.next |cs175

I've carped a bit above about excess activity on the part of some of the musicians. Well, this trio of electronicists can be as active, scurrying and scrabbling as anyone...but it works. Freewheeling while managing to maintain some kind of control, they're perhaps comparable to Lehn/Schmickler in approach when they have pedal to the floor. But also quite capable of reining things in as on the lengthy "[thinner]", a fine, low, rumbling series of quivers and rustles. Good, solid recording. Just Outside (Brian Olewnick)

I've carped a bit above about excess activity on the part of some of the musicians. Well, this trio of electronicists can be as active, scurrying and scrabbling as anyone...but it works. Freewheeling while managing to maintain some kind of control, they're perhaps comparable to Lehn/Schmickler in approach when they have pedal to the floor. But also quite capable of reining things in as on the lengthy "[thinner]", a fine, low, rumbling series of quivers and rustles. Good, solid recording. Brian Olewnick (Just Outside)

This CD was recorded at STEIM in 2008. It features three laptop artists: Jeff Carey, Robert van Heumen, and Bas van Koolwijk. The first two are sound artists, the third one does visuals (unrepresented on this album except for the cover artwork, but he was interacting with the musicians during the performance). Eclectic electracoustic music, rather dense, lively but not frantic, perhaps a bit short on cohesion - my attention tended to drift off. Not uninteresting, but not striking either. I’ll try to get back to it. François Couture (Monsieur Délire)

Recorded at STEIM in 2008 a trio of "laptop" ( I don't like catgorizing this way) musicians gives a rich and eclectic overview of how music generated via laptops can be. Assembled with van Koolwijk visuals is a viable and flashy base for sonic explorations which don't seem boring at all as in many cases of improvised laptop music can be. The tracks are nicely put into the form of more and less dynamic passages. I like its quivering and rustling bit which is harsh in a nice way. Steady way of work, I like it a lot... Hubert Napiorski (Felthat Reviews)

A laptop trio, this Skif++, consisting of Robert Van Heumen on a laptop playing LiSa, Jeff Carey (whom you may know as 87 Central, who plays with Super Collidor on his laptop)) and Bas van Koolwijk who plays with Jitter and is responsible for the groups' visual side. They already had a CD release on Fridgesound (see Vital Weekly 627) and now there is a new one, simply called 'Next'. If the word laptop trio scares you, thinking of microsound, careful crackles and minor beeps, then this is something you should investigate as its nothing like that at all. The first piece, cut into five separate pieces, explodes loudly in your face. A bumping collision of collidors and LiSa, with heavy bass end and noisy top end. Think Merzbow running on a random generator. A blast of laptop burning. Great, heavy weight noise, and words like carefull simply don't apply here. That happens in '[Thinner]', in which Skif++ expand their horizon and show us that they also know how to play a piece that is quiet
as well as unsettling. Maybe a bit long as a whole this piece (lasting well over twenty minutes this one), but then such is the nature of improvised music. Using computers means also that there are repeating blocks of sound, so that the average listener - say the type who is not used to improvised music - has some form to hold on to. The final two pieces are excursions again into distinctly louder music again. This is not an easy work to digest, but certainly with some great untamed power. Sadly no visuals here. Frans de Waard (Vital Weekly)

Skif++, the laptop-handling trio of Jeff Carey, Robert Van Heumen and Bas Van Koolwijk (the latter also in charge of the visual aspects of the live performances), present a difficult-to-approach yet ultimately galvanizing album whose dual nature is manifest from the outset. Framed by the bracing fragmentariness of the first and the last third of the disc, in the form of seven shorter tracks whose sheer quantity of events renders them utterly indescribable, the central nucleus is the longest track on offer, "thinner", whose gradually unfolding static waves, extraterrestrial harmonies and lunar calls, at times reminiscent of the most otherworldly Roland Kayn, are far removed from the sharp, shooting-star schizophrenia of the remaining chapters. The brain reacts unpredictably to these absurdly morphing accumulations of quirky incidents, disconnected rhythms, subsonic throbs and hyper-distorted spirals – I actually fell asleep while listening, twice. With, I'm told, a smile on my face. Massimo Ricci (Paris Transatlantic)