Jazzkammer: Panic
CD - Bottrop-Boy, Germany - 2006 - B-Boy026
Reviews:
Jazzkammer - Panic [B-Boy - 2006]
Panic paints this strong emotional sate at it’s lowest mostly hopeless ebb, you can almost taste the despair and dried sweat in the richly atmospheric audio air as Jazzkammer paint a wonderful long form piece, which mainly utilizes the guitar scapes of John Hegre with subtle and cinematic noise and sound edges added by Lasse Marhaug.
The thirty five minute piece starts with a slowly appearing guitar riff that whispers of dust blow expanses and nearing the final moments of despaired panic, been born from a grim metallic come bleak blues air. Marhaugh surrounds the riff repetition with subtle noise elements,clever and effective sound atmospherics. Giving the feeling of the vast expanse pressing down on you with both it's heat and dry mouth panic. At about the seven minute mark the first riff disappears to be replaced by another more ambient and eerier guitar dwelling, that feels more born from the dark and mist, less expansive. Maybe your now find your self in an abandoned mine, been pushed along in a decaying cart just come awake ,panic starting to once more settle deep into your bones as your heavy breathing hunched capture pushers you deep and deeper into the darkness. Sounds like snapping cables and subtle sound elements appearing ever so often, really breeding an superb yet drowsy dark atmosphere. At about the sixteen mark it fades to be replaced by another more metallic element, the piece seesaws between repetitive riffing and more streached out guitar and subtle noise expanses for the rest of it's running time. It’s all toped off with a superb booklet full with eerier and somehow chilling photos of abounded buildings ect.
Panic stands as the pair most involving, clever and atmospheric work thus far making one of the finest internal soundtracks you’re likely to come across. (Roger Batty, www.musiquemachine.com)
JAZZKAMMER - PANIC (CD by Bottrop-boy)
Ah the Norwegian lover boys of noise, John Hegre and Lasse Marhaug, also known as Jazzkammer returns once again. Their previous slab of music, 'Metal Music Machine' didn't make it into these pages, which was a pity, since that saw a shift from the laptop noise into the world of six strings. Actually a pair of six strings. 'Panic' is an epic piece for the city. Not the glorious big city life, but rather a picture of decay, emptiness and loneliness: the city at its most ugly. This doesn't lead to ugly music though, as there is a lot of beauty in this decay. Just like the booklet has pictures of decay, beautifully shown by Yuen Chee Wai, this dueling guitars take the listener to the beauty beneath the sewer, with desolate, sustaining strumming, haunted by effects. That is roughly in the first fifteen minutes, but after that the ugly face is shown and we are full blown in the streets: guitars howl about with great intensity and furious like hell. It's like being in a car at night, driving a great speed and the street lights flicker by. All of this until we collapse. We are left on the sidewalk and we can see the city in full decay. No-one is there to help, everybody is afraid and the gangs roam the streets. A city in panic. The final part is an illusion: it seems nice on the surface, yet no-one is happy. The panic is still there and the silenced music is just a facade. The perfect soundtrack for a movie about cities in the late twenty-first century or the soundtrack of today's reality? My city is too small, but I can imagine a few where this is reality. A great work. (FdW, Vital Weekly)
Jazzkammer: Panic
With great power comes great responsibility, and nobody knows this
better than the Norwegians. With Oil reserves and government surpluses
to set teeth gnashing in jealousy across Europe they certainly have the power bit sorted, but responsibility? Well they've already given us Black Metal, and now they seem to be quite happy making ear crushing noise, with Lasse Marhaug at the forefront – distortion pedal in hand. Apparently the 'theme' of this particular recording is urban degradation and decomposition - something which is also illustrated beautifully inside the cd booklet, but Jazzkammer's duo of Marhaug and fellow noisy Norwegian John Hegre take hold of their trusty guitars to explore these themes with a gutsy vibe that's hard to describe. Their last album, the utterly stunning 'Metal Machine Music' took their sound into devastating new directions, and 'Panic' feels like a logical continuation, providing us with crushing drones and feedback that should be patented with the Norwegian flag attached. With the glorious droning bass-heavy doom of Sunn O))) in mind, the two musicians battle their way through one gigantic 35 minute piece, battling with their axes, layering field recordings, drones and sheets of white noise. Surprisingly much of this disc is quite warmingly 'ambient' for want of a better word, with nods to romantic guitar dronesters Stars of the Lid, but mid-way through the distortion erupts like Mount Etna laying waste to countless eardrums in the process. Like the soundtrack to a melancholy documentary about the decline of modern society, this gives us a deep emotional core but also a strong narrative laced with despair and unease. 'Panic' is a simply huge release from two of Norway's most gifted sons. (boomkat.com)
Jazzkammer: Panic / Pulse (Bottrop Boy) - CD
Some might start to suspect that this blog is turning into some sort of shrine for all things Marhaug. The Norwegian master of noise here under his Jazzkammer project (with John Hegre). Two releases: both different, both brilliant.'Panic' is a single 35-minute piece that moves through passages of solemn ambience to rusting guitar shrills. Does the whole "loud-quiet-loud" routine to a tee. Tense as fuck and proved an apt soundtrack to wandering the streets of Soho on dark, wet nights.'Pulse' which is the earlier release, is less textural but still manages to contain layer upon layer of discreet detail. A isolationist orchestration of ticks that recall dense jungle, insect patterns and night heat. Both releases are stunningly presented with beautiful photography by Yuen Chee Wai. (failme.net)s
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