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Oval | Re:systemisch

A collection of their groundbreaking early tracks.
CD, Form and Function/Lowlands

Tekst: Matthijs de Jonge

Publicatiedatum: 12 januari 2002

Re:systemisch collects Oval's groundbreaking early tracks, dating from 1993 to 1995 and including the critically acclaimed 1994 'Systemisch' album (often hailed as the first 'glitch' album) on two crammed silver disks. As such, it's an indispensable must-have for completists as well as a nice treat to everyone who's curious about where this computer deconstructionism came from. You'll find 30 calm ambientesque tracks constructed from raw material purportedly salvaged from things like skipping cd's, failing hard drives (hence the term 'glitch') and other accidental phenomena unique to the digital realm. Most likely, you won't listen to all of them in one go, as they are rather samey and, depending on your taste, somewhat bland, but as historical documents illustrating a rather cool idea, they're quite interesting. You may, of course, like me, happen to be rather fond of their hazy loops and charmingly illogical rhythmic crackles, but Oval *does* rightly receive more acclaim as a theoretician than as a great musician. It is, therefore, very unfortunate that this important release packaging important experiments in digital information technology comes marred by the Music Industry's latest Evil Scheme (tm): copy protection for cd's. Why is this Scheme Evil? Well, it prevents you from playing cd's (even if you've spent your hard-earned cash on them) equipped with it on computer cd-rom drives (rather a normal thing to do in this digital age, I'd wager). Plus, because it works by adding 'damaged data' to the music that will make a cd-rom drive choke on it, there's a very real risk standalone cd-players will refuse to play protected cd's as well after subsequent deterioration of the media damages the bit stream even further. The conclusion, therefore, must be that even though it's a laudable effort to collect all of Oval's early work in one convenient package, the record company's incredibly ill-mannered efforts to damage a piece of property they want you to buy deserve a very firm thumbs down.

http://www.kindamuzik.net/recensie/oval/re-systemisch/1213/
Meer Oval op KindaMuzik: http://www.kindamuzik.net/artiest/oval