Back Catalogue CD Review: Brave New Wales

Various Composers / Artists - transform010
www.fouriertransform.com

The following short review appeared in Issue 2 of Composers of Wales / Cyfansoddwyr Cymru Quarterly, March 2013

According to the liner notes, this triple-CD compilation is a ‘personal selection of the best new music being made under the radar and off the grid by musicians from and/or living in the Land of Song'. It features a wealth of over eighty experimental composers, musicians and sonic artists working under some thirty names; many operating in a solo capacity, but the majority as part of small groups or collectives - some local, others more geographically widespread - with an emphasis on shared creativity and collaboration. Most of the featured artists, perhaps inevitably, are clustered around main population centres in the south-east and north-west of Wales, but a substantial number also hail from more remote, rural and coastal areas; thus, with the CDs comprising recordings made largely between the years 2000 and 2008, the collection makes for essential listening as a truly national survey of the underground, experimental scene in Wales at the start of the new millennium.

The variety here is enormous, with tracks occupying a whole gamut of genre-defying, abstract zones from the noise-inspired electronica of Rose Heyworth to the free improvisation of Rhodri Davies via ambient drones, avant-garde doodlings and the field recordings of Simon Profitt. Many tracks are abrasive, some have political or humorous subtexts - but all challenge the listener to enter a world of serious and vital music-making well away from the academy or mainstreams of ‘rock’ and ‘classical’ music.

Fourniertransform’s liner speaks for itself: ‘Despite many areas of Welsh music being celebrated and well-documented, little publicity has so far been given to the ... avenues being pursued by the rule-breakers, or perhaps more interestingly, those blissfully unaware of the rules in the first place ... our intention is ... to showcase music that you are unlikely to have heard before; to give recognition to the creative souls tucked away in bedrooms and studios (and forests) up and down the land making music primarily for their own pleasure and to show that in this tiny and bewitching country of only 3 million people, there’s much to celebrate’.

The resulting package is ambitious, well produced and beautifully designed; a rare collection to be cherished.