Henriksen, from Neuzeit (one of our albums of the month, see column with review by Uli Koch)

 

THIRD HOUR – CLOSE-UP: „Just as you are“ – Robert Wyatt and Alfie Benge (based on the book „Side By Side“, songs, paintings, my unforgettable encounters, once upon a time, with the couple at London‘s Westbank, and a very fine biography) – Kalenderblatt 

 

FOURTH HOUR – TIME TRAVEL 1 – talking 1 / Beverly Glenn-Copeland: La Vita, Ever New, from Transmissions – The Music of Beverly Glenn-Copeland / talking 2 / Neil Young: Separate Ways, from Homegrown /  Willie Nelson: from the album Stardust (produced by Booker T. Jones) / Bernard Herrmann: from Vertigo O.S.T / Ran Blake & Andrew Rathbun: Vertigo, from Northern Noir / Al Green: Judy, aus Let‘s Stay Together / Ran Blake & Andrew Rathbun: Judy, from Northern Noir / M. Ward, from Think of Spring /  talking 3 / Gary Peacock, Keith Jarrett, Jack DeJohnette: Tone Field, from Tales of Another

 
 

Ein Gespräch von Ingo J. Biermann mit Gary Peacock und Marc Copland

 
 

FIFTH HOUR – TIME TRAVEL 2 – Terje Rypdal: two compositions from Descendre, with Palle Mikkelborg and Jon Christensen / talking 1 / Jon Hassell: Hex, from Vernal Equinox /// Nachrichten und Tagesspiegel um 5.30 bis 5.40 /// Tony Allen: Ise Nla, Morose, Aye Le,  from: Lagos No Shaking („Honest Jon’s Records is fast becoming a haven for treasures left-field, lost and overlooked, and has given Allen his head and let him do Lagos No Shaking. Recorded over 10 nights in the Nigerian capital, the record effortlessly proves that this older generation can still show the Afrobeat way. As might be expected, the album is rhythmically faultless, the percussion being allowed to breathe in its own space, while the horns are reassuringly rude, and the guitar figures conjure a trance for a dance, if you will.“)

 

 

 

 
 

After duo works with Robert Fripp, Harold Budd, David Byrne, brother Roger, Peter Schwalm a.o., Brian Eno started another creative duo with Underworld maestro Karl Hyde in the year 2014. In fact, the teamwork ended in the same year, within three months roundabout: a short span of time for two great albums, Someday World, and High Life. One more on the song side, the other freewheelin‘, rougher. I was there in the studio of day one of High Life. The first two improvisations didn’t end up on the album. Fully enjoying this „concert for one“, Brian asked what I was thinking. I answered something like: „Quite hypnotic, something Arabian, a distant echo of the more anarchic sounds of Embryo.“ On this blog you can find my long interview with the two lads, in which they looked back on Someday World. The interview and the old card game titled „Oblique Strategies“, inspired two excellent Frank Nikol „one picture stories“. What you see above is just a photo of mine in mono comic mode. (Brian Eno‘s „Film Music (1976-2020) is no. 2 of my year‘s end list of archival discoveries / reissues.  Brian will speak about this album and his classic „Music For Films“ (1978) in my edition of the radio night „Klanghorizonte“ on Dec. 26, between 3.05 and 4.00 am)

 

Interview with Kateryna Zavoloka, Ukranian sound artist, composer, performer, and visual artist, who is now based in Berlin. Living in Kyiv in 2006, Zavoloka founded the label Kvitnu with her partner Dmytro Fedorenko (aka Kotra) and designed and curated the visual appearance of the label’s releases, while also releasing her own music through the label. Cluster Lizard is a duo project with Dmytro Fedorenko.

 

I mainly became really aware of Kvitnu and of your visual design work with the release of the Pan Sonic concert album Oksastus – Live In Ukraine. It was released in 2014, but Mika and Ilpo had already ended the Pan Sonic collaboration a few years prior, so for their fans – like myself – it was a great surprise and event to hear some new music from them (and the album had been recorded at the end of their collaborative years). Can you talk a bit about how you approached that album design? An impressive artwork, it’s just as unusual for Pan Sonic as it is mysterious, opening up a really strong atmospheric world, before one actually listens to the music on the album. It’s a peculiar combination of organic, abstract and artificial elements; the image on the front reminds me of a seed of some sort of grain, but also of an egg from the movie Alien. What’s the story behind it?

