VA — Shadowplay Tape #3 (2020)

 

Hi everyone, we're happy to finally present your latest physical release, Shadowplay Tape #3, which includes 4th longplay by Nervöse Leute, titled "I Play the Music — You Dance", and also tracks by The Colourful Pictures and Vladimir Laznev.

 

Brace yourselves, this is gonna be a longread.

 

 

Nervöse Leute

 

New album by Nervöse Leute is a story of an ill guy who is facing the fact he's about to die soon. The whole 45 minutes of noises and weird sound collages keep on exploring his state of mind. It took me more than 2 years to complete the album. This is mostly post-industrial record with several songs, but also with big amount of shortwave recordings and field recordings, bunch of metal percussion and quite musical pieces (mostly acoustic guitar and piano).

 

The meaning of the title can be explained in a way that long-lasting investigation of frontiers of music and noise led to an insight that in the end you'll get music, but not just sonic structure. And if it's music, then you're supposed to dance :D

 

A1: New Tab

 

New Tab is an opening track which was a result of an experiment of simultaneous mixing of the whole spectre of #shortwave stations (which were primary sources for the project when it was initiated), but when mixed, these 25 layers created rather dull soundscape which could be used as a background only, so I added some declamation of numbers from Soviet book about trains and from table of contents of Soviet songbook. It also includes an acoustic guitar piece with chant.

The story begins when the protagonist is about to take a train to see a doctor in Moscow. He studies the schedule.

A2: Brain Zaps

 

Brain Zaps is a short industrial piece based on found objects recordings which served as plastic percussion, is also has field recordings of workers doing repair jobs on the street. The sound resembles lo-fi version of Scatology-era Coil, but a bit darker.

The story moves to protagonist's monologue about "some serious brain zaps" he suffers from. It ends with the line "I just can't work anymore".

A3: Frankincence

 

The longest track of the album, Frankincense, is an exploration of movement. It was inspired by Neubauten's "Perpetuum Mobile". There are 13 layers of different sounds of movement, mostly train recordings (as protagonist is supposed to travel by a train), including Emperor's Route, a train which repeats a trip of former Tsar Nickolaus II to Siberian exile, being an allegory of protagonist's exclusion from life. It also has recordings made in Moscow Metro (Underground: the protagonist arrived to Moscow), in a Railway Station in Yekaterinburg, and some field recording made at Sheremetyevo Airport and Aero Express (Moscow).

It's titled Frankincense because there is actually a recording of frankincense which is believed to help reducing stress and is still used in Orthodoxal Christianity as a symbol of Divine Power, among others (because protagonist can only rely on God in his case).

There's also some laptop fan noise recording (the only "digital" source here), ultra-sound washing machine recording (it can't be heard by our ears just as frankincense, but it's making the spectre as full, as in New Tab), a steam generator recording (first trains used steam for movement), there are also some repair jobs field recordings, shortwave recordings, recording made in a museum of Russian history, and a recording of an emergency system telling "to exit the building" (which means death for protagonist).

"Musical" part consists of calimba, a real 19th century accordion recorded in Siberia, and more traditional acoustic guitar and piano pieces. The piano plays a significant role on the album, piano pieces portray soul movements, they're sort of sentimental. Sometimes piano sounds on this album as if a schoolboy tried to repeat Tuxedomoon's plays (Music #2 and others). 

 

Guitar accompanies to the romantic song about "The descending sun sinking in the sea". There's also a declamation of an instruction from a book for electricians, it tells "when to change bulbs".

The track has also a "hidden" sample of a meowing cat, try to find it!

 

 

A4: Paper Clips

 

This piece was inspired by Paper Hats by This Heat and by What is This? by Swans. The main line ("Now what is this? Paper clips!") is like memories of protagonist working in the office, where he probably wouldn't return (as he can die soon).

A real paper clips box served as the source for percussion, there's also some piano and emergency system pieces which provide connection with previous track. It also has a feedback recording.

A5: Makeshift (Aus Ruinen)

 

This was also inspired by This Heat (Makeshift Swahili), and it has a distorted DDR anthem (Aus Ruinen; From Ruins) as a primary source. Metal percussion samples were recorded on the roof of Atmosphere studio (now they've moved) where Лосины Маршала Потемкина had rehearsals, so they can be heard playing at the background. Some samples were taken from stuff excluded from Северный голос's mixtape, for instance, Александр Швецов plays drums here.

