labor |cs206

Nascida no Norte de Itália, com estudos clássicos feitos em Viena e actual residência no Luxemburgo, Elisabeth Flunger forma com o peruano, também tornado luxemburguês, Tomas Tello o duo ET, que agora nos oferece este "Labor". A primeira impressão que temos é a recusa por parte de Flunger de qualquer tipo de discurso que pareça "erudito", preferindo mesmo a utilização de objectos de metal à convencional percussão metálica. Pelo seu lado, Tello é creditado como um manipulador de electricidade, o que faz tendo como interface uma guitarra ligada a uma série de pedais de processamento e ainda dispositivos como circuitos integrados de computador e comandos de televisão e vídeo modificados. Tal como, aliás, consta na composição fotográfica de um grande compositor de música electrónica do nosso tempo, Bernhard Gunther, no "booklet" do CD. Verificados os recursos, dificilmente se crê na música conseguida, mas "what you see is what you hera". Rui Eduardo Paes

Springs from old mattresses, dented cowbells and trychels, corrugated metal sheets, old-fashioned boxes for candies, tea bags and truffles, rusty harpoons, zappers, a wide assortment of gimcracks and electronic toys combined to roughly effected guitar ennoble the funny equipment of this bizarre release by Tyrolean (but Luxembourg-based) drummer, percussionist, performer and composer (a list of emeritus qualifications taken from her website) Elisabeth Flunger and Luxembourgian "electrician" Tomas Tello, who named their eccentric project E.T. (supposedly from their initials). Their "Labor" shows neither an obsessively epic nor an academic approach, it could be rather qualified as recreational: weird echoes and sounds on metallic hits of the first track "Miracle Merchants", the electric brushes and bleeps on sci-fi/lo-fi sounds which sounds coming from rudimentary theremins created with radio antenna on "Closer To The Sky", the acute electric peeps on percussive sizzles and grumbling of sonic waves on "Tar and Feather" are going to catch listeners' attention and persuade them to keep on listening their funny fumbling with objects and electrons, which sounds engaging even when their weird collages becomes more brooding and nervous ("Otra Tormenta"), frightening ("Se Fue'", "Imminente") or abstract ("Katze Was Tust Du?"). Their nice and eccentric tracks will implicitly strike a blow for all those people and loyal supporter of recycling who prefer to spare any kind of odds and ends and rattletrap insted of throwing them away while foreseeing a certain undefined utility related to their preservation! Have you thought about the possible existence of an authentic orchestra inside a rubbish bag? E.T. are aware about it! Have a listen! Vito Camarretta (Chin DLK)

Endlich einmal keine Kontrollfreaks! Weder Tomas Tello, der aus Klang produzierenden Gerätschaften aller Art durch elektronische Verfremdung neue, kaum vorhersehbare Effekte erzielt, hat hundertprozentige Kontrolle nötig. Noch Elisabeth Flunger, die aus Schrottelementen, in der Mehrzahl metallischer Natur, Perkussion generiert, die sich während ihrer Klangarbeit weitgehend verselbstständigen. Mit solcherlei Unvorhersehbarkeiten haben Flunger & Tello umgehen, ja spielen gelernt. Improvisation heißt in diesem, in Luxemburg ansässigen Duo, dessen Herkünfte Bozen/Italien und Lima/Peru heißen, dass der Verlust der Kontrolle nicht unfreiwillig passiert, sondern Teil der Idee dahinter und damit Teil der Performance ist. Umso erstaunlicher ist es, wenn man mit diesem Hintergrundwissen der CD lauscht, auf der das Stückwerk wie von Zauberhand organisch organisiert klingt. Die auffällige Hintertreibung von Dilettantismus oder öder Beliebigkeit zeugt von hohem Spielvermögen und lässt, allerdings erst nach Absolvierung des Wegs über die Bewältigung des Zufalls, die Konsequenz zu, dann doch vermehrt an konkreten Songs bzw. Stücken zu arbeiten, die auf ihre ursprünglich erlernten Instrumente (Perkussion, Gitarre) Bezug nehmen. In diesem „Labor“, das de facto eine kleine Küche im Keller von Tellos früherer Wohnung Platz fand, konstruiert das Duo mithilfe armseliger Mittel eine abenteuerliche Reise in die solitären Welten der Sounds und der Assoziationen, die sie auszulösen vermögen. Mit einem Wort: fabelhaft! felix (freiStil)

Events often move so quickly in 21st Century music that the electronic manipulators featured on these fine European sessions can be considered throw-backs because both insist on using analog devices, many of them DIY. Yet the key to exultant Free Music is its adaptability. The ET duo for instance pairs these primitive electronics with primordial percussion consisting of cast off junk, tools and found objects. Meanwhile the electronics on Acid Rain are paired with the 20th Century’s two most popular instruments – the electric guitar and the drum kit. In both cases the result is as mesmerizing as it is unique.
[…] With a tougher row to hoe, almost literally, ET’s Elisabeth Flunger rolls, grinds, smacks and quivers sounds from tools, trash, toys, souvenirs and any other non-stationary object. Born in Bolzano, Italy, since 2005 she has lived in the Grand Duchy of Luxemburg, a country so affluent and unsoiled that one would think junk doesn’t exist. Bringing the same DIY and inventive ideas to electronic devices is ET’s other half, Lima, Peru-native Tomás Tello, who has lived in Luxemburg since 2009. Labor’s eight tracks were pieced together during sessions in Tello’s kitchen throughout 2011.
Unattached to musical niceties, sounds on Labor may be affiliated or alienated, but the clashes, grinds, scrubs, buzzes and vibrations are usually repeated often enough to create unforeseen but memorable patterns and narratives. Tello’s home-made electronics produce tones that range from tremolo melodica-like trills to warbling pulses, while Flunger beats are defined as everything from grinding rubs against unyielding material to springs exploding every which way. Occasionally there’s even a suggestion of historical time displacement as on “Imminente” when the thickened timbre miasma consists in equal parts of futuristic signal- processing including blurry oscillations and Paleolithic percussion created by whacking un-tempered wood and stones.
[…] Without exactly defining what has happened, abstract improvisations have managed keep the track consisting fascinating while reference many sonic streams in split-second bursts. In an aleatoric fashion that too happens on Labor. If suspension of a need for regular tempo, timbre and tone is acceptable, either session can be appreciated for what it is. Ken Waxman (JazzWord)