 

We invited Pan Sonic to play at the Kvitnu_live event in 2009 in Kyiv, and it was an amazing and very powerful concert. We recorded it properly and asked them if we could release it on Kvitnu, and five years after the concert we made the double LP. The first release was on 20th of February 2014, and it was the last days of the Maidan revolution in Kyiv, Ukraine, during the clashes of protesters with Berkut special forces, police troops, and that day the snipers shot protesters. Those were the most tragic days and a transformational period for Ukraine – and of course for us, and I will remember this day forever. Pan Sonic called the release Oksastus – the Finnish word for process of grafting or cultivating of plants. That is why I decided to use some plants in the design for the artwork, I wanted to make it abstract and organic. I found the slide films of different seeds made by my grandfather Oleg Kozlov, who was a biochemist, scientist and inventor. In the 1960s he made the “scanning microscope” that could make very sharp images of very small objects like insects or seeds. So I used his slides, transformed the images and added textures and special print techniques like UV-lacquering, bronze paint and foil to create a metallic effect. The vinyls me made in white for a contrast, and Dmytro then stamped each LP label with the Pan Sonic logo by hand. Real art work.

 

 

Can you talk about the relationship between your visual work as a designer or graphic artist and your work as a musician/composer? Having the mission and the chance to come up with designs for other artists’ musical worlds must be a bit of a challenge sometimes, I guess.

 

I always asked musicians if they wanted anything particular, and most of the time they answered that they trusted me. While I made artworks, I always listened to their music, kind of sinesthesia. Sometimes musicians would give me some image or photo and I would transform it, and we would add some special effects, like hot foil pressing or the glitter, metallic paint, embossing or silk-print. I’d the say musicians have been happy with my designs for them, as we always would listen carefully. But we never compromised our visions of Kvitnu.

 

You grew up in in Kyiv when Ukraine was still a Soviet Republic – so you experienced the changes from the 80s through the challenging years after 1991. Where did your path as a visual artist and musician start?

 

Yes, it was during the Soviet Union, and I hated it. I was a kid when the union collapsed and Ukrainians were very happy to have independence in 1991. It’s true that those were challenging years for us, but it was wonderful; finally, we we allowed to travel abroad, have private property or make business, listen to music in the end! From my childhood I was interested in visual art and music, my father and mother were painters and designers and I went to millions of different art workshops for kids and sang in a children’s choir. Somehow from my childhood I already knew that I would design artworks for other musicians.

 

Then at some point in time you moved to Vienna and later to Berlin, so in a way you are now in between here and there — also artistically?

 

Dmytro and I moved to Vienna because we wanted to study at the Academy of Fine Arts. A year after graduation we moved to Berlin. It was the most transformational period for me. I think it is very important for any person to have such an experience, and especially for any artist. Living in other countries shifts your perception of everything, removes clichés and patterns in your head, causes tectonic transformations in your consciousness; you start to question your reality more and more, and therefore make more right choices for yourself. This is so important for creativity when you have a more clear vision, of what you want, and what you would not accept anymore. This period made me more balanced and happier after all these stormy times, and this first year in Berlin was actually shiny fruitful in my art.

 

Usually it’s rather the other way round: People from stable Western countries like Germany say how transformational it has been for them to live in much more unstable and messy places for a while. In what way have Vienna or Berlin had such a transformative impetus for you?

 

Maybe it was not very clear: I meant that moving to any other country from your own home country and living there would shift the perception and would offer you different perspectives. We moved to Vienna in 2014 to study and we lived there for five years; and in the middle of 2019 we moved to Berlin – actually, not so long before all the lockdowns. I think when you live in your homeland you have some vision of some sort of spherical happiness in a vacuum about another countries, which is not true for sure. For us, living in Austria was not stable and not comfortable at all, as for immigrants with a non-EU passport it has been extremely tough.

Transformational experiences don’t come from the country itself, but rather from extreme situations, more like a shock therapy that wakes you up, like if you plunge yourself into boiling water and then have to pull yourself out of it. My album Promeni from 2018 is about that.

 

So what kind of things – in art – do you not want to accept anymore?

 

In general, I don’t want to accept compromises with myself, I would rather think and meditate a thousand times and ask myself intuitively: does that resonate with me? Does that what I really need? And after that make better and calm decisions.

 

You had already several years of experience, working as an artist, working with music, sound, visuals, as well as, through the label, with lots of different musicians and artist. What caused both of you to study at the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna?

 

I wanted to learn more about video and motion graphics, Dmytro had math and economy educations and wanted to study at an art academy, that’s why we applied. Well, it was my second art education, as I also used to study at Kyiv State Institute of Decorative and Applied Art and Design before, where it was more academical and technical, whereas in Vienna it was more conceptual and ideological. For artists, it is important to be free thinkers, and free from any ideology templates installed in the head by educational institutes, and I am very glad that I don’t need to study anymore.

 

Earlier you worked with vocals on some releases – you even made a whole collaboration album with AGF, who is a well-versed vocal artist, and I also like your remix of Колискова Для Ворога (Lullaby For The Enemy) by Стасік (Stasik).

 

Стасік is a young Ukrainian singer, songwriter, and a veteran of the Russian-Ukrainian war. She doesn’t have many songs yet, but all of them are like the sharpest knife into the heart, very strong. When Lullaby for the enemy came out, I was so strongly impressed that I immediately wrote to her and suggested making a remix. Then we decided with my partner Dmytro to release these two remixes on Kvitnu as an exclusive EP.