The protagonist is up on the roof looking down to the city dreaming of possibility to "arise from ruins".

The track also includes field recording of heavy wind at the Fool's Mountain, air conditioning system recordings, field recordings made in Moscow State University, a jackhammer recording.

A6: Was ist Information — Fernsehen

 

This piece consists of a piano piece and a TV noise piece, it's like a dialogue between music and white noise.

A7: Elisa Lam Elevator

 

This piece has me reading Wikipedia page about death of Elisa Lam dubbed with piano piece played by children at the shooting of a film about WWII. It sounds really scary!

A8: Celebrity Armpits

 

This was inspired by Celebrity Lifestyle by Swans and also consists of Лосины Маршала Потемкина's rehearsal outtakes which seemed to me sounding like a deconstructed version of Swans' song. Pretty weird, to be fair.

B1: Suicidal Behaviour Among Male Lions

 

Well, this is actually a song. It's a lo-fi singer-songwriter piece done with acoustic guitar and metal percussion. It's sad, totally depressing story. The protagonist tells about "caves where lions prefer to die", reflecting on his possible death, too.

B2: Kosygin Kamp — Death of Hurvinek

 

This is the harshest song, sounding like a lo-fi early Coil meeting Test Dept. and Laibach: metal percussion, eerie voice, disturbing flutes and melodica which remind of a French horn, and a story of "starving to death in the camp of Kosygin".

 

"Camp of Kosygin" is actually the whole USSR/Russia, Kosygin was a Prime Minister of USSR for 16 years, and a member of Soviet Government for 42 years. Hurvinek is a puppet toy from Czech Republic, also a character of Soviet children's magazine "Веселые картинки" (Funny Pictures), a smart boy who often comes to help to his silly Papa Spable (but not vice-versa: "no Papa Spable will come to help").

The song also features piano piece, broken external storage noises, street workers' recordings (including samples of them coughing), and also David Lynch's speech samples like "I'm so depressed, I don't know what I'm doing", recording of a folk song sung with accordion accompany, and also shortwave speech samples cut from documentary about mountain lions (connection with previous song about lions).

B3: I'm Ready

 

The final song is mostly like Suicidal Behaviour..., but it's even sadder. Musically it's the same: acoustic guitar, metal percussion (this time based on parts from Soviet vinyl player) and depression. It was inspired by 2 songs with the same name recorded by Jandek and also by Leonard Cohen's song You Want It Darker — with a chorus "Hineni, hineni, I'm ready, My Lord" (from the Bible; Cohen translated hineni as "declaration of readiness" while in Russian translation it means more like declaration of presence: here I am, My Lord").

So the story ends when the doctor says protagonist's case is uncurable (sic!), and he expresses readiness with it.

The Colourful Pictures — One Drop of Petrol in a Whole Tun of Coffee

 

This was recorded in Red Moral studio as an attempt of 2nd jam of The Colourful Pictures. This time it was Snowbringer, Предложный Падеж and me, so we created synth only sound. The recording of the jam was cut then, and it provides more traditional laptop soundscapes.

 

Владимир Лазнев — Маятник

 

Vladimir Laznev's minimal synth piece Маятник (The Pendulum) closes the tape. This is great minimalistic play made with true passion of 80's!

 

About the tape

 

The tape is obviously limited edition (50 copies). Each tape has a unique cover and unique design of the tape itself, made with cuts from Полярная Правда newspaper (2016). Covers portray historical photos of English army marching in Russia celebrating the end of WWI, pictures of Red Army soldiers during Russian Civil War, photos of destroyed Navy Theatre and sunk Kolskaya Jack-up Rig.

 

So it's nice collector's item, I must admit.

 

You may purchase a copy at a tremendously low price ($2.75 + postal costs), just leave a comment or write me a e-mail.

 

The content of the tape is currently unavailable to download. We'll inform you when it's done.

 

Sincerely yours,

John "Grey Lenses" Grey 

 

 

VA — Географический диктат (2019)

Hi everyone, we're presenting our latest VA sampler. It's called «Географический диктат» (Geographic Dictation), and it's a tongue-in-cheek game because it's almost similar to annual geographic quiz «Географический диктант» (i.e. Spelling test).

