Search - Crank :: Wanton Phenomena

Intrigue, discomfort, beauty, & terror...

Jack Dempsey | South Miami Beach, Florida | 07/26/2000

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This cd evokes a wide range of emotions as it plays. There are times it is truly enchanting, drawing the listener deeper and deeper within its mold. Still, other times, when one cringes in pain. Others, when the listener can only come to one, true and inevitable conclusion...these are the sounds of hell. Yes, reader, there are times when you simply know that, this is what you will be hearing should you end up in the perpetual lake of fire.All in all, a pretty decent release. To be honest, I much prefer the "heftibag" release by crank which appears on the (wonderful and consistent) "mille-plateaux" label. Still, this one does not fail to disappoint.As an aside, should your curiousity be aroused by thoughts of the sounds of hell....look for Achim Wollscheid "airs-live 23/05/99 at Radio X" release which is also on "mille-plateaux." Should you find it, it's worth having....if nothing, to simply enjoy the feeling of returning back to (somewhat of) a happy existence once the recording ends. It is a truly frightening dirge, endured only by the fearless....or those enthralled by the hideous sounds produced....wondering what shall happen next."

Another stunning advance

Jack Dempsey | 08/13/2000

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Until recently nu electronica more or less turned on a UK/European axis. But 1999 has already been marked by an explosion of American productions, discharging shrapnel loaded with new shapes and possibilities. With Wanton Phenomena, CrankÕs Danny Zelonky steps out of his Low Res/Plug Research persona to deliver a staggering album of cavernous, ever shifting electronics.Cleverly conceived and engineered, the album forges a crumbling, deterritiorialised headspace, whose prehistory (in terms of effect) lies in the brilliant barrages of Mark StewartÕs first albums, Royal TruxÕs Twin Infinitives, Disco Inferno circa DI Go Pop, or even MoverÕs Final Sickness (which similarly suggests an automated, battlezone apocalypse).Made up of dark atmospherics, skittering, glitchy rhythms, some seriously foggy, freaked out loops and FX, its tracks map a treacherous minefield of asymmetrical occurrences, earthshifts and random explosions (hence the titlesÕs euphemism, Ôwanton phenomenaÕ) that constantly derail the listenerÕs expectations. Each fresh hearing yields new details. ÒJerkÓ rocks the body through a zone of crunchy electro beats before dissolving in a field of cloud hiss. On ÒInfantile NarcosisÓ and ÒDiscomposeÓ, reverb-heavy melodies drift hazily through the textrual melee. Ò10Ó+Ó is a gorgeously low key voidscape, while the Merzbow-like ÒVzhiu VzhiuÓ is filled with buckling chunks of digital dirt, gritblasts and all manner of movement.Following breakthroughs by the likes of DJ Disk, Matmos, Terre Thaemlitz and MiamiÕs Schematic label, CrankÕs Wanton Phenomena is another stunning advance for US electronica."

The typist formerly known as Low Res

Jack Dempsey | 11/02/2000

(5 out of 5 stars)

"The typist formerly known as Low Res, civil Danny Zelonky, publishes briefly after the sensational " " Approximat Love Boat " " CD here still more, and more of Danny Zelonky is always good. The most impressing thing at its TRACKS remains the spielerische ease also here, with which he modifies in such a way again and again with all crazy experimentalism of the sounds like unnoticed the structure within his TRACKS that they suddenly rausreissen themselves from all references and become undeterminable. If one created oneself on something, Crank is already further on new transformations, deceives things on, which must be never implemented, and swivels from angedachten moments and large-scale research projects immediately on the next. That CD is just as audible nevertheless always thereby stretching those, but (without those sometimes somewhat kunstige effort, which is gladly spread in the field by anti-club music, to only introduce in order the valuation of the cultural one where one can be adapted new fields age-old ideas), is however definitely because of the unbelievable sounds, which let Crank sound like one of the few, which created it already long into the next millenium. One, which makes the unbestimmbarste music, which one heard so far in so quite different way beside oval and atom Heart."