 

On my new album Ornament I also worked with my voice, but it was kind of hidden, and I didn’t want to draw attention to it, but rather work with the voice like an expressive sound source, untraceable in the sonic fabric.

 

 

On the last few albums your music on the one hand seems to have become more reduced, compositionally – but on the other hand, sound-wise, also more “high-energy“. I often find a curious combination of smooth, or mellow elements in your music – while it is still very energetic, these more recent releases, too. Did living in Berlin have an influence on the new album?

 

I don’t think it’s influenced by Berlin, because the music came from the period of the album Syngonia, which was written around 2016. Just before that, I spent several years looking for the sound I needed. I even wanted to stop composing music, I was not satisfied and thought that I was tired. I think it’s a natural evolution, and it’s natural for an artist to have such peaks of negativity and positivity, and it’s really great to find a middle way and balance in creativity.

 

Right before Syngonia I was going through a difficult period. Syngonia and Promeni were the last two volumes of the series of “Purification by Four Elements: Air, Water, Earth, Fire” and I felt relieved when I finished them. Ornament was written in 2019–2020 and is a stand-alone album with a different concept, where ornament is the coding element for the unique algorithm that modulates an intention, path, state, and a space.

 

Since you commented on your art or process becoming clearer: The artwork of Ornament is probably your most reduced and minimalist cover – at the same time it also seems to be inspired by some sort of extreme contrast, it’s almost aggressive.

 

The artwork of Ornament is more minimalist because I wanted to make it like a colourful contrast of extreme states of consciousness, where balance is the key. As it is contrasting sonically.

 

The album is very contrasting in atmospheres and in sound, it is like travel.

 

And Prophecy, the 2018 Cluster Lizard album, was the last one you recorded in Vienna? What’s the main idea behind it? I notice the tracks are quite long (as are the track titles, which are quotes from poetry). What kind of prophecy does the album title refer to?

 

Prophecy is like a message of revelation. The tracks are as long as their poetic titles, we wanted to create narrative atmospheres, sonic trip.

 

So Kvitnu has been running since 2006 with around 70 releases. So what caused you to start another label, Prostir, in 2018? 

 

Yes, we started Kvitnu in 2006 in Kyiv and made it for 14 years, until 2020. At first, it was only for Ukrainian experimental electronic music, but soon we received so many demos from around the world, so Kvitnu became international. We helped many musicians to release their music, it was truly an honour for us to discover wonderful artists and to help them from the heart. We have decided to close Kvitnu, because it was an art project, like an art movie with a good ending. We already heard several melancholic stories about other labels, and it was extremely important for us to make a positive finale at the highest peak of development. We became friends with our artists, we have a very grateful audience, and the release of Kotra & Zavoloka Silence became the final endless silent loop with the question written on the EP label: “What do you hear, how much you hear nothing?“


Prostir me and Dmytro started in 2018 for only our own music and arts with the second release by Cluster Lizard, Prophecy. So it was natural that I wanted to release my solo album Ornament there. We consider Prostir not only as a music label but also as an art space (“prostir” / “простір” means “space” in Ukrainian) for any other art forms and other dimensions we might imagine.

 

Which direction would you like to see your music moving towards?

 

Our plan is to release the new Cluster Lizard album, which will sound different from our previous albums. We already composed several tracks. Dmytro has played on his guitar and bass with various effect processors and pedals, so the new album will sound more bright and fresh. And after we finish the album, I want to compose for my solo work – I have some thoughts already.

 

How is your view on the situation among your friends in Ukraine today? Would you consider moving back sometime, or do you think the political situation is too dire — and you prefer to stay in Berlin?

 

We moved to Berlin for music. Now, of course, it’s a bit quiet everywhere, but I hope it will change soon. Somehow now I play more often in Ukraine than before and love to travel there. And I am very glad that so many very good events and professional promoters have appeared in recent years; it’s wonderful! As any Ukrainian has a cherry-blossom garden in their heart, whenever I will be bored here, I will move back.

 

 

Finally, which music has been the most evocative and inspiring for you in 2020?

 

For me, 2020 has been precious as the most productive and intense year in my own music and I believe for other artists too. I liked the new albums of my friends – Kotra’s Namir and Ujif_Notfound’s Neumatonic. Amazing new album by Liturgy, Origin of the Alimonies, Simon Posford‘s Flux & Contemplation – Portrait of an Artist in Isolation, and Extrawelt’s Little We Know and many others. Of older music, I opened for myself this year Japanese collective Geinoh Yamashirogumi and the last album by Jack White, Boarding House Reach, and Muslimgauze’s Salaam Alekum, Bastard are great.

I think we are currently in a time of beautiful transitions and transformations in music.

–

The conversation between Kateryna Zavoloka and IJ.Biermann, was conducted in Berlin, in December 2020.