Kemialliset Ystävät

Alas Rattoisaa Virtaa

 Kemialliset Ystävät — Alas Rattoisaa Virtaa 
Γ•   Jede–li současná hudba kolem světa vysokorychlostním vlakem, pak hudba Kemialliset Ystävät je orgií světla pod železničním mostem.  Není to hudba pro lidi s nízkým zaměřením, fokusem. Místo toho, je to hudba pro lidi s vysokým zaměřením, fokusem. Toto LP zahrnuje také full–colour tisk vnitřního rukávu otevíracího alba. Pere Ubu's David Thomas once said: “New ain't nothing but old hat chromed,” and indeed it sometimes appears although there is little room left for true musical innovation that isn't solely derived from the application of new technology.
Γ•   Although Kemialliset Ystävät bring to mind both The Residents at the time of their early experiments with sampling technology around The Mole Trilogy era and the more electronically pulsating Faust tracks to be found on their Munic & Elsewhere collection of previously unreleased material, there is still something strikingly original about their sound.
Location: Tampere, Finland
Album release: May 12, 2014
Record Label: Dekorder
Duration:     44:45
Tracks:
01. Alempana Kuin Enkelit      3:35
02. Arkistorotat / Risuilla Täyteyssä Salissa     4:28
03. Nijura      4:08
04. Roiske Ruudukolla      1:46
05. Naderbux & Sundergrund      4:55
06. Vettä Yarahille      7:07
07. Hetkinen      2:34
08. Ei Millään Kielellä      4:39
09. Kun Rajat Sulaa      3:32
10. Apinatkin Laulaa      2:46
11. Nijura (World Bank Remix)      4:15
Γ•   Jan Anderzén and his partners celebrate the transcendental power of ecstatic music. Alas Rattoisaa Virtaa is the first Kemialliset Ystävät album in four years. It is the result of chance enhancing online collaboration methods, desire to get lost in the sound archives and the high art of meticulous editing. The album title is from visions of rivers running down from Heart of Darkness to the City of Joyful Noise. If contemporary music is a high speed train passing by then KY's music would be an orgy of light under a railway bridge.
Γ•   A band member Lars Mattila experiences the music of Alas Rattoisaa Virtaa in spatial terms:
Γ•   ”There are worlds accessed only through our auditory system. I hear a Wunderkammer of freestanding sound objects. Rhythms like sequences of seemingly random stuff laid out on the forest floor: a pair of thrones, a Henry Moore sculpture, a watermelon, two thrones, a Moore sculpture, a melon... I trust the path to go on even if I can't see behind the hill. There's motion, wether it be drunk driving or super human rapid eye movement. The sheer amount of detail makes it impossible to take everything in at once. One's perception and shifting focus reshape the experience on each listen. I remember my visit to Cappella Palatina in Palermo where Normann architecture, Arabic arches and Byzantine dome form a harmonious whole. Various cultural and spiritual influences are recognized as equals. The sense of space also brings to mind the end scene of The Lawnmower Man when the dude is trying to escape the virtual world.”  (2012 — 2013) 
Γ•   JAN ANDERZÉN
Γ•   JEREMY COUBROUGH
Γ•   LARS MATTILA
Γ•   MARJA JOHANSSON
Γ•   NIKO–MATTI AHTI
Γ•   JOSHUA STEVENSON
Γ•   ROOPE ERONEN
Γ•   JEFFREY ALEXANDER
Γ•   STEVEN WARWICK
Γ•   LAURENT GERARD
Γ•   GOODIEPAL
Γ•   JIMMY VIRANI
Review
By Winston Cook–Wilson; May 12, 2014;  Score: 7.6
Γ•   Over the past two decades, Finnish experimental cooperative Kemialliset Ystävät have mesmerized and puzzled listeners with a varied string of CD, LP, cassette, and digital releases. The obscure enclave led by Jan Anderzén specializes in pieces carefully assembled from samples and snippets of improvisations. Woven into these tapestries are rough–hewn scraps of melody that blur the distinction between acoustic and electronic sound; it’s often impossible to differentiate a synth lead from a shrill reed instrument, or a grainy field recording from an overblown drum machine. When it becomes futile to attempt to catalog the source material, Kemialliset’s songs come across as uninterrupted streams of raw, constantly unfolding texture — as willfully dizzying and deceptive in their syntax as a film montage.
