Blamstrain: Disfold

Info:

Author:	Jeff Acker
Magazine:	Pasatiempo
Review language:	English
Artist:	Blamstrain
Rating:	no rate given
Review date:	06 Oct 2006

Review:

Public transportation has inspired electronic music for decades —in 1977,Kraftwerk’s “Trans-Europe Express” honored the now-defunct rail line, and Tangerine Dream lent its urgent synth loops to Tom Cruise and Rebecca De Mornay as they made “Love on a Real Train” in 1983’s Risky Business.

The association continues with Disfold, the second full-length release from Helsinki-based bleepster Juho Hietala, aka Blamstrain. The back cover of the CD lays out the sonic journey within as a series of stops on a subway map (one is called “The Thing You Hate Me for Is Also a Part of the Rest of Me You Love”; two stops later we’re at “Frame Math”). Musically, it’s a departure from the aggressive, scrambled beats of Hietala’s debut on Merck Records (Ensi, 2003). This is a gurgling ambient voyage that departs from a station filled with echoes and snatches of conversation, slowly skirts a club throbbing with minimal techno, and winds toward the planets of distant solar systems. As the album progresses, it brings to mind imagery from Leiji Matsumoto’s Galaxy Express 999, a lovely animated film about a space-traveling locomotive.

Disfold is a good choice for headphone enthusiasts, gallery wanderers, and, of course, metro passengers (ah well, there’s always the Rail Runner). It also makes great sleepytime music.