Music Is a Hungry Ghost

From URB Magazine
To Rococo Rot may not be the only band melding aesthetics both organic and digital these days - it seems that everyone from Luke Vibert to BT has gone the route of musical cyborg genetics. But the German brothers Lippok, alongside Kriedler bassist Stefan Schneider and New York native producer I-Sound (aka Craig Williamson), have the science down to an art.

Music is a Hungry Ghost, the Berliners' fourth album to date, manages to fuse the two in a sublime manner that avoids the pratfall of kitschy overstatement. Weaving a spell around the listener, digital washes of sound pulse in (and out of) time with Schneider's bass licks and guest violinist Alexander Balanescu's eerie bowing. Although To Rococo Rot takes obvious cues from labelmates Pan Sonic and foundational "glitch" artist Oval (hiccuping CD skips and gurgles sweep through "A Number of Things") the human warmth they bring to a song (for those of us who remember when a song wasn't just a DJ-spun "track") elevates them to the hypnotic levels initially elevated by fellow Kraut rockers Can and Neu!. "From Dream to Daylight," a track on which Balanescu shines, and the most obvious nod to the sounds of Chicago's current post-rock scene, fiddles with an ambient bongo groove, paddling in a transcendental groove to rest atop coy whispers of violin and subtle percussive licks. Even those who tend to shy away from the abstract will find that most songs here eventually congeal into something coherent to groove to.

Adrienne Day

Tracks:

A Number of Things
For A Moment
How We Never Went To Bed
First
From Dream To Daylight
Your Secrets, A Few Words
Along The Route
Overhead
Kotu
Pantone
Mazda In The Mist
She Tended To Forget
The Trance Of Travel

Customer Reviews:

beware of hungry ghosts bearing gifts..........2005-10-28

I received this CD as a promo several years ago while employed at a record shop. One of many CDs I received in this manner, listened to a few times and passed on to friends...

...except this one I kept, and listened to again and again. Odd, considering I'm no electronica afficionado. This is definitely not your garden variety 4/4 beats. Compositions are short but superbly developed. The music has an organic feel, as of live instruments delicately cut-and-pasted and looped. The crackly turntablism and evocative violin crop up at just the right places. It has basslines Tortoise would be proud of. It made me go out and buy "Veiculo" and "Amateur View." All three albums are highly enjoyable and reward repeated listens. This is warm, inviting listening with lots of subtleties. I want their whole catalog!

Music is more than just sound.......2001-07-13

If music's merits were measured in atmosphere and texture alone, then To Rococo Rot would be considered one of the most innovative bands on the planet. The four members achieve a wonderfully cohesive sound that explores the space/density dichotomy with effortless grace. Unfortunately, as far as thematic development and melodic and harmonic complexity are concerned, "Music Is A Hungry Ghost" is decidedly primitive. So in time the locked grooves that establish such delicate interplay end up feeling more like incarceration than liberation, and what could have been warm and inviting sonic exploration begins to sound cold and aloof. More complex, enticing and listenable material is produced by the bands with which To Rococo Rot shares members - Kreidler and Tarwater.

MUSIC SPOKEN IN ITS OWN LANGUAGE.......2001-05-30

You will listen to this CD and not know what you've heard. You may listen again and have the same experience. You may ultimately decide the sounds To Rococo Rot have composed here mean nothing to you. They don't evoke one to dance. They are so momentary, there is no memory of them. In general, it sounds as if this is not something many out there are looking for. But, of course, that is the point to personal music. It speaks inwardly out from its creator with the artist so close to the material there is a danger we, the listener, may ultimately not be allowed in. And there is a certain distance between us and To Rococo Rot on "Music Is A Hungry Ghost" but in the ambient textures and the angled compositions, the corners are not too sharp and a real warmth emerges, capturing a sense of timelessness, of light, of darkness. There is the play of children in the sound, of depth of feeling next to the mechanical sputtering of machines. There are open horizons, wide open space, and the pulsing of a synthetic heart. I am not one to categorize. I try to take all music on its own terms and see as clearly as I can, the intent of the artist(s). This is indefinable stuff marbled throughout with brilliance and audacity never going over the top or where you want it to. It flexes an experimental muscle in its stubborness. Adventurous listening in many genres is gone these days. To Rococo Rot stays tried and true to the mystery. Long may they run.

Average customer rating:

Music Is a Hungry Ghost

ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

General | Dance & DJ | Styles | Music

Dance & DJ | Imports | Stores | Music
ASIN: B00005HVZX
Release Date: 2003-12-02

Album Description

Japanese edition of the German electronica/down tempo bands 5th full length release adds 2 rare bonus tracks, 'Process Blue' & 'On Sunday We Met'. 15 tracks in all. To Rococo Rot are often lumped in with the Krautrock sound of today, Stereolab, Tortoise, Aerial M etc. P-Vine/Japan release. 2001 release.

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