Γ•   More so than on any previous release, Alas Rattoisaa Virtaa, the group’s latest full-length, finds them working primarily with identifiably electronic sounds. The sonic palette and approach are reminiscent of collagists such as Ground Zero and Black Dice, where free–floating noise objects coalesce into loose, slushy grooves and fall out of them just as quickly. Here, Anderzén and company sometimes indulge in full–on synth–scapes without their usual balance of hand-drum loops, harmonized Scandinavian bagpipes, or guitar blasts. “Roiske Ruudukolla”, a pointillistic exercise for MIDI orchestral instruments, Jean–Michel Jarre arpeggiators, and wordless vocals phased out into digital gravel, is particularly surprising. The aesthetic is not far off the avant–Muzak pastiches of James Ferraro. When put up against the recorder and balalaika trimmings of earlier KY albums (see 2002’s Kellari Juniversumi), the contrast is staggering.
Γ•   Kemialliset’s approach to layering incongruous and damaged sound artifacts is uncompromising, but the music is never outright abrasive. Even the chunkiest sine waves are pacified by a bit of reverb or ambience. The clever sequencing also contributes to the record’s relative smoothness, or at least helps blunt some rough edges. Anderzén expertly masks cuts and fades, creating form out of chaos like a young, circuit–bending Teo Macero. “Vettä Yarahille”, in particular, is remarkably sutured, morphing from skeletal, handclap–driven R&B into a denouement of birdsong and voices speaking in tongues (think the “Cloven Theater” of the Sun City Girls).
Despite these diplomatic gestures toward establishing unity and balance, Alas Rattoisaa Virtaa is never a passive listen. If we dare to nod our head to a muted Terry Riley–like melodic loop, some far-off siren or blockade of detuned synths always disturbs the idyll. Dialectic and disruption aren’t ornamental techniques for Kemialliset — 0they’re the central organizational principles of the group’s music, keeping the project from becoming too scattered and less deserving of our undivided attention.
:: http://pitchfork.com/
Review
Sean Kitching, October 2nd, 2014 10:32
Γ•   Last night a Finnish freak–tronica band saved my life... Well, in actual fact it was a night four years ago, around the time of their last full length release Ullakkopalo, when I found myself urgently in need of a chemical friend (as their name translates into English), and Jan Anderzén's far–out collective Kemialliset Ystävät thankfully came to my aid. It was a simple mistake that any fool with an unhealthy obsession with the ideas of Timothy Leary, a narcissistic love of wallowing in their own subconscious and a downright disrespect for their own physical safety, could have made. I spoke to a friend who ill–advisedly suggested at least three drops of the liquid preparation, so I of course took four, regretting the decision a mere ten minutes later as an Almighty phantom hand swept in from the deepest regions of the cosmos to enfold my hammering heart in its tight, icy grasp. Being no stranger to such experiences, I knew that although technically speaking I was in no immediate physical danger, spending the next 12 hours cowering in abject terror was no fun either, so I immediately began trying to rectify the situation as best I knew how.
Γ•   Can's beautifully symphonic Future Days, combined with some chanting on my part as I watched my face in the mirror run fast–forward through a rapid spectrum of animal forms certainly helped, but it wasn't until I put Ullakkopalo on the stereo that I breathed a massive sigh of relief and actually began to enjoy myself. My friend who was with me (people, if you really must do psychedelic drugs, for Christ's sake get your doses right and never take them on your own, no matter how confident you think you are), thought it was hilarious that this very strange album, which sounded like a group of toddler extraterrestrials playing with toy instruments actually had the effect of calming me down, when it would likely have caused other more sane individuals to run screaming for the metaphorical hills.
Γ•   But calm me down it did, and by the third or fourth consecutive spin, I felt as if the universe was sharing its innermost secrets with me, as though I were witnessing the manufacture of matter itself, brought into being by industrious entities singing, enchanting and knitting together energy into the bonds that underlie atomic structure. Γ•   I always wanted to thank my chemical friends for their participation in my cosmic swansong (if you think I'd go there again after that, then you're crazier than I am) but up until now I've never had the chance, so let me take this opportunity to say: Thanks guys.
