Dana Matthiessen’s Cloning specializes in electronic sound collages that extend well into musique concrète levels of abstraction.
“Weighted” is a track from Cloning’s lapses, originally released on cassette last March by the FUC label and available now for download. The album is described by Matthiessen as “the sound of rummaging through electronic trash heaps.” As with most Cloning pieces, there’s a lot of tape hiss, garbled beeping, and ambient clatter splattered across “weighted”s sonic canvas, but this track also contains hints of traditional “music” in the form of degraded samples that fade in and out like the voices of ghosts attempting to communicate from another dimension. Don’t worry, Cloning didn’t pull a Merzbeat-era Merzbow or anything (the top YouTube comment on that album’s “Forgotten Land” reads, somewhat incredulously, “Hey this sounds like music,” if that helps with the analogy); there are still plenty of droning feedback bursts here to jar your eardrums and unsettle the part of your brain that craves dulcet tones and melodious vocals. Long live the noise.
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