It's also about dictation = dictatorship, etc.

Geography, space in general, dictates how we ought to behave, what we should do. We are separated by vast spaces, miles and miles, thousands of miles, we haven't met with some of artists who contribute to us for years and years.

We present different styles here. Grey Lenses (me) presents an ambient piece titled "Teriberka" with geographic destination:"from Siberia to North West of Russia". It's made using different software than on previous ambient releases.

Владимир Лазнев (Vladimir Laznev) plays a minimal synth piece titled "Киевское шоссе" (Highway to Kiev) with geographic destination: "from Southern Russia to Kiev, Ukraine", but Kiev Highway can also be found in St. Petersburg and as a federal route from Moscow to Ukraine. Its sound somehow reminded me of Front 242's debut "Geography" which also fits the idea of this compilation.

Snowbringer continues to experiment here with his "Summer Collage" recorded on vacation with geographic destination "from Kazan to Nort West of Russia". Sometimes it sounds just like Nervoese Leute! You see, Snowbringer is not quite active now, perhaps a break is really needed to think about future of this project. We believe that it would surprise us and hope its new works will be exciting!

Лосины Маршала Потемкина contributed a song «3 соуса» (3 Sauces) with more local story: from Apatity to Murmansk. The song was recorded this summer and mastered this autumn. It tells a surreal story of Semyon Zolotarev (the most mysterious guy from Dyaltov Pass incident) found survived in a local fast food cafe. The protagonist says: "There are rumors you're a double agent", and Semyon replies: "3 sauces ain't always better than 2".

Yes, we love detective stories.

So, you can instantly download mp3 version of this compilation, but once downloaded, please change ".r2r" to ".rar" to open it normally.

Stay tuned!
I'd also like to inform you that since this post we're not going to make publications monthly; new posts will arrive when new records will be released.

Sincerely yours,
John "Grey Lenses" Grey

Nervöse Leute — Mellow & Concrete Rats: Video

Hi everyone! Check out a video telling stories about latest Nervöse Leute releases:

Annual sampler is on the go! Stay tuned!

Sincerely yours,
John "Grey Lenses" Grey

Nervöse Leute — Insane Cassette [Now available online]

Hi everyone, you might remember we've released a cassette in December, 2016, which included new albums by Nervöse Leute & Snowbringer. After a while, the 2nd album by Nervöse Leute is finally uploaded and available for free listening and download though some copies of the tape still can be purchased.

The picture for a cover was taken by me this summer, but the album was completed by me in 2016.

Online version differs from the physical one, and such long expectation has some benefits: online listeners get an extended version of the title track "The  Queen" and of the sound collage "Tonic Seizure" plus bonus "Bury Me Dressed Like a Chanson Star".

Now let's talk a little about the record. As you may know, Nervöse Leute (Nervous People) is a web project making sound collages from samples and occasional musical / spoken word pieces and live found objects recordings.

The main aim is to put different pieces into logically built compositions. We consider sound collage a form of art. No effects have been applied to the samples except changing the volume and the speed of the records, and occasional delay effect. The additional information and disclaimer can be found in an archive file below.

The album messes around tape samples and tape manipulations. Some of these tracks are tremendous tape manipulations, others are collages, some mix these two tactics, adding occasional lyrics, original musical pieces and found objects. The tape samples are all authentic and made using analogue equipment. The samples have been recorded in 1997-200? by a variety of people, whose contribution remains anonymous but not forgotten (some tapes have been found, so they performed as found objects, too). There are samples of what have been popular in this period in Russia. We are still faithful to radio samples, too. This is a solid nostalgic record.

Title track "The Queen", tracks "Give Me Your Hands" and "I'm Allergic to Music" are "tremendous tape manipulations" of pop music, while "Tape Sonata" is a manipulation with classical music.

Sound collages include "Postapoc in a Nutshell" and "Tonic Seizure". There is also an unique field recording titled "A Trip into the Past" which was recorded by an anonymous little boy in early 2000's, probably at school, — this tape had been found and turned into a collage by me.

