Andreas Rohden aka gillicuddy is of East Frisian-descent, now in Bochum residing a singer-songwriter. He has issued as the sum of 4 albums, all during one year and a half, on respected labels such as Resting Bell, Merzbau, and Clinical Archives to date. Rohden`s music can be characterized as influenced by North American roots-driven pop music and minimalist song composition. Through his restraint approach he is getting close to delta blues and the string music derived from the years of the 1920-30`s. By continuing to go onwards in time it all reminds me of John Fahey, Leo Kottke, Phil Reavis, Lou Barlow, and of contemporaries the likes of Ben Chasny, early Devendra Banhart, (Carlo), Barbagallo, James Blackshaw.
Rohden`s deliberately a bit rough even primitive songs do reflect the truthfulness of the eras of the past decades (especially the album music for moles). In fact, the similarities with John Fahey do have common point in the shortness of the tracks not often reaching a couple of minutes. On the other hand, Rohden `s music has always been a bit too cagey to label it simply as roots music in itself (for example, it is as the same as to consider Wilco or The Silver Jews could it to be). His cutting edge-ness does arise from the fountainhead of the recent time (by the way, he has himself compared his music as if with “living together with the ducks and squirrels”). It is not possible to forget he is yet living in the midst of one of the main European industry complexes. His music would seem as an escaping far away from today and an urban jungle around.
His sonic inventiveness is vividly and broadly demonstrated on his latest release the yaouhl! mashup. In accordance with the spirit of Clinical Archives it does sound in a modern way (no matter how anachronistically this sentence would even sound!), being far away from the sleekness of buttoned-up chart music. However, all those songs establish an excellent bunch. The gambit i know starts with beautiful sonorous overdrives and will be continued by almost 8-minute long adventurous (post-) grunge sound. Indeed, de mannetjesolifant gaat op reis naar de oostzee sounds like grunge music in a way it could ideally to be. The track is compiled of sequences and details which are obviously not very ordinary at all. For instance, one of those sound layers is drifted by tape (speed) manipulation effects, though, the full story will be ended by background hisses coming from the (Baltic) sea. Sh-da is a marvellous blending of avant-garde/indie/post-rock, which main attention are focused on tumultuous structure consisting of the symbiosis of usual instruments and digital audio. Instrumental # 2 does approach a concept of the previous albums, but, yes, ... just moving nearer. Sme. li. co. is likely to move up into underground folk of the 60`s. What does it mean “Sme.li.co”? Therein are explaining sentences:
/ too many people on the subway train to tell people smell like cock / Why do the people under the subway train smell like cock /. In this way? Definitely.
the yaouhl! mashup demonstrates an ingenious and skillful balance between sound experimentation and solid song-crafting. There is actually one thing I am concerning about. Why are all of those song titles and the project title itself as well initiated without capital initial letter? By my opinion one of the best albums of 2010.
Download it from here
9.5
