MODUS PONY “Systemmetry” C5 (Superpolar TaÏps)

 

This is Superpolar TaÏps cassingle series #6, and I’ve checked out #4 (Qualchan.) and #5 (German Army) already, so you should probably go back and check those out. You’ll also find the likes of Adderall Canyonly, Nicholas Langley, and Superpolar TaÏps’s own bleed Air among the releases (a veritable Who’s Who of the international experimental tape scene – this is your third reminder). This time we’re checking in on moduS ponY, and it’s like this whole series was curated with me in mind. How many moduS ponY releases have I tackled? German Army, Qualchan.? It never stops getting old. And here on “Systemmetry” we get two and a half minutes of lovely guitar, synthesizer, and rhythm track, a mathematically precise, avant-garde replication of a music box. Sure, it’s not really a music box tune, but it follows a similar pace, rhythmic pattern, and simple arrangement that, when taken altogether, sounds like the work of a master tinker, one whose deliberate placement of all elements reveals an intricate connection of each piece. We’ve come to know this of moduS ponY throughout the years, yet we can still marvel at it when it confronts us head on. And yes, this one has an unstreamable B-side too, so get to a tape! “2ystemmetry” is too weird looking a track title to pass up.
 
https://moduspony.bandcamp.com/
 
https://superpolar.bandcamp.com/

--Ryan

MODUS PONY & VLK“Split EP” C30(Strategic Tape Reserve)

Sound-Collage, but the source material is weedy/proggy jam bands? Or are they actually psychy mathrock outfits, doing their damnedest to emulate the left-hook counterpoint-gone-riffy-texture of Musique Concrète? What the hell are harmonies, anyway?

CA’s moduS ponY and Cologne’s VLK reinvent the buzzsaw here in a seriously groovy drone of a dance-floor banger. It’s both spellbinding and innocuous in a relaxedly poised way, if not a bit disorienting…

https://strategictapereserve.bandcamp.com/album/split-2

and/or

https://moduspony.bandcamp.com/

http://vlksound.blogspot.com/

-- Jacob An Kittenplan

MODUs PONy"Phonogetic Ouch" C20(Strategic Tape Reserve)

I wasn’t even done writing this review before putting MP’s “Bananafest Destiny” and “Fresh Business” on a mixtape I was making for a friend, on account of its sounding maybe like perhaps an “Odelay”-era Beck and a ‘00s-era The Books decided to collaborate and leave thee most awesomely fucked up outgoing message on their answering machine humanly-possibly ever, and he, my buddy, Tyler, he really, really needed to hear it, as he’d been having a busy month, and this rules.

The above (possibly) run-on sentence, from what I can tell, is, fairly, grammatically correct. As is the likeness-ascribed ‘twixt said well-renowned recording artists and MP. Really. This tape is pretty great. Cologne, Germany did the world a service by picking up this Californian’s batshit-crazy transmissions.

For real, moduS ponY got woke on the (Steve) Reich side of the bed, if you know what I mean. As in, the attention to detail, while editing/obfuscating/obsessing over weirdo/funky/angular loops, is rock solid, as is the fluid, stream-of-conscious stitching of disparate vocal samples (on Bananafest Destiney, specifically, but certainly throughout the album, for sure), this all being reminiscent of the seamless melding of timbrally-diverse tones in that heaviest-hitting “riff” from Morton Feldman’s “Rothko Chapel”.

When the focus from all the other-wise juxtaposing elements’ unity isn’t the focus, it’s likely on account of the juuuuuuust-out-of-time looping between layers, which truly adds to the whole clusterfuck, in that it, itself, fluctuates, falling in time, then out, again, of “the rhythm”. Beware, ready, and open to it, and this short banger can be played for hours at a time while drawing, walking, or pretending you can dance. Not remotely good for studying.

https://strategictapereserve.bandcamp.com/album/phonogetic-ouch
and/or
https://moduspony.bandcamp.com/

-- Jacob An Kittenplan