Kim Cascone | Parasites
Anechoic | CD
Kim Cascone follows up his 'Pulsar Studies' on fals.ch and an earlier set of 'Parasites' on the Ritornell compilation 'Maschinelle Strategeme' with a further twenty 'Parasites' on his own recently-formed Anechoic label.
As its title suggests the 20 tracks might be regarded as organisms; indeed, Cascone states that they are released with the intention that they "travel and mutate into various forms". The opening track '1ParasiteForDeleuze' does indeed sound alive and at just over three minutes it displays perhaps the greatest compositional and structural development of all the tracks. This is audio which - rather than being alive - seems to occupy some pure or abstract mathematical space in which hissing particle flows trace out smooth or folded geometrical surfaces and shifting fields.
Each of the subsequent tracks exhibit some unique characteristics and, though similar, are by no means identical. They follow each other in rapid succession some of them just a few seconds long. Sequencing seems secondary, in fact, the CD could be played randomly every time or dipped into for just one or two tracks chosen by chance.
Perhaps, like some of the more rarefied aspects of pure mathematics, these unreal spaces are a route to understanding some deeply hidden features of our normal acoustic environment. Whatever, 'Parasites' is also appreciable on more levels than the purely conceptual. As far as Cascone's stated purpose is concerned, only time will tell how far they travel and where they lodge.
[GM]
