#deathprod

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Go by Susanna and the Magical Orchestra from the album List Of Lights And Buoys

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Deathprod — Compositions (Smalltown Supersound)

Photo by Carsten Aniks

Compositions by Deathprod

From the first note of Compositions, Helge Stern AKA Deathprod immerses the listener into a granular focus on pitch and tonal depth. Crushingly slow, heavy and intense, the Norwegian producer manages to create a sense of enormity from 17 short, minimalist pieces in which he stresses his equipment to express the tensile strength of his music. Working with his trademark mix of obsolete electronic and handmade analog gear in his Audio Virus Lab studio in Oslo, Stern manages to conjure movement from stasis by focusing on the tactility of sound. Whether the bottom end of a string quartet playing out the last days or the murmuring of Atlas straining beneath his burden, there an almost heroic splendor in the delicacy of Stern’s discipline.

“Composition 1” opens with the doomsday basses; long notes echo and rumble as if their very frequency might forestall fate, if even for a moment. Intimate and tactile, it provides an entry point for what follows. Sequenced and numbered chronologically as composed, the subsequent pieces extend Stern’s juxtaposition of bespoke tunings, machine tones and formal arrangement. As one listens, the ear becomes attuned to the slightest variation in sound, grains of sand in a shell, muscles racked by weight. Musically you are reminded of a church organ at its most abstract and, indeed, when compositions “8” and “9” arrive, there is a flash of recognition in the hymnal quality of the tracks, the former in the lower register, the bass notes fluttering delicately and the latter adding minor distortions to the upper notes. Thereafter, Stern builds on the emotional heft foreshadowed in the album’s opening. The decomposing delay and reverb on “11”, “12” and “13” evoke a suffocating desolation in which the organization of sound signifies defiant hope. Between each piece the quiet hum and crackle of idle machines recharging for the next surge. It ends on an elegiac note on “17” with the barest hint of a piano motif beneath oscillating sinewaves. 

Deathprod’s ability to conjure soul from his machines is key to the power of his music. If his last album 2019’s Occulting Disk seemed designed to alienate, Compositions for all its formality and repetition has a far more human aspect. Lugubrious yes, sometimes harsh but its granular beauty has a mesmeric effect that lingers. 

Andrew Forell

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Deathprod - Composition 1

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

July 11, 2020: a new episode of The Anatomy Lesson at 11pm EST on CFRC 101.9 FM. In isolation, volume 18 - ‘we have to stop them early.’ Music by Pop. 1280, Yunclas, Tati au miel, False Moniker, Blackhoods, Caerulea + more. Tune in at 101.9 on your FM dial, stream at http://audio.cfrc.ca:8000/listen.pls or listen to a special archive here: https://www.mixcloud.com/cameronwillis1232/the-anatomy-lesson-july-11-2020/ Deathprod - “Occultation 3″ Occulting Disk (2019) Mariachi - “Le Talon” Mariachi (2018) Yunclas - “Phenomenology of Misery” A Train to Finland (2017) LAL - “Losing Myself” Dark Beings (2019) Blackhoods - “Constant Wrestle” Sunk (2013) Gel Nails - “Princess Di (1961-1997)” Moth Mane Beauty Through Pain (2017) Jim Haynes - “An Isolated Failure” Inconclusive (2019) Tati au Miel - “surviving (part 1)” The Exorcism of Tania Daniel (2019) False Moniker - “Recant/Disappear” Screen Memory (2020) Ligature - “Heat Stroke” 245 Days in Hell (2019) Pop. 1280 - “Monument” Way Station (2019) Calhau!- “Uruburro” U (2016) Caerulea - “II” Untitled (2018)

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Deathprod ‎– DISAPPEARANCE/REAPPEARANCE

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(via OCCULTING DISK | Deathprod)

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Hold On by Stian Westerhus from the benefit compilation Slava Ukraini!