Γ•   There has been much discussion on the Quietus of late as to what constitutes music that is psychedelic in nature, rather than simply of the psychedelic genre, with some commenters suggesting that any music may indeed sound psychedelic when perceived through the right (or wrong, depending on your personal experience) chemical lens. Whilst there is certainly some truth in the fact that all sounds may appear altered during such an experience, for me it's an undeniable fact that only truly psychedelic music can wrap you safely in its wings and take you on a journey to the deepest realms of inner space. Kemialliset Ystävät make such music, doing so with both a unique sense of identity and a joyous playfulness that makes them an irresistible proposition for anyone inclined towards such journeys.
Γ•   Pere Ubu's David Thomas once said: “New ain't nothing but old hat chromed,” and indeed it sometimes appears although there is little room left for true musical innovation that isn't solely derived from the application of new technology. Γ•   Although Kemialliset Ystävät bring to mind both The Residents at the time of their early experiments with sampling technology around The Mole Trilogy era and the more electronically pulsating Faust tracks to be found on their Munic & Elsewhere collection of previously unreleased material, there is still something strikingly original about their sound. Experimental, yet accessible, their songs are compiled of acoustic and electronic sources, manipulated voices (when they played the Buffalo Bar in London in August 2007, one member of the band sat on the floor for the whole time, chanting into a microphone with a bank of effects pedals beside him), hand–drum loops, flutes and god–only–knows what else.
Γ•   Their 12th album, Alas Rattoisaa Virtaa, which translates into something like "enjoyable down flows" according to Google translator, is more electronic and less murky sounding than its predecessor. Despite the music's inherent strangeness, the sounds that make up its palette glow with an inner neon beauty and flickering warmth that feels welcoming instead of purely disorientating. Eschewing outright beats in favour of a propulsive, throbbing irregular heartbeat that the band themselves describe as akin to "an overflowing tub of funny jelly," the music evokes images of creatures of Finnish folklore, Moomins cavorting manically in lush green forests. This is an addictive record which makes for compulsive listening, with pieces flowing seamlessly into one another. Picking a single highlight is therefore a difficult task, but at a push I'd go for track number eight, 'Ei Millään Kielellä', which could almost be a freakier, Finnish cousin to something from Musik Von Harmonia. Simply put, this is wonderful, otherworldly stuff, capable of taking the listener on a hugely enjoyable journey even without recourse to psychedelic drugs. Γ•  http://thequietus.com/
Also:
By gerry.admin |
Γ•  http://gerryswebreview.com/kemialliset-ystavat-alas-rattoisaa-virtaa/
By Richard Allen |
Γ•  http://acloserlisten.com/2014/05/04/kemialliset-ystavat-alas-rattoisaa-virtaa/
By Riccardo Gorone, di Gorot, 9 luglio 2014 |
Γ•   Avendo a disposizione una sorta di blbioteca di Babele di suoni, il collettivo apre un museo di memorabilia o di rimossi che costituiscono un collage universale con una struttura transeunte.
Γ•  http://carnagenews.com/kemilliaset-ystavat-alas-rattoisaa-virtaa-dekorder-2014/
Discography:
Γ•   Kellari Juniversumi CD (Fonal Records, 2002)
Γ•   Alkuhärkä CD (Fonal Records, 2004)
Γ•   Lumottu Karkkipurkki CD–reissue (Fonal Records, 2005)
Γ•   Kemialliset ystävät CD/LP/MC (Fonal Records, 2007)
Γ•   Kemialliset ystävät / Sunroof! (Split #19) CD/DD (Fat Cat Records, 2008)
Γ•   June (Tomutonttu feat. Henkka) (2009)
Γ•   Ullakkopalo CD/LP/DD (Fonal Records, 2010)
Γ•   Alas Rattoisaa Virtaa (Dekorder, 2014)
Website: http://www.kemiallisetystavat.com/
Bandcamp: http://dekorder.bandcamp.com/album/alas-rattoisaa-virtaa
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Kemialliset Ystävät

Alas Rattoisaa Virtaa

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