Thanks to Frans de Waard for his thoughtful reviews of both of these releases!
CHOP SHOP - PRIMER (2LP by C.I.P.)
Scott Konzelmann's project Chop Shop is one of the most underrated music
projects I know. The reasons for it I am not entirely sure of; partly it is
that there never have been a lot of releases and also never a lot of concerts,
but also misfortune in which Konzelmann lost his sound tools in a flood. His
tools include rusty speakers, ancient reel-to-reel tapes and it is some truly
great noise music. There is very little out there on a similar level. Active
since the late 80s, there are not a lot of releases; six albums (of which only
'Oxide' ever made it to these pages, Vital Weekly 625), plus a bunch of singles
including a double 10" with heavy steel plates and a 3" CD on the
sadly no longer existing label V2_Archief. The latter with a soft lead cover; another
release came with broken security glass. All of these releases are not easy to
get hold off and all of these show what Chop Shop is about and that's the
physical sounds through visible sources. The covers look like the music sounds;
rusty and loud. Konzelmann created speaker installations of old speakers, through
which he sends his sounds; loops of tape or records and in general these sounds
are picked up from space, so there is an additional 'harsh' feeling about this.
This is music that needs to play at a loud volume, as you would miss out some
of finer frequencies. Maybe therein lies also one of the reasons that Chop Shop
isn't that well known. It was never easy to travel with these heavy speaker
objects and besides getting lost in a flood a record is perhaps not the same as
seeing and hearing one in the rusty flesh.
This double LP consists of Chop Shop's earliest recordings.
The first LP is culled from his first cassette, 'Primitive Power/Positive
Force' from 1987. Originally this was a ninety minute cassette, but part of it
is apparently (it is one of those Chop Shop releases I never heard) has
"sampling that would have raised serious copyright infringement/clearance
issues", while another part is still available as a CDR, so the remainder
is now on the first LP. Here we have Chop Shop in its earliest incarnation and the presence of a drum machine in the opening piece is
rather surprising. On the other side, there is a piece, which is culled from
looping pop music (I think) and along with some of the heavy electronics used,
it is not difficult to see Chop Shop’s first release to be part of then-burgeoning
power electronic scene. Having not found his own voice yet, this is, however, something
of historical value, Chop Shop’s first steps to what became his trademark
sound, traces of which can already be found in this record.
The second LP contains the C45 cassette 'Scraps', as
released by Chop Shop in an edition of 200 and which was available at
Generator, Gen Ken Montgomery's store/gallery in New York, where Chop Shop
presented his pieces as installations. Montgomery is responsible for some of the
liner notes here. It's on this cassette that Chop Shop's sound fully matures
into this rich junk/scrap metal sound; the heavy amplification of what seems to
be the sound of a rusty plate on a turntable or the stretch loop of a
reel-to-reel recorder. At times it seems like there is something attached to the speaker, which adds an additional layer of rattling, which,
again, adds to the literal vibrancy of the music. The instability of machines
used are not covered up, or edited out, but used as sounds by themselves.
Sometimes a quick change, a rough cut, changes the material from one abrasive
field of sound to the next. Now, there was at the time very little that was
alike. There is, of course, the lack of visuals here, the rusty constructions
in metal and perhaps also the sonic overload (depending on what you are willing to do with your volume setting at
home) is something that needs no controlling, but you get the drift.
The release of this great record marks the end of the
C.I.P., this being one of those much-wanted re-issues and a dream now realized,
which is perhaps a sad thing. However, the next imprint is already in place,
Ballast NVP, for some time now. Of course with Chop Shop’s analogue approach there
is no download code, but I guess you expected that already. (FdW)
** ** **
BLACKTOP_AUDIO - RECORDINGS 1981-83
(CDR by Ballast NVP)
If you start reading this and your first thought was 'Blacktop_audio'? Never
heard of them? Then that is no surprise. This group existed for four years, in
Boise, Idaho and was the musical side of a 'street theatre' group called
Blacktop. By accident Blake Edwards, the man behind Vertonen and Ballast NVP
heard some of their music when he was exchanging sound material with Jeph Jerman
(a.k.a. Hands To) in the early 90s. He liked what he heard, but forgot about it
until in 2002 he was cleaning out his cupboard and found that tape again.
Online research didn't result in much, but with the help of Jerman, a former
member was tracked down, and in particularly Penny Chapman was helpful in
getting this release out. It comes with an introductory text by her, as well as
a long interview she did with Jeph Jerman, plus a list of gigs and descriptions
of their releases; all cassettes in editions of 11 to 20 copies. There are no
pictures of the group in action or otherwise, which leaves something to
imagine. It all makes up a very interesting read, which is something that Ballast NVP usually takes off very well. The group used very primitive
means, such as air organs, radios, keyboards, skipping records, cassettes and
guitar. This is not your usual no wave group, but something that comes very
much from the early days of noise music. Not Throbbing Gristle alike or
Whitehouse, but it's easy to see influences by Boyd Rice's black record for
Mute Records, but with a bit more variation when it comes to using instruments,
technology and even with the odd melodic touch; I would guess from some kind of
record stuck in a lock groove. It is all quite the prototype industrial music
of the early 80s and I would think that had this group not split up/gave up and
existed for some more years they could have been on worldwide group of cassette
enthusiasts and even have acquired some 'fame', or even a re-issue or two on
hipper re-issue labels. This re-issue is most welcome, surely, but at fifty
copies remains obscure, I guess. The music is great but not without flaws; some
of these pieces are just a bit too long, and understandable from the point of
time. Back then it was a thing to do: stick on noise for too long and be provocative. Maybe some more pieces, but shorter would have been great
as well? Or maybe this is it? In which case I didn't say a word. Looking for obscure
historical noise music? Blacktop_audio is something that quite rightfully
should not be forgotten. (FdW)
