III | cs128

Someone jumpstarted Portugal's muted underground experimental scene; either that or substances abound in the country's waters that've lit the aquifers afire. Ernesto Rodrigues' indigenous Creative Sources label has quietly, undemonstratively, gradually assumed an impressive stature as one of the most forward-thinking concerns bisecting the new jazz/electroacoustic interface. Though formally launched in 2001, across an astonishing 123-release strong catalog there's enough variety to keep both pundits and punters' ears alike upwardly pricked. Names known vie for attention with noteworthy up-and-comers, concepts volley for position, acoustic instruments mimic electronics and vice versa; one thing notable about Creative Sources is that, whether you absorb the entirety of the catalog en masse, or choose your preferred styles, you can't accuse Rodrigues' and crew of anything like stagnation or errant boredom.
The label's never been shy of exploring borderless musics (propagated by borderless musicians), but a recent clutch of releases reveal a distinct fondness for onkyo-esque electronica where procedure and texture trump composition. Ry-om (one Tom Shelton and Ryo Ikeshiro) are newcomers on the scene, but the shapeshifting mores inhabiting III could have just as easily found a home on Günter Müller's For4Ears imprint as on Creative Sources. Laptop is the duo's weapon of choice, augmented by acoustic and electric guitar, no doubt bled dry of recognizable characteristics in the service of some resolutely compelling aural structures. "3.1" pivots on an axis built on wow and flutter; revolving-door pulses, quickfire blips, and subtly resonating frequencies dance like tiny gnats over a watery membrane. "3.2" lets cascade some trebly acoustic guitar pickings over the duo's "feedback loops" that shift morosely below further strangulated strings. The fifteen minutes of "3.4" are a dazzling display for the senses: both artists massage their full inventory of sounds to unveil a decidedly "toxic" ambience comprised of machinic whirrs, Subotnick-like buzzes, storm clouds of fragmented hard drive spittle, firework aftershocks.
Cruising across the basal ganglia of their respective laptops, Ry-om proffer what could be coined improv concrete, hacking and sculpting software to achieve idiomatic ends that wholly justify their means. All categorizations aside however, III shares spiritual kin with Müller's own Eight Landscapes, and is just as superb a piece of work. Darren Bergstein (The Squid's Ear)

Do duo ry-om, formado em Londres por Tom Shelton e Ryo Ikeshiro, ainda não se conhece rasto assinalável, para além da música acessível através da página web do projecto e das edições da netlabel Earth Monkey Productions. De formação recente, o ry-om, que a si próprio se designa por «autonomous electroacoustic soundscape co-operative», concorre com laptops, guitarras acústicas e eléctricas, pedais de efeitos, loops, sintetizadores e samplers, para a produção de ruído electrónico de industriosa manufactura. A música de III (edição de 2008 da Creative Sources Recordings), livremente improvisada e de feição acentuadamente atonal, enche-se de frequências ressonantes de glitch digital e drones efervescentes, em que proliferam colónias de insectos electrónicos das mais diversificadas estirpes. Nas cinco peças de III, gravadas em Londres entre Dezembro de 2007 e Janeiro de 2008, Shelton e Ikeshiro desafiam-se mutuamente para acesos debates, aos quais não faltam organização, método e sentido orquestral, à procura de um patamar comum de entendimento, comunicando sem arriscar a perda da coerência e a sobrecarga da panorâmica, ainda que por vezes no limite da saturação por sinais electrónicos e electroacústicos. A progressão é em pulso irregular, num som de configuração leve e austera, com um toque ligeiramente abrasivo. O que facilita o acesso e a empatia por parte de ouvidos menos familiarizados com as estéticas que explicitamente abordam diferentes modos de organizar o ruído experimental. Eduardo Chagas (Jazz e Arredores)

The duo of Tom Shelton (laptop, acoustic guitar, feedback loops, vocals) and Ryo Ikeshiro (laptop, electric guitar, feedback loops), Ry-Om is the kind of project that inspires confidence ever since the very first listen, pushing our will to repeat the experience time and again. Theirs is one of the most exquisitely meaningful types of computer-based blends heard in the last ten years: evanescent implications and bell-and-whistle attitudes don’t belong here, structural steadiness and compositional rationality do - no questions about it.
Kaleidoscopic timbres and unstable frequencies aren’t used as an excuse for intellectual mystification, each element finding an ideal placement in the fastidious logic of a particular segment, linking its connotation with a far-from-foolhardy approach to the extremities of the audible range. Throbbing regularities - when existing - coincide with the shortage of directional lights, the music stabilized by an inherent consistency which makes us perceive it as rock-solid despite the volatility of some of its constituents. We’re offered apocalyptic droning ecstasies, bubbling marmalades, acid syrups, unfriendly integralism, entomic interferences. Sharp-witted interceptions remove the cancerous growths of sterile repetition in the right moments, at the same time introducing new factors of interest. When the infected physicality of the guitars is involved, its frail concreteness gets agonizingly mangled by the absolute nonexistence of canonical mercy, leading to repeated episodes of forthright hostility.
Thus here we are, numerous consecutive spins over a week’s span still insufficient to really determine what works so well for us to stamp the record with a seal of unconditional excellence, wholly justified and without reservations. Choice track: “3.4”, utter magnificence for ears willing to be horsewhipped by the redeeming values of tetchy dissonance and clogged up by the wax of reiterated enmity. Massimo Ricci (Brain Dead Eternity)

Both Tom Shelton and Ryo Ikeshiro play guitar and laptop and both are using feedbacks loops, together with some of the latest releases on this portuguese label it's mostly electronic music, but seen the essence of this work this cd could have been out on Touch records. Abstract sounds and soft drones generated through guitars, it's just
with the second track that we have the introduction of some melody thanks to a processed acoustic guitar, but don't worry it won't last too much. This not an extreme release but the music is laptop based with an atmosphere that's fucking dead serious. As somebody else has already wrote they reach 'idiomatic ends that wholly justify their means' but aside from their intellectual satisfaction this cd is by some means listenable. The recording as you can imagine is nothing but top notch to this you've to add the two musicians work in a really complementary way and you know why I can truly say this record is interesting. Space is the place. Andrea Ferraris (Chain DLK)