Monolake GHOST album preview
Album "GHOST" one of electronic music's peerless! Release date for all fomats: February 27th
"I found a lovely spot on the hill near the east gate, my private little escape from the madness. I watch the birds, listen to the occasional rolls of distant thunder, and enjoy the saturated colors of the forest.
* * * The poison of the yellow-red frog acts fast and efficient. When Jonathan realized something went seriously wrong it was already too late. He tried to estimate if he could make it out in time, but his vision got already blurry. He thought of leaving a note to prevent the crew from coming down and making the same mistake, but before he could think any further his heart stopped beating. When his body touched the surface of the dark lake he was already dead * * *"
Over the years, Robert Henke's been a relentless collaborator—Monolake has had two and three members at various moments—but he has been on his own for his last two albums, Silence and the forthcoming Ghosts. They're the first two parts of a trilogy of music that, in a music landscape suffused with content, sounds like little else. Henke's drive to evolve is easy enough to hear in conversation. As he sees it, things only happen when you're interested and engaged in what you're doing.
The title of this album, Ghosts, came to my mind at a quite early stage. I liked it due of the large field of associations it provokes. I started taking notes about topics connected to the term, read about mythologies and collected ideas. I also often write fragmentary texts, short cinematic scenes that I come up with when my head is idling and I have time to kill. One of these texts is included in the artwork of the CD and the vinyl edition and it is an essential part of the Ghosts album, it serves as a window to a bigger drama, and the music offers another view. The text also links the Ghosts album to the Silence album from 2009. Both stories are related, I just don't know yet how.
Independently of the aim to create a new album I constantly try out things in the studio, and some day in December 2010 a structure started to emerge that had a dark and evil quality. I knew this would become a core part of a future album and I gave that sketch the working title 'Ghosts'. Finding new material with similar color turned out to be more difficult than I did anticipate so I changed my strategy and worked on sounds and shapes of very different vibe; whimsical little sonic creatures, potentially mean or helpful spirits that have their very own life. I recorded and transformed sounds from objects I found in my flat; glasses, paper, thin plastic sheets, stones, pebbles in a salad bowl and so on. I believe I became a pretty good foley artist by doing so. The track 'Taku' mainly consists of recordings I made with two empty glasses clicking at each other, and 'Unstable Matter' is an exercise in applying complex transformations to all kinds of recordings: a bunch of vintage cymbals, my own voice, metal plates, singing bowls, bells, and a rusty hi-hat.