For those who know Russian language, there are 2 humorous collages — "Unbearable Humor" and "The Art of Advertisement" which contain collages of Russian FM radio samples recorded (probably) around 1997–2004 by anonymous people and me — some tapes had also been found. These samples had been edited by me into humorous stuff, using basically "cut-up technique". I believe it's a proto- audio version of future video "cut-up" jokes (YouTube poops). "Unbearable Humor" includes DJs' conversations and funny song cut-ups, while "The Art of Advertisement" tries to make fun of awkward and sometimes risky 1990's Russian radio ads.

I am sure Nervöse Leute will go on and ahead, and I even hope to perform live again under this moniker; moreover, I'm sure this project will continue to explore weird spaces and release new stuff.

Stay tuned and check out this work of Art!



 
(instant download link, please change file type to .rar if you have some issues opening it)

Sincerely yours,
John "Grey Lenses" Grey

VA — ColdSpot Muzak (2017)

Hi everyone, we've just released our new annual sampler, and here's the information about it!

TL;DR? Then check out the video version!

 

It's called "ColdSpot Muzak", and even the title can already tell you a lot. Cold spot is a place in space which is extremely cold (well, that was obvious). It's a relict of very ancient times, and it may be a sign of presence of another universe or a "great void" — such a perfect term for us.

Moreover, "cold spot" is opposite to "hot spot", which is associated with electronics, so it can give you a sign that the sampler is purely electronic and minimalistic.

And "Muzak" might imply irony, and it's actually a sardonic word: this is background music which wasn't meant to be background music, this is the music listeners never pay attention to.

The cover also follows this "Coldspot" strategy, this picture was taken by me in Northern Russia about a year ago.

OK, let's check out the tracklist. We begin with my remix of a song "Money" by Пророк СанБой. It's rather enegry-filled track you can even dance to, and the lyrics are actually a nursery rhyme "Work While You Work" sang with significant accent. The intention of adding a chorus "Oh, money" is unclear to me, though I realize it has some sense. Our collaboration goes on, so maybe one day we'll release the 2nd album of remixes.

The second track is a new electronic song by Лосины Маршала Потемкина. This project exists as a real band for several months now, and the live sound differs greatly from what you can hear on "recordings". Anyway, fortunately, we play live quite frequently, so you can also check out our live sound. The song "Рив гош" ("Rive Gauche") tells a story about irritation connected with constant visits paid by narrator's interlocutor to Rive Gauche (fancy cosmetics store). There was also a song with similar name, so Лосины... tend to deconstruct it by humor, and its humor is based on a pointe (wendepunkt), an unexpected turning point, so if you study Russian culture and language, you might enjoy it.

The third track is a sound collage by Nervoese Leute "I'm Allergic to Music" (opposition to music / melodies has always been important to us), which can also be found on a tape split (still available for purchase!). This project is also developing and may even see its live debut soon!

Then goes the very first appearance on our releases: the artist's name is Jo Har Key, and the track is my mix of his 2000 song "Виктория" ("Victoria") is a superb synthpop recorded using analogue equipment.

Our friend from Moscow Hipstor Smith recorded an instrumental "My Favourite Dance Machine" especially for the sampler!

The next track is a very interesting electronic work filled with Soviet speech samples. It's called "Другие миры" ("The Other Worlds"), and the project which released it, is called "Диспозиция Линча" ("Lynch's Disposition"). Thorough work with samples, pads and synths makes its sound so profound.

Then goes surprisingly noisy track by Snowbringer:

And the final track is by project Concern Void, its it's 2nd song, and I want to believe, this project will go on. It's called "In Disguise", and you may consider it as both our manifesto and a lamentation.

Hope you like our new sampler!

Sincerely yours,
John "Grey Lenses" Grey

Nervoese Leute / Snowbringer — Split (2016)

 Hi everyone, I finally managed to put everything together and tell you about our 2nd and last (so far) physical release. I’d honestly say in the very beginning that I feel sort of pessimistic regarding the possibility of releasing cassettes in the future, but this tape has become some true piece of art.

 
First and foremost, this C80 tape looks very rich. Hipstor Smith, who designed the cassette, has made truly huge amount of work. Just look: this tape is a very limited edition (37 copies), made manually recording analogue equipment, even the tracklist, included in a tape, was printed manually using a typewriter, and it was printed on authentic tabulating cards. Moreover, each copy has a different, unique cover which has originally been a part of geological map. 

