Sverre Larssen ‘Wind Harp Recordings 1976-1977’ 12” (O. Gudmundsen Minde)

The history of experimental music is not just in the hallowed names, records, and studios of current remembrance, but in the forgotten developments, obscurities and isolations which are lost in time, of which were never really found to begin with. The intersection of experimental music with other creative – and non-creative – disciplines is an essential part of the cross-pollenation of ideas and techniques which has fed the development of outsider music, and is convergence which has frequently incorporated the earth’s natural elemental forces – the power of which has the capacity to dwarf any electronic creation.

Sverre Larssen was a Norwegian businessman who in the early 1970s constructed a wind harp – in his case a twelve-stringed instrument, capturing the interaction of the wind with the instrument’s strings via contact microphones – through, it seems, a combination of engineering ability, rudimentary external instructions, and a healhy does of intuition. This LP on O. Gudmundsen Minde releases the only available recordings of Sverre’s creation, obtained from his family and publicly available for the first time.

Even across multiple recordings the LP is essentially one – albeit beautiful – outcome: a low tonal drone with slight fluctuations and imperfections, from which a prism of harmonic overtones and sympathetic vibrations come and go, the resilience on the initial octaves giving way to a looser structure in the upper layers of Larsen’s captivating drones.

Where the pieces differ is in the depth and strength of that harmonic overlay, “Nordavinden I” quite strong in its base layer and minimalist in its higher registers, whereas “Nordavinden II” emphasises a mid-range tonal sheen almost absent from the first track. The environment itself is also a variable, the wind more audible on “Sonnavinden” as it merges with the spiralling overtones emitted from Sverre’s wind harp. But even from that singular realisation the result is captivating, the gorgeousness of the kaleidoscopic harmonic movements more than enough to move these recordings beyond ‘simple drone’ descriptors.

I have only two disappointments, entirely contradictory and born from my abhorrent mono-lingualism. The first is the disappointingly short blurb on the back cover, and lack of other historical materials or analysis. For what is promoted as a special historical find, the importance or context of Sverre’s work is difficult to appreciate from the confined description on the back cover. The second is the interviews which pad out the B side, all in Norwegian and featuring only a few gusts of musical content. I’m sure these would be satisfactorily (or at least somewhat) expository if I could understand them (correcting my first criticism), but as it is the B side comes up short.

Even with that possible insight obscured, the beauty of Sverre’s work is standalone enchanting, and  I don’t need an historical context to listen to this LP enraptured. Those with an interest in the works of Alan Lamb or Alvin Lucier’s classic ‘Music On A Long Thin Wire’ will have a (or at least, my) starting point for Sverre Larssen’s work, but the musicality which Sverre extracts is all his own.

https://ogudmundsenminde.bandcamp.com/album/wind-harp-recordings-1976-1977

V:XII ‘Rom, Rune and Ruin: The Odium Disciplina’ CD (Aesthetic Death)

Daniel Jansson has an impressive history in underground music, gaining notoriety in the projects Blodulv and Keplers Odd before emerging on the Cold Spring label as Deadwood, a project merging chaotic black metal elements with hardened power electronics. V:XII draws again on that history, but largely maintains a clear separation from Daniel’s earlier work.

“The New Black” opens ‘Rom, Rune and Ruin’ with emphasis on Daniel’s soulless vocals by subduing the piece’s other elements. The various vocal styles, borrowed from Daniel’s musical history, are key to ‘Rom, Rune and Ruin’ and emerge from “The New Black” through a minimal irregular rhythm, short crescendos of synth, and looming low-end waterforms which all lurk in the track’s subzero blindness, establishing a strong current of dark ambient which flows through the sleeper of the CD.

What follows is “Madr”, a central legacy track which cleverly captures a strong black metal sensibility while remaining rooted in the project’s power electronics/industrial intentions, a melodic refrain and sung vocals buried under the hateful synthesizer, drum machine bursts and grim vocals which dominate the piece as they suffocate, strafe and castigate the track respectively. I haven’t before heard something so melodically capable retain such a strong genre focus and external harshness, and as only the second track on the CD “Madr” quickly sets the bar high, its glimmers of musical legacy giving brief breaths of hope in the ebbs of an otherwise dominating piece. If Deadwood was a merger of black metal’s more raw and unforgiving tendencies, “Madr” acknowledges the genre’s slow melodic abilities without drawing too much attention.

“Yawning Void” and “Vanagandr” likewise bridge the same gap, the former importing semi-melody in its abyssal low-end synth haunt, similar to “Madr” in affect but stripped of everything except synthesizer and vocals; the latter corrals its melodic elements from a transparent synth drift, adding a slowed heartbeat pulse and glacial chill without tipping the piece fully into dark ambient territory. Shards of desolate musicality lie at the core of V:XII’s work, permeating these few tracks in a less subtle way than elsewhere on the CD and tying V:XII to its history.

“Twining Rope” follows as a more straight ahead death industrial work, chilling synth despondency moving into snowstorm flange which is swirled around a mordant rhythm and tectonic effected vocals, a bleak outlook repeated on “Djavulsogon - Deconstructing the Bloodwolf” which strips V:XII down to a basic track of bleak synthesizer and gruff vocals, and the driving drum machine thud and wisps of electronics which underpin gruff vocals on “Ururz” for a strong hint of Trepaneringsritualen’s ritualised industrial rawness.

Penultimate track “BAHF” is the merging of the disc’s various ideas, a slow musical pulse running through the piece as it bursts forth with hardened power electronics vignettes, lulls into slow ambient drift, and a closing harder rhythmically edged apex – again tied together with hoarse vocals which push the piece through its permutations. “BAHF” manages to tie the threads of ‘Rom, Rune and Ruin: The Odium Disciplina’ together and inject some greater compositional movement, without ever sounding incongruous or too stretched.

While each track presents as a standalone creation, ‘Rom, Rune and Ruin: The Odium Disciplina’ has a dark chill through its entirety: an unshakeable iciness which – while familiar to fans of the genres V:XII draws from – cuts across the CD’s genre references and permeates to the unbeating heart of the CD. The clear and nuanced production serves to detail that encompassing frost’s impact on all the timbral components of ‘Rom, Rune and Ruin: The Odium Disciplina’, burying the listener in its dark Arctic scenery down to the last snowflake. In execution and effect V:XII delivers within genre expectations, while adding a clear imprint of its own.