The fungal-growth patches of this classic smudged, squelching brand of tape collage can be found all over the world (some locations have much higher concentrations than others; best to stay away if you don’t have your own hazmat suit yet), but this short slice comes all the way from Kyiv, Ukraine—somewhat of a rarity in this esoteric subdiscipline of mycology. But Edward Sol is no obscure name, at least not relatively; in addition to founding and operating Quasi Pop, Sentimental Productions, and Village Tapes, he’s released material on everything from Beartown and Sangoplasmo to Banned Production and Chocolate Monk. For it’s brief length, Go and Get Dressed, a C20 produced via Sol’s primary imprint, is a quite dense and complex piece of gritty acousmatics, and seems a great entry point for myself and other uninitiated mold-sniffers. Sol’s sources and techniques feel like more of the homemade variety, low-fidelity domestic recordings and dusty tape delay and contact mic shuffle, but the way they’re layered and stitched together is careful, deliberate, intricate, despite all the rough edges—it’s not surgical, or anything, but definitely eschews the artful naïvety that often drives this sort of thing. And it couldn’t be a better choice, because even though the sounds here aren’t anything you’ve never heard before, the interplay and progression and dynamism between all of them is enthralling.
Noise Not Music 