Genetic Transmission – Strychnina / Music for Acoustic Installations (Album – Zoharum)

Genre/Influences: Experimental, Ambient-Noise, Electro-Acoustic.
Format: Digital, CD, Vinyl.
Background/Info: Tomasz Twardawa better known under the moniker of Genetic Transmission has been without a shadow of a doubt one of the most prominent and influential artists from the Polish Experimental/Industrial/Noise scene. I didn’t notice he passed away last Summer while today Zoharum re-release the album “Strychnina / Music for Acoustic Installations” originally released in 2005 as CDR.
Content: The work features two long during cuts, which create a compact entity. The sound is mainly made of field recordings and Electro-Acoustic sound treatments. It creates a kind of sonic collage animated by monstrous sounds and crispy noises. Both cuts are untitled.
+ + + : If you like improvised music, this album is definitely one that will catch your attention, but more especially if you’re into the Electro-Acoustic approach. This work sounds to me like a sonic puzzle of noises and effects. I have a preference for the first track and its overwhelming sounds. But there also is something to say about the second cut, which is characterized by a slow progression evolving into a heavy noise outburst. Last, but not least –and it becomes pretty common, I have to say a word about the great artwork of the CD format revealing pictures of the different ‘instruments’ and noise sources this album has been made with.
– – – : Genetic Transmission remains a total Experiment, which will clearly not appeal for a wider audience, but only ravish the die-hard fans of this project and music style.
Conclusion: This album is a kind of unplugged Industrial/Noise work for fine tasters.
Best songs: “Untitled 1”.
Rate: (7).
Label: www.zoharum.com / www.facebook.com/zoharum
About Genetic Transmission
Genetic Transmission is the main recording name of Polish artist Tomasz Twardawa, active in the country’s underground industrial and noise scene from the mid-1980s, when he also co-founded the groups Zilch, Ladne Kwiatki and Godzilla. Twardawa ran his own label, Die Schone Blumen Musik Werk, and released over 30 albums under the Genetic Transmission name before his death on 16 July 2020. Zoharum’s reissue campaign returns “Strychnina / Music for Acoustic Installations”, originally self-released as a CDR in 2005, to circulation alongside its companion volume, “Lullabies”.
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