Danny Zelonky's second
Crank album on Mille Plateaux stays true to his style of stream of consciousness-like constructions, built around more subtle, abstract sounds than one can point out or choose to identify. Without working within the standard palette of electronic music sounds -- characterized primarily by drum machines, synthesizers, and breakbeats -- Zelonky instead takes genuinely foreign sounds from synthetic worlds and pieces them together into non-rhythmic structures that are neither energetic or relaxing; if anything, the result feels dissonant. The songs do emanate an indistinct mood in the spirit of collage, meaning that nothing feels or seems concrete, instead operating like an assembled mass of non-harmonious but not necessarily juxtaposing units brought together randomly. Zelonky's unique style of fractured collage soundscapes leave plenty open to the imagination and particularly the senses, but
Heftibag can't help but seem as if it is coded in an alien musical language that most humans can't seem to figure out. In sum, this is a challenging album that only the most ambitious listeners will care to explore at length.