The results “form a symbiotic unit” of sound, movement and space.
Somatic Soundtracks reworks scores composed for choreographer Georg Blaschke during the period 2010— 12. Ulrich Troyer explains that this music is the result of such close collaboration (as seen, Blaschke gets double billing despite not appearing on the ablum) that the results “form a symbiotic unit” of sound, movement and space. No bodies in movement, no music.
Unable to see Blaschke’s dance as the record plays, I assume that structures accrue, like lifeforms colonizing sunken ships. Troyer commences from a Philip Jeck, rhythmic vinyl crackle template, letting rhythms thicken to the point of neo-industrial distress at the height of the title track. Happily, it resolves harmoniously.
“Your Dancer” is the most direct reference to choreography and here you can really “see” it, feel the scrape of feet along the floor and waving of the dancer’s limbs. Its wire-hanger structure also indicates the direction in which Troyer is heading, toward a dub of great delicacy and intimate fingertip sensitivity on “Return” and “In Case of Loss.” “Song for Heide (Extended Version)” gently fuses fractured digidub with increasingly exciting narrative momentum. Troyer eases us out of his wirey world with the muscle-easing, reverb-heavy dub of “Back from Serbia.”
Somatic Soundtracks is available on 4bit.
