Stephan Mathieu

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5...according to our Phil on Thu 03 Feb, 2011.

This is a sister release to the recent CD on 12K which came and went in no time though a repress is happening soon. Not one to cut and paste from press releases but this is a reasonably informative sentence so here you go 'Remain, a new 60 minute composition utilizes original material from Janek Schaefer's Extended Play, reprocessed by Stephan Mathieu between September 2008 and October 2010 using an entropic setup, spectral analysis and convolution processes. A companion piece to A Static Place on 12k.' Entropic setup?? Convolution processes?? I have no idea.... I know what I like though and listening to this is a total pleasure. It's one of the warmest dense sounding drone records I've heard in ages. I just stopped typing and tranced out for a few minutes while I was wrapped up in some lovely textured drones punctuated by some small crackles and whizzes. I wanted to get the word celestial in there but it didn't quite fit so I thought I'd slip it in to it's own sentence. I so wish I had time to listen to all of this cos it sounds awesome. I'm gonna have to check out some of his other music now. Proper chill out music!

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Another beautiful sweeping dense work by German artist Stephan Mathieu. Remain, a new 60 minute composition utilizes original material from Janek Schaefer’s Extended Play, reprocessed by Stephan Mathieu between September 2008 and October 2010 using an entropic setup, spectral analysis and convolution processes. A companion piece to A Static Place on 12k.

Still Image: Stephan Mathieu
Published by TouchMusic (MCPS)

Stephan Mathieu (b. 1967) is a self taught composer and performer of his own music, working in the fields of electroacoustics and abstract digitala. His sound is largely based on early instruments, environmental sound and obsolete media, which are recorded and transformed by means of experimental microphony, re-editing techniques and software processes involving spectral analysis and convolution; it has been compared to the landscape paintings of Caspar David Friedrich, the work of Colorfield artists Mark Rothko, Barnett Newman and Ellsworth Kelly.

During the last decade Stephan’s music has been released on 28 CDs and vinyl records, both solo and in collaboration with Akira Rabelais, Douglas Benford, Ekkehard Ehlers, Janek Schaefer, John Hudak and Taylor Deupree on electronic music labels worldwide.

Since 1992 he performed his music live in solo shows and on festivals all over Europe, Scandinavia, North and South America and created various audio installations for galleries and museums, a glass-blowing factory, a 17th century garden, Berlin Mitte, a 19th century steel plant, parks, an arrangement of 30 Peugeots, a late antique throne hall and many other unique sites.

“I’m a collector of 78rpm records from the 1910s and 20s, the era of acoustic and early electronic audio recording. I love the way they transport sound.”

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