Lee Gamble - In a Paraventral Scale
A Closer Listen
In a Paraventral Scale plays with the idea that there might be a musical note set that exists at the sides of the ventral scales, which can be found at the bottom of snakes, smaller and more flexible, covered by a very thin oil that prevents the reptile from getting stuck with every pebble and piece of rough terrain it might traverse. The complete, confusing shift in topics that I just made is exactly the kind of associative leap embedded in Lee Gamble’s ‘semioblitz’ technique, which consists of reproducing the experiential overload of contemporary city life. One meaning blends into another, like the liquid metal of the “Many Gods, Many Angels” video, slithering not a form of movement but a form in itself.
This EP is the first of a “triptych sonic documentary” called Flush Real Pharynx, its surrealistic treatment of a medical word reflected not only in the EP’s name, but also in the poly-droning edges of tracks like “Fata Morgana”, one easily identifiable sound swiveling clearly into the unknown. It would be easy -and logical- to think of the sensory mass attack of cities as noise, but what Gamble is producing here is not the migraine-induced states of modern fallouts (pollution of all kinds); it is the slick shapes of rational urbanization, the efficiency of public transport and wide avenues, the glittering symmetry of skyscrapers what comprises this sweeping assault upon each and every cell of our bodies. Like the signals that wash over any and all cities, perpetually mapping their vibrations, our bodies pulse and change in every direction, existential stress the outcome of our alignment with the cities’ own slithering. Every sound here is clear and crisp, even at its noisiest, like in “BMW Shuanghuan X5”, which introduces recordings of car motors revving and the glissando tones of a fast car flying by, In a Paraventral Scale creates an aural certainty that in the tension of dissonance finds comfort.
That is, after all, what everyone native to a city has probably experienced at some point or another: the chaos, the slithering, is a pleasurable zone of ambiguous self-dissolution and self-affirmation. All the noises become crystal-clear, their meanings not set in stone but orderly blundering into each other, a broken window simultaneously an accident, an act of violence, a party, a prank, a construction, a work of art… and this is where Gamble also makes the question of volume supremely relevant, in the sense that every sound seems meant for a specific volume. Like getting used to sleeping with the background low-key groan of city traffic, the density of sounds becomes ingrained in our ears’ capacity for filtering and focusing on specific, minute things. In a city like mine, you get to know pretty much intimately the meaning of certain sounds in certain contexts, the key, for example, to distinguishing between a firework, a blown tire, or the sound of a gun. And yet, those meanings are not fixed, and, like the rest of the city, they tend to slither.
It’s a great start to what seems will be a really interesting triptych, which I hope continues the assault in new and particular ways of thinking about cities. (David Murrieta Flores)
Tue Jan 29 00:01:40 GMT 2019Drowned In Sound 80
Since 2006 Lee Gamble has been making forward-thinking electronic music. Over the years he’s found the balance between abstract electronic compositions and fuzzed- out bass, that has as much in common with musique concréte and Karlheinz Stockhausen as it does with Carl Crack and his current home Hyperdub.
He’s starting 2019 with a series of concept EPs that are a satire on modern day society, due to form one album called - for some reason - Flush Real Pharynx. The first part is called In a Paraventral Scale but instead of a messy collection of bass thumps and ambient drone, Gamble has crafted something that is touching and tender and feels like a drunk Vangelis. with the following two parts continuing to build on this theory.
In A Paraventral Scale by Lee Gamble
‘Fata’ Morgana’ opens In a Paraventral Scale with hazy synths and murky melodies. As a dense fug builds motifs pierce through it showing Gamble’s masterplan in full, before pulling the curtains back. Effectively Gamble is showing that this isn’t going to be a bright and clear album, and buried deep in its darkened hue there are glorious melodies but you have to hunt them out. Or it could just be a musician enjoying layering broody abstract synths to create something enjoying, but not 100 percent tangible. ‘Folding’, on the other hand, is a bright and rhythmic thing of beauty. Droplets of sound cascade, while a beat skitters in the background.
On ‘BMW Shuanghuan X5’ Gamble uses the noise of cars speeding, backed with an ambient tones and buzzing bass to create soundscapes that are filled with tension and wouldn’t be out of place on any racing video game. Gamble is showcasing his ability to create something gritty and visceral from limited elements to full effect. ‘Chant’ and ‘In the Wreck Room’ takes things up a bit by adding chopped up vocal samples, haunting organs and choppy garage beats. These are combined with glitchy synths and bass, the sound of smashing glass and an underlying feeling of malice and unease. Massive bass motifs do battle with abstract soundscapes, making these two of In a Paraventral Scale highlights.
