Un Culte Sans R​ê​ve Et Sans Merci – Collaboration w/ Monad Node

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Collaborative project with Monad Node is now available as digital download, tape and CD. Songs developed over a three month period by exchanging tracks; artwork, design and production are a shared effort, titles were taken from works by Walter Benjamin (Capitalism as Religion), Max Horkheimer („But whoever is not willing to talk about capitalism should also keep quiet about fascism“), Rosa Luxemburg („[The most revolutionary thing one can do is] always to proclaim loudly what is happening“) and Karl Marx („The tradition of all dead generations weighs like a nightmare on the brains of the living„).

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The Commune of Nightmares – reviews

release, review

In no particular order, here are some reviews that The Commune of Nightmares has garnered over the past few weeks:

„Instrumentalmusik, radikaler als die hundertste Vertonung angestaubter Politparolen, ist auf dem neuen Album The Commune of Nightmares des Noise-Künstlers David Wallraf zu hören.“

Robert Miessner, Taz Berlin

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„Sehr düster […]. Auf mich wirken [die Stücke] wie Patchwork-Untote, die sich durch die Wahrnehmung der Hörenden schieben.“

Ilka Geyer, WDR3 Multitrack

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„Dark, ominous, not too soothing, not too noisy, but lovingly ‘present’ when played at a moderate volume; this is the kind of music with that post-nuclear, dystopian feel and whatever I took from his philosophical text that’s exactly what he’s aiming at, so mission succeeded.“

Frans de Waard, Vital Weekly

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„[The track In Nightmares Screened by Algorithms], along with much of the rest of the album feels as though it is incredibly dystopian. But this dystopian feeling is all the more unsettling as it never quite clarifies whether this dystopia is in the present or the future. Either way, the album left a small stain on my thoughts – one that would’t wash off easily and forced me to consider the hellscape with a somewhat distant but connected view.“

Lars Haur, Fringes of Sound

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„Wonderfully creepy stuff.“

Kristoffer Cornils, Field Notes

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„Given the album’s thesis and purview, bringing about natural, instinctual responses is a perfect fit, and by keeping it subtle, the reactions are true to the individual instead of by following the forced hand of the artist.“

Paul Casey, Musique Machine 

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„The Commune of Nightmares is not only a sonic journey, but also a profound immersion into the soulful atmosphere that the artist deftly creates. It is a unique story about a sonic community where minimalism blends with moments of intense peculiarity.“

Artur Mieczkowski, Anxious Musick Magazine

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„Karlrecords will be releasing The Commune Of Nightmares on January 26. It comes highly recommended to anyone who appreciates gritty ambiance with an extra helping of metaphysical anxiety.“

Mike, Avant Music News

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„Dem Titel entsprechend enthält The Commune Of Nightmares rund vierzig Minuten ‚Nightmare Culture‘ auf der Basis von Tapeloops und verteilt auf sieben Tracks voll infernalischen Rauschens und prasselnder Schuttlawinen, die – auch – als unverblümter Kommentar zum Leben des Menschen im Kapitalismus verstanden sind.“

African Paper

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What strikes me is how often the album has been characterised as dystopian – it totally is insofar as it literally builds the soundscape of a ‚bad place‘ (δυσ = bad, τόπος = place), but in my mind it’s strictly contemporary. What I wish I had put into the short text that accompanies the tape and now add here as a footnote is this: the most important part of any dream or nightmare is waking up. And also this: „Note that we cannot interpret dreams. Rather, dreams interpret us.“ (Kathy Acker).

The Commune of Nightmares

release

My new tape/album The Commune of Nightmares is due to be released on Karlrecords on January 26 and is up for preorder here.

The Commune of Nightmares stems from the idea that nightmares are the logical reverse of ‘capitalist realism’: an uncanny undercurrent of daily experiences and an algorithmic haunting of dreams that at the same time is a shared – communal – experience of everybody. All songs are based on tapeloops that were cut arbitrarily from a stash of cassettes, some of which found on the street, others from a stockpile of 4 track tapes recorded in the late 90s and early 2000s – a musical game of cadavre exquis played with random strangers and former versions of the self.

The C40 tape comes with a download card and an eight page booklet containing some theoretical background on the songs.

On January 19 there will be a release concert at West Germany in Berlin.