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Miracle Libido (Moscow, Russia)
The noun "beatmaker" has taken on a particular meaning in Slavic and Baltic lands; it embodies various cultural practices that have a historically specific resonance. That same local importance can be assessed - at least initially - by examining some other, related terms that have made their way from contemporary English into Russian slang. In other words, were a young, homebound artist in Moscow to ponder his/her options as a "beatmaker," they'd also notice that a number of kindred English phrases appear with equal frequency. What are, therefore, the associations that come with cutting, copying, and splicing?
Over and above the technical or corporate vocabulary relating to certain software packages, the terms "sample," "loop," "groove," and "waveshape" will certainly be encountered. The cyclical, repetitious aspect of DIY beatmaking has leapt into the Russian language faster than any other. Those three nouns are especially useful - and appealing, too.
This, in other words, is a sonic artform of redoing - of simultaneous creation and reconsideration. For that reason, when arranging our new compilation album, showcasing thirty young beatmakers, we divided the tracks into a couple of historically discrete patterns. Each is driven by a similar love of reiteration. On the first album, "Antique," we gathered fifteen Slavic and Baltic artists whose contributions tend to focus on the crackle of old vinyl - or the jazz works thereof.
Cream Child (St. Petersburg, Russia)
The second album, "Astral," is given over to more recent times. The musicians here - also fifteen in number - lean more towards a reconsideration of '80s synth-pop, say, or the future vistas of science fiction.
In short, the looping structures of sampled sounds come to inform a couple of attitudes towards the past and/or future. Fond memories are repeated - and held in happy suspension - while fleeting thoughts of the future are given a related "solidity" through restatement. The common ground, therefore, between the albums is one of desired continuity. Samples - as they're looped - create a stable "groove." Hence the vocabulary that moves from English into Russian.
And yet, as listeners will find, our thirty contributors often live and work very "far from Moscow," so to speak. We offer musicians from Lithuania, Estonia, and - in the opposite direction - Kazakhstan. This does not necessarily mean that they all operate in isolation: instead, many of our chosen artists have formed collaborative nodes, usually as netlabels (or at least through online forums). If the practice of (uncredited!) sampling tends to erase geographic connections, then today's netlabels foster novel, miniature linkages - across the lines of political geography.
Discernible forms appear through the digital wilderness.
Fingalick (Vilnius, Lithuania)
And so, as a little context, we offer a snapshot here of three labels that have contributed to FFM2 ("Antique") and FFM3 ("Astral"). More specifically, we have in mind 237 Records, the 716 label, and Ritmo Sportivo.
The first of these, operating from Moscow, is still very much in development, given that some of the 237 artists have yet to establish any kind of web presence. Sound is evidently more important than vision at this early stage. The miniature manifesto that guides the project, overseen by the figure of Lega Secdubec, reads as follows:
...artists from different formats on the same stage
"The 237 project works with the most daring of avant-garde artists. Together they represent a wide variety of directions in contemporary music, including techno, abstract, and jazz. 237 is also engaged in a number of other unique and creative experiments, combining artists from different formats on the same stage."
Despite the unavoidable vagaries that emerge from describing an open-ended, ongoing process, it's evident that 237 hopes to dissemble some traditional or canonical styles - and then establish new semantic centers through repeated actions in a stable venue.
Repetition claims a certain ground: it begins the accrual of identity through constant affirmation. One of our artists shows how.
Vaiper Vitalijus Despotin (Vilnius, Lithuania)
That ground need not be physical - in fact, it's more likely to be web-based - but the logic of a collaborative, creative "venue" remains. Once an erstwhile playing field or its boundaries have been erased, "looped" activity is key is formatting new, meaningful domains.
A new age of sonic creativity
This need for erasure - prior to any established utterance - is clear in the modus operandi of 716, under the guidance of Igor Fedoseev in the city of Ufa. The label itself informs us: "Our music does not recognize today's borders. It recognizes neither frameworks nor nationality. We strive for a creative realization in sound; we even aspire to fall outside the limits of long-established styles and genres. This new age of sonic creativity allows each and every one of us to express our individuality!"
Selfhood, in a word, is best begun in emptiness. It does not, we're informed, benefit from any long-standing association with a given, tangible location. This devil-may-care flight from physical specificity is extended as follows: "Individuality is the main criterion of 716's selection process. We seek no form of benefit [from running the label]. We neither pose questions nor seek answers. We simply want to draw attention to artists who - in our opinion - are talented, despite the fact they're unknown."
"Individuality," according to this logic, comes from the dialog between an erasure of prior significances and the creation of new equivalents. It's a looping process.
Ufmo (Moscow, Russia)
Ritmo Sportivo is a young and very promising netlabel from both Moscow and Tula, responsible thus far for a host of small, lovingly crafted albums, EPs and mixes. Common among the label's organizers and artists is a fondness for American soul and classic hip-hop recordings, all of which are cut, spliced, and decelerated to the point of being unrecognizable.
The staff at Ritmo describe that Black heritage as a "musical platform" for their experiments, in other words a launchpad into related, though qualitatively different spheres. The result, with justification, is called an "unusual [sonic] atmosphere." Put differently, things "usual" or predictable are radically transformed, especially when the distinct, driven beats of R&B are slowed down to the point of a general "atmosphere," rather than anything noticeably progressive.
Mimicking American urban slang of the '70s, the folks at Ritmo Sportivo also declare, in semi-serious tones, their intention to champion "regular dope sounds based on Black music"; this admirable goal will be pursued by "people who really love that sh*t."
No real signs of irony.
Malefique (Moscow, Russia)
That very foreign (yet relevant) phrase is also interesting in its role as a dysphemism - a deliberately severe or negative term, employed in order to imply its opposite. The music is simultaneously degraded and dismissed - yet it's claimed by "true" aficionados, full of love and attention. Over and over.
In a recent interview, one of the Ritmo Sportivo musicians - known professionally as Cream Child - claimed that the appeal of these repeated, reclaimed sounds also has a private aspect. Having moved to St Petersburg, a city where he initially knew nobody, he needed to mark out a sense of personal, reliable space. "I needed to improve my feeling of isolation. I had to create something that'd keep me busy, too." In response to a query from the interviewer, he agreed that the same activity was also a means of "fighting stress. After all, it's pretty tough changing locations so swiftly."
And so these tracks, from across Russia, Lithuania, Estonia, and Kazakhstan, all help - structurally and socially - to build a sense of belonging. The sampled and looped sounds bring a feeling of home - be it in the past, the (hopeful) future, or among busy and distant colleagues in the digital present.
It's an intuitive view of the world.
Fiji (Orenburg, Russia)
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