Hipstor Smith was very enthusiastic in putting Nervoese Leute’s music back to analogue form, when he has found frames from analogue photo film, and the pictures were taken in 1983. I thank Hipstor Smith for such great work! You may purchase a tape or two directly from him, the price per copy is somewhat around $3.5 + shipping costs.

Now, let’s switch to music. Side “A” is filled with the second album by Nervoese Leute. It was meant to be called “Insane Cassette”, as it consists of tape collages made using analogue equipment. Sometimes humorous, sometimes scary, these 40 minutes hopefully demonstrate the further development of the project. Tape samples include ones recorded from FM-radio in 1990-2000’s and it shows the atmosphere of Russian mainstream radio back in those days. Nervoese Leute, as always, worked under Creative Commons License (Some Rights Reserved), and, as always, worked in a style somewhat similar to bands like Negativland.

On the side “B”, there’s a new album by Snowbringer. It’s untitled, and all the tracks are untitled. Snowbringer did it on purpose as he believes that listeners can name them whatever they like. He also claims this album is a result of long experiments, and the final track represents a darker side of this project.
So, this album is not available online, and, at least for Nervoese Leute, will not be available online at least for 2–3 more months, so the only chance to listen to it now is to buy it. Please support us, as it may play a significant role in a decision we have to make soon: if we continue to make physical releases, or not.

And stay tuned, we have some encouraging plans for future web-releases!

Sincerely yours,
John “Grey Lenses” Grey

We go conquering YouTube! Watch us!

Hi everyone, we finally got a camera managed to upload a video made a video about one of our reviews, and we think we will make video versions of our posts from time to time if this first video would receive some good amount of views.

We started with the review of Nervöse Leute's first album because the second is actually on its way to the big world, and I believe it will be released this year. New text posts will also follow this year. And now you can listen about the first one.

We even think videos are quite convenient if you don't have time to read the reviews. Now you'll be able to listen to it while you're washing your dishes or doing some other useful things.

You can also take a look at my handsome face (especially if you're a female person) instead of looking at soulless letters on your screen. Here we go, enjoy!

P.S.: Please leave some feedback! Maybe you'd like to watch some certain review from our blog? Please subscribe and like our video if you like it.

Sincerely yours,
John "Grey Lenses" Grey

VA — In Vacuo (2016)

TL;DR? Then watch a video:

 

Hello, dear fellow travelers! We’re happy to present you our brand new annual sampler! It’s called “In Vacuo”, which means not physical term of an experiment in airless conditions, but a philosophical term as it was originally understood in ancient Rome: an experiment without object.

You see, we’ve been around in Russian web for more than 7 years, remaining obscure and unknown to the majority of listeners, not gaining enough feedback from the efforts we’ve been making; having turned to a broader international audience last year we hoped for more, but we didn’t receive a comment, although I got some encouraging personal messages from readers from the UK, the US, etc., which I cherish a lot.

That’s why I picked name “In Vacuo” for this release: it’s like we’re acting disregarding the listener, the object of creative activity. Some of my peers who probably wanted to make fun of it, wrote me “You guys record it, and then only you listen to it”, and now it’s up to you to prove he was wrong :)

All right, no more lamentations, let’s switch to the sampler. Photos were provided on the courtesy of our long-time collaborator photographer, Pavel Chainichkov, and I thank him for it. The picture for front cover was taken in Moscow, the picture for back cover was taken presumably in Samara, Southern Russia.

Photos by Pavel Chainichkov

The introduction, a track by our new member; it's a neoclassical improvisation «Лидер не имеет права на безрассудство» (“The Leader Has No Right to Be Reckless”), of the project called «Наброски Арни» (“Arnie’s Sketches”), mixed by me. Actually, I suggested more radical remix, but the author rejected it by some unclear reason, and this mix is sort of compromise. Anyway, I find neoclassical style important in outsider music of Russia. We've already included neoclassical stuff by another project in our sampler "Music for Homebodies" (2013) which I'll review one fine day, and this sampler surely represents the direct evolution of our community.

Second song is my remix of Пророк СанБой’s nice pop song “Rainbow”, recorded in 1996, remixed in 2016. Our collaboration continued until this but I remain uncertain about its perspectives. The music video was filmed for the original version, but I changed the soundtrack by request of the artist.

