Pan Sonic
A
(Mute)
There's "electronic music," and then there's "electronica," and while
fans of the latter may not recognize the former as music when they hear
it, electronic-music fans certainly know enough about electronica to
dismiss much of it as crass hype exploitation. Electronica, cultural
catch-phrase that it is, is more clearly aligned with the pop-music
applications of synthesizers, samplers, and sine waves: namely, songs
with hooks. Electronic music is more of a general label which denotes a
less clear-cut mode of composition favored by not only avant-garde and
musique concrete creators like Stockhausen and Xenakis, but also more
visible techno artists like Aphex Twin and Autechre: namely, songs
without hooks. That's not to imply that Pan Sonic, the Finnish duo of
Mika Vainio and Ilpo Vaisanen, doesn't make music that's pleasant to
listen to. Rather, its third full-length record, A, is a "halfway"
record: You have to meet it halfway to make sense of it. Unlike the work
of most sample-reliant musicians, Pan Sonic's stuff doesn't sound the
least bit like pop music. There are no soulful soundbites on A, and
whatever beats pop up are clearly meant for something more than dancing.
By reducing computers, analog synths, and noisemakers to their most
primitive level, Vainio and Vaisanen don't just make music; they unmake
it. "A-Kemia," for instance, sounds like a rhythmic accident, rescued
from the happenstance hiss and buzz of everyday machinery operation by
the diligent concentration and construction of Pan Sonic's collage
technicians. By the time a melody threatens to appear, the song
immediately halts and turns into "Johto 1," a haunting collection of
static clicks, skipping sounds, and steam-room echo. The rest of A is no
more or less accessible, though anyone still fascinated with Kraftwerk's
emotionless man-machine ideal will surely find much to latch onto. Pan
Sonic, though, has no time for hooks and emotion, so much is the duo
intent on the impossible mission of capturing the future before it
immediately becomes the past. Whoops, there it goes again. --Joshua Klein
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