Maja S.K. Ratkje/Lasse Marhaug "Music for Faking" CD
[C3R]
These seven generally long experimental noise tracks are the result of a one-day collaborative effort between these two Norwegian artists, recorded live with no overdubs on July 20, 2004 at Ratkje's home.  As the colorful and lighthearted layout full of oddly collaged imagery would suggest, this is a rather chaotic listen - but not one that's harsh and acerbic, no, just one that's got a lot going on, shifting and changing between all sorts of different effects and sampled sounds: Be it piano, rock music, Indian music (or so it seems), jazz, chirping glitches, ethereal ambient hums, beeps, shuffling, breaks of distortion, whispering, or more lighthearted fare.  Some tracks make heavier use of layering than others, and at times portions of songs like "Pop Up in Strange Beds With a Smile" can shift quite strongly from sparse textures to rather grating noise that does have a significant edge to it; while "As Real as it Gets: A Psalm for Ultra-Woman" is a little more relaxed and repetitious in its use of loops and only subtly musical undercurrents.  The distorted drum solo manipulated at the start of "How Much Noise Can We Make? (Let's Find Out)" is actually surprisingly effective as well, slowly but surely caving in to a wall of harsh distortion that allows a few more intricate details to seep out into the foreground over the persistently vibrating hum that resonates throughout the entire selection.  At barely over a minute "Announcement to All the Graceful Sailors" is by far the shortest track herein, but then it's back into more than 12 minutes for closer "Music for Faking" - opening with some sort of weird grindcore sample or something that's been spliced up against comedy samples about cops and chirping electronic sounds.  Eventually things lead over to another strange electronic texture against some breakdance beats or whatever.  Of course things eventually do end up louder and more distorted, with lots of cutup movement and stuttered shifts in structure, but there are some really spacey ambient passages to be found later in the track as well (for the final several minutes, in fact), so this one's a little wild in its range of different dynamics that keep popping in and out almost out of nowhere.  I'm not sure what more to say about this one.  It's kind of a succinct review for a full-length CD, but the seven tracks, while different from one another in their minor details, are all fairly consistent in general approach.  It's not something I'm totally into because it's not the kind of noise that tends to focus on atmosphere, but it's still a release that I can appreciate, and none of these songs are bad.  I enjoy some compositions more than others, but most of them have their standout moments.  The more laidback and consistent "As Real as it Gets..." works a little better for my tastes than many of the other tracks, but again, nothing here is "bad".  It's more a matter of personal taste that keeps me from being more enthusiastic about the work. (6/10)
Running time - 45:57, Tracks: 7
[Notable tracks: As Real as it Gets: A Psalm for Ultra-Woman, Music for Faking]
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