Modelbau – Cataract

Artist: Modelbau
title: Cataract
format: cassette / digital
keywords: electronic, experimental, frans de waard, punk, germany
label: Licht-Ung http://www.licht-ung.de/
reviewer: The Paranoid Reviewer

Modelbau’s latest release is something you should check out.
Strangely and totally by coincidence the first track on this album is also named ‘Checkout’.
For some reason when hearing it, I feel like checking out over my shoulder,
just to see if there is no swarm of hungry mosquitos behind me with a certain human on their menu.
But of course it is the actual sound of this experimental audio piece and not a group of real mosquitoes twirling ready and steady in the hearing range.
The sound of the actual track slightly moves into a more electronic acid-ish smoothy,
which is basically scraping off the crazy idea that mosquitoes had been part of some kind of audio experiment; this must have been done without any mosquitoes involved, it sounds unnatural.

The next track embraces this unnaturally sound, but does keep that buzzing vibe of mosquitoes alive. The track is named ‘Chalked’ which is a title that has nothing to do with mosquitoes.
I really like how this work moves, it’s warm and deep and strangely exiting. When you sit closer to the speakers while this track plays, it even feels a bit like a head massage. Or perhaps more an internal ear massage. The buzzing vibrations seem to trigger strange ambient music. Strange in a way that I can’t be totally sure if my ears are hearing something that isn’t there, or that it is indeed there but put in such a hidden way that it triggers listeners to some kind of lucid hallucination triggered by audio. My mosquito reference was almost buzzed completely out of my brain, luckily I can scroll up to be reminded again.

The third work on this Modelbau release is ‘Clockworks’. The sound still has multiple buzzes, one quick buzz mixed with a deeper pulsating buzz fuzz. The music sound nothing like mosquitoes, but does sound strangely organic. I might be paranoid, but the track seems to interlock with my own heartbeat, as if it is music that is not just music but secret artificial intelligence. It knows what to play, how to move in all its suability to take over the senses of a weak minded listener. It is actually pretty comfortable to be hijacked like this once in a while.

The next step on this release is ‘Cubical’ which is if you play it very loud; suitable as a very minimal dance track. This is the track that leaves the mosquito reference far behind, as now it’s more like checking over the shoulder to see if a bass will drop, or some strange minimal raver will start to throw some glowstick behind me. Luckily this is not the case, as this track is perfectly fine to be enjoyed alone and in proper peace. No dancing is needed; just sitting with ears open would be fine.

The title track of the album ‘Caustic’ is automatically my personal favorite track on here. It is a track that combines all the things we have gone through in the previous works and melts it down after subtle analyses of what the listening customer wants; beat-less techno! If there are any uninvited ravers and mosquitoes behind me than they probably should take a step back as this is my tune!
Waving hands all over the place, banging the head close in to the speakers system to get the great hypnotic rhythm attack in its finest shapes and forms. This is synthetic synthesis at its finest and brightest, going for the most minimal way and delivering the most perfect outcome and effects! Splash the mosquitoes on a Caustic window, as this is the tune!

After the highlight of my night listening and hanging out in the sounds of this album by Modelbau,
it’s time to chill out with the last and final track named ‘Cumulative’. Strangely it feels as if this is the beat that had escaped the epic Caustic track. It is rhythmic fuzz in its finest and the tempo is keeping me up while the lack of distractions of other sounds calms me down. Ah, what a perfect session.
You can get this album from the Licht-Ung label;
http://licht-ung.bandcamp.com/album/cataract