In a Paraventral Scale is the strongest collection of songs that Gamble has released since 2014’s Koch. On that album he seamlessly mixed the abstract to the actual. On In a Paraventral Scale he has progressed his sound, and style, into something far more engaging and pellucid. After opening with hazy synths that twine and intertwine until they are a solid mass, Gamble then starts to add abrasive edges that cut through the mist showing precisely what he is doing for a brief moment before throwing up a fuggy cloud, like squid ink in water, that shields his true intentions. This motif is used throughout, so that just when you think you have a handle, or hold, on what Gamble is doing, he immediately shrouds himself.
This is the first part of a trilogy of EP release Gamble has planned for 2019. It’s hard to know whether he’s released the most cohesive, and immediate, collection of songs first, or as the series goes on it’ll get more abstract and ethereal. Either way this is an artist, and series of releases, to embrace and get excited about.
Wed Feb 06 18:25:07 GMT 2019Tiny Mix Tapes 60
Lee Gamble
In a Paraventral Scale
[Hyperdub; 2019]
Rating: 3/5
Cities. New cities. Cities that aren’t even on this earth yet. The kind that Lee Gamble, on In a Paraventral Scale, gives a language to. Cities like shrines shining, where stars spill their milk-light on the silken earth, the air cracking open like an egg. Cities where the cyborg-sublime meets avant-garde sound design, where brujería mixes with psychedelia. Where poets twitch language into glitches, splattering syntax in a fight against their techno-financial bondage. Where apartment building after apartment building builds into a 4/4 rhythm, one after the other after the other. Where there is hurt of wanting the financially — and metaphysically — impossible.
To be the poem-glitch that combats the wage-slavery: there’s the rub. To be above, at the top of a skyscraper, in a blanket of mist, in the secret of your own being. Then to be inside a sound — a sound like the perception of the Other’s body as an extension of one’s own. A sound like metamorphosis gathering amidst dazzling emptiness. A sound like wind wrinkling street puddles. A sound like a robot’s human-shaped buttocks sitting in a metal chair. A sound like pigeon poo landing on pavement. A sound like money being printed on a large machine.
Gamble’s making sounds like all of that, with Autechre spasms and Resident Evil soundtrack dread combined into one. The melodies don’t propel; they put buffers and stopgaps between other moments of intense sound design. Like a luxury car at a car show, they exude and ooze sleekness and velocity. But hidden within that is a terror: the terror of being surveilled, minute by minute, devoid of ontological access to the eternal or the metaphysical. The terror of automation taking over your life. The terror of money scraping your insides out. Of your inner emptiness pushing you over the edge.
Yet inward toward this vortex we go, into our virtual coil. Inward toward a city within a dream. Toward a roar of plane engines in our face, strong winds slapping our hair around. Toward some crude, sullen murk we call a living space, an architecture. Toward the headquarters of this necro-enterprise. Toward warfare, without the war.
Tiny Mix Tapes 60
Lee Gamble
In a Paraventral Scale
[Hyperdub; 2019]
Rating: 3/5
Cities. New cities. Cities that aren’t even on this earth yet. The kind that Lee Gamble, on In a Paraventral Scale, gives a language to. Cities like shrines shining, where stars spill their milk-light on the silken earth, the air cracking open like an egg. Cities where the cyborg-sublime meets avant-garde sound design, where brujería mixes with psychedelia. Where poets twitch language into glitches, splattering syntax in a fight against their techno-financial bondage. Where apartment building after apartment building builds into a 4/4 rhythm, one after the other after the other. Where there is hurt of wanting the financially — and metaphysically — impossible.
To be the poem-glitch that combats the wage-slavery: there’s the rub. To be above, at the top of a skyscraper, in a blanket of mist, in the secret of your own being. Then to be inside a sound — a sound like the perception of the Other’s body as an extension of one’s own. A sound like metamorphosis gathering amidst dazzling emptiness. A sound like wind wrinkling street puddles. A sound like a robot’s human-shaped buttocks sitting in a metal chair. A sound like pigeon poo landing on pavement. A sound like money being printed on a large machine.
Gamble’s making sounds like all of that, with Autechre spasms and Resident Evil soundtrack dread combined into one. The melodies don’t propel; they put buffers and stopgaps between other moments of intense sound design. Like a luxury car at a car show, they exude and ooze sleekness and velocity. But hidden within that is a terror: the terror of being surveilled, minute by minute, devoid of ontological access to the eternal or the metaphysical. The terror of automation taking over your life. The terror of money scraping your insides out. Of your inner emptiness pushing you over the edge.
Yet inward toward this vortex we go, into our virtual coil. Inward toward a city within a dream. Toward a roar of plane engines in our face, strong winds slapping our hair around. Toward some crude, sullen murk we call a living space, an architecture. Toward the headquarters of this necro-enterprise. Toward warfare, without the war.