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PRICE:
$18.00
IN STOCK
ARTIST
TITLE
Plays Wagner - Part One
FORMAT
LP

LABEL
CATALOG #
TYPE 058LP TYPE 058LP
GENRE
RELEASE DATE
3/2/2010

Please note that this is part one of a two-part set. A CD edition compiling both volumes will be released as well. Under a plethora of names, Pat Maherr has hand-crafted some of the most beguiling sounds anyone has heard in the last few years -- chopped and screwed hip-hop as DJ Yo-Yo Dieting, lo-fi noise as Sisprum Vish, sample-heavy musique concrète as Moms Who Chop and cask-strength industrial ambience under the Indignant Senility moniker. Plays Wagner appeared as a very limited cassette on Maherr's own label in 2009, but as soon as it landed at the Type offices, they knew it needed to reach more ears. Using a handful of dusty Wagner pieces (no doubt scored from one of Portland, Oregon's many thrift stores), he has stretched and distorted the hallowed tones into something indescribably dark and beautiful. Like David Lynch's peerless Eraserhead soundtrack before it, this is music that sounds as if you are being dragged through rusted pipes and hearing the distant swell of broken gramophones playing in unison. Maherr has created music that is at all times exquisite but deeply disturbing. Like Leyland Kirby or even William Basinski, there is a sense of harmony, nostalgia and restraint in the layers of hiss, grit and noise. It is only very rarely you hear something as pure and enveloping as Plays Wagner. Having mastered this from cassette tape, Type has retained all the decomposing grime experienced on the original version (which was dubbed to aging, heavily-used C90 cassettes), but have beefed it up for public consumption. The best way to absorb an album like this is to place the needle and simply slip away into a deep, nightmarish slumber. Just keep your eye on the radiator -- who knows what might happen.