Track 3 is a comeback of Acid Socks, awesome electronic track “Still a Factory”, a part of which was used in our promo video in 2015. Again I presented lyrics and chant, while Acid Socks wrote music. I want to believe Acid Socks will be revived for a solo release. This is the first appearance of Acid Socks on a music release since 2013, too.

Track 4 is a new composition by Snowbringer; still "brightest" ambient ever possible, dedicated to the famous ambient composer. Snowbringer released another "magnum opus" lasting about 2.5 hours just a few days ago, but we, Concern Void Records, anyway hope to release a split with Snowbringer this summer, so maybe there’ll be this track, too :)

Then goes the comeback of Man With a Dictaphone who also appears at our releases first time since 2013. I really like their instrumental electronic track “87+3”, filled with positive energy. Man With a Dictaphone has a lot of awesome unreleased stuff I wish to see released.

An interlude sound collage “Tonic Seizure”, edited for the sampler, is actually the evolution of “Nervoese Leute” project, which I renamed for “Insane Cassette” as I’ve been running it alone. I guess I'm gonna rename it again :)

It’s an analogue tape collage in a venue of Negativland, probably Culturcide, including cut-ups and mixes or Russian analogue radio stations from 2000's. I believe a long-play (or a split release) by “Insane Cassette” will follow. It’s published under Creative Commons license; if you own any samples used in a collage, please contact me, and it will be removed from the track.

Track 7 is a new dark ambient composition by Hipstor Smith, it’s important as it catches his mood, his state of mind during writing, I guess, overall weary state, so peculiar for spring.

Final track is by Лосины Маршала Потемкина, they tend to change the direction, releasing electronic stuff. The song «Нудный» (“Boring”) tells a story of a dull life of a dull man: I’m boring; it’s hard to deal with me.

It's also the very first music video we ever filmed, hope you enjoy it :)

The sampler can be downloaded for free (mp3, direct download)

Please leave some feedback, it’s much appreciated!

Your sincerely,

John “Grey Lenses” Grey

Nervöse Leute – Nervöse Leute (2015)

Too long to read? Now you can watch the video of this review!

Now, it’s a little sophisticated one. To cut a long story short, it’s a long-play album of radio sound collages, noisy, (post-)industrial one, messing around with shortwave stations, mixing real shortwave recordings and then even deconstructing this idea.

Of course, we’re aware of what The Conet Project was doing, but Nervöse Leute are way different. First of all, The Conet Project’s goal, as we can understand, was to document the shortwave stations’ recordings; unlike them, we consider shortwave collages as a form of sound art. None of Conet Project’s samples were used in this album; it was all originally recorded for the album (at least that’s what I’m told).

Moreover, Nervöse Leute didn’t claim any copyright for this album, instead, Nervöse Leute used Creative Commons license (Some Rights Reserved); so if you’re a copyright owner of any samples Nervöse Leute used in this album, please contact us, and your samples will be removed from the album.

Also, Nervöse Leute is not just about shortwave; playing with this idea was the goal of the first album; now Nervöse Leute turn to different methods while working on their second album, which, as I want to believe, will be released next year. Tasks and methods may vary, but the primary purpose of Nervöse Leute is to show the anxiety spilt in daily life. It’s like – you gotta be scared if you listen carefully. Or you may laugh – it’s basically the same reaction.

You see, creating such kind of sound collage requires a lot of time, hours and hours of recording and editing (no major computer effects were applied to the records: only editing, volume changing and occasional delay), so it took Nervöse Leute about a year to finish the album.

I was involved in this project: it was me who made all the mixes from previously recorded stuff. Also, I sometimes recorded samples, added some spoken word, found objects, and “Sell My Car” is actually my song. But Nervöse Leute was a collective project, at least in 2014 when it was formed – I had to finish the album alone at some moment, but I hope I won’t continue this project just on my own.

The name “Nervöse Leute” (Nervous People) comes from a short story with the same name by awesome Russian writer Mikhail Zoshchenko, known for his humorous stories, but we highly recommend you his later works “Youth Restored” and “Before Sunrise”, especially the second one, the true masterpiece of Russian modernism.

Have a listen to our collages:

 

The album is available for free listening here (SoundCloud) and here (YouTube)


Contact the recorder

(you may need to sign up)

Sincerely yours,

John “Grey Lenses” Grey