Live Performance Meets Studio Production
'Rendered Environment' by Adam Juraszek is a five piece EP which combines elements of electronica, sound design and IDM, released on SØVN Records.
Rendered Environment contains three extracts from a live concert in Studio Loos in the Hague, one from a live concert at Splendor in Amsterdam and one studio interpretation of material from the concert in Studio Loos.
Complex Clarity
All five works in this EP contain immense clarity and dynamic range.
There are clear layers of foreground, middle and background material, and each individual texture, whether it be a synthesized sound or an organic texture, is clear and tangible.
Further, individual sounds contain dynamic ranges of their own, phasing in and out at both high and low speeds throughout the EP.
Computer Music
This whole EP really redefines what it means to write computer music.
There are a multitude of organic textures that may seem familiar, albeit slightly disturbing due to their digitally textured processing.
Additionally, fully electronic sounds and signals create the impression of the inner workings of machinery and computers, especially in track one, 'Login'.
These sounds occur throughout, sometimes more subtly, all five tracks sharing sound material and samples.
Atmospheric Stacking
Juraszek is a master at accumulating textures to form a morphing amalgamation of sounds and synths.
Track two 'Return the Flows' forms the best point of reference for this technique.
What Stockhausen spoke of in his electronic compositional processes is relevant here; namely the method of hiding layers inside layers.
Often the composer removes sound layers to reveal underlying layers which were previously inaudible due to the masking effect.
Technological Skepticism
Juraszek is known to experiment in his choice of sound design to reflect upon his impending skepticism towards technology.
This is clear in particular in the third track on the EP, 'Wipe Everything Clean', where a strange stacking of computer generated voices urge and tempt the listener like some kind of digitized ondine - although this seduction differs to the romanticized version that we are used to in folklore. It is void of all life, and echoes of its empty and mechanical song may be heard throughout the EP as a whole.
The lover of electronic music cannot help but feel a sense of dystopian poetry in the music, due to its deliberately lifeless timbres.
Repetition Without Repetitiveness
Track four, titled 'Voicing Nest' is the perfect example of applying repetition in electronic composition without becoming repetitive.
A consistent ostinato triplet rhythm is introduced, which changes and morphs in texture, sometimes startingly, all throughout the work, at times interrupted by new new and familiar sounds.
Clear Progression
When listening to this EP with my friend and colleague Allan Chen, he described the arc of the EP as 'sublime, and perfectly balanced'.
Each track may be likened to a movement. Although they are interesting seperately; they work together as a single entity.
The tracks move forward from ambient works to clear-cut, driving finishers, while still retaining referential elements.
The set naturally arrives at its own conclusion, titled 'Hard Lumungus' which is an almost satirical take on modern-day dance-floor music.
