YEAST CULTURE — Stick Men

"Mark Schomburg was once the mysterious and legendary figure behind Yeast Culture, with only a handful of releases, but packed to great legend on his likewise small Petri Supply label. He was also running a mailorder called Incubator, before going into long hibernation. But since about a year he's back and mainly releasing cassettes, old and new. This Yeast Culture release is both old and new. Old in the sense of recording, new in terms of mixing. The sound was recorded during the first Merzbow USA tour in 1989 when he also played Incubator's home town Seattle. For this occasion Schomburg sculpted a performance environment for Merzbow to play in, made of found materials from nearby streets. The place was transformed into a sort of hospital room, with plastic body bags, plastic sheets, along with spark generators that would spark electricity every now and then. There was wood and metal chairs. I am quoting from the website, in case you are wondering if I was actually there. Schomburg hid microphones into the sculptures and recorded the sounds onto a four track, sometimes playing the mix back into the space as things were built. In November 2010 the original four track tapes (ten in total!) were found again and mixed into two pieces of thirty-two minutes and I'm sure will be greeted with much delight by Yeast Culture fans. One side is the title piece, essentially building the sculpture and the other the drones that were made after the proceedings were over. This is exactly as Yeast Culture should sound like: highly minimal with detailed, small changes in the material to go along every now and then. In building the sculpture we hear sometimes hammering but throughout these strange, ever changing drones in a mid to high end range. Like sound being picked up from various spots in a bigger area - which is no doubt is. The other side has the obscured rumble of objects on surfaces, both closely miked but also taped from a wider distance. Perhaps all a bit more raw than 'IYS' LP, but with a likewise mysterious quality to it. Highly minimal as said, and the best is to sit back, put the tape on auto reverse and leave it playing for a couple of hours. And the packaging? Handpainted, screened box with things stuck on the label. I am so curious what else the vaults hold for us." [FdW/Vital WEekly]