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COELACANTH - The Glass Sponge

Format: CD
Label & Cat.Number: 23five Incorporated 004
Release Year: 2003
Note: jewel-case with extra cardboard case
Price (incl. 19% VAT): €13.00
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Neues Werk des Projekts von LOREN CHASSE (ID BATTERY) und JIM HAYNES aus San Francisco! Super sensible, fast zärtliche drones und minimale konkret-noises, die extrem surreal wirken... intra-uterine, ozeanische Soundscapes; lebendig , mikroskopisch detailreich, ein beständiges feines Summen, Sirren & Knirschen. Genius stuff !!!


“ The glass sponge is a subclass within the sponge phyllum, distinguished by their silica spicules that unite into delicate geometric networks. These needlelike structures form the skeleton of this most simple animal, which when dried acquires an exquisite white hue. During the Victorian era, these dessicated remains were prize possessions in the finest of wunderkammers; and from what we’ve been told, a pair of glass sponges mounted under a dome could fetch up to “5 guineas.” Furthermore, glass sponges have the unique ability to respond to their harsh, deep sea environment through rudimentary electrical impulses that ripple through their bodies which are devoid of nerves and muscle. These are merely the beginnings of the fascination with the glass sponge for Coelacanth, a sound art project whose name is of an ancient fish once thought to be extinct, but in truth has been flourishing in oceanic trenches. Authored by the Coelacanth duo of Loren Chasse and Jim Haynes, The Glass Sponge takes an abstracted yet empathetic view of its allegorical subject. Throughout The Glass Sponge, Coelacanth sets textural flutters, squeaks, and scrabblings in motion. These brittle events punctuate the boundless excursions of minimalism brought to life through elegaic bell tones, ghostly feedback, and tuning fork resonance, all spiralling together into translucent drones. Despite the obvious submariner references for this album, it may be a surprise that very little water spilled into the recording of The Glass Sponge.” [press release]

“... Four extended tracks of gorgeous space-y drone-y almost-ambience. Forests of cricket-like chirps are blurred into smeary ambient washes of cool greys and pale whites, beneath smatterings of clinking clicking clatter. Keening, indistinct moaning tones sound like distant foghorns, reflected from the slowly shifting terrain. Underwatery warped sonic shudders billow outward as vague melodies drift and float, chiming and reverberating, eventually dissipating into misty clusters of ethereal almost transparent notes. Hissing, fuzzy high end buzz whirs machinelike over industrial clatter that has been smoothed out into pulsing, barely-there rhythms. So so nice. All of the sounds were collected from various public and private Coelacanth performances over the last couple years, before being assembled into the Glass Sponge. Released by local sound art nonprofit 23five.” [AQ]