Webster’s defines “vanguard” as “the forefront of an
action or movement.” (Next to “hackneyed writer” it dispenses with words
altogether and features only a picture of me with a lampshade on my head.) I think
we’ve established that German Army, of which Q///Q is an offshoot brand, is at
the vanguard of social resistance and
change via sound art, and it’s also pretty clear that the youth are going to have to step in and take up the mantle and
continue the fight as time passes. Youth with enough energy to throw each
other, Superman-like, through the air. Vanguard
Youth we could call them.
Q///Q did.
Yeah, we like a little rhapsody with our waxation,
and Vanguard Youth delivers it within
its fragile now-wave synth tunes, numbers teetering on the edge of a knife: to
one side, trouble, to the other, rapture. It’s an operation that seems untenable
– too much potential for disaster. But that’s the beauty of Q///Q – it balances
the hazy computer pulse of a good GeAr tune, whacking itself against a shorting
node, with the blissful and melancholy ambience of a good Peter Kris track,
enveloping a node with its humidity until it shorts. Either way you’re effing
up a perfectly good computer.
And while it’s not a traditional call to arms in the
same way as the most circuit-fried GeAr releases can be, it at least sustains
the unease beneath the surface. Its consistent presence is a constant reminder
to go forth and do that thing, right that wrong. It’s not on the front line, but
it’s nourishment for the vanguard youth behind the scenes. Real change is gonna
come, you mark my words.
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