- Former Brisbanite Cedie Janson, now based in LA, has returned - at least in musical form. Three years since his last little EP comes another handful of beats, this new collection bearing the title, Stillness. The five tracks are, apparently, a meditation on the concept. Ambience has certainly been a go-to in Cedie’s bag of stylistic tricks, so you might have been expecting vast, uncluttered soundscapes? You would then, like me, be wrong.
Beginning with the EP’s title-track which was sent out ahead of release, the listener is confronted with a sharp intensity and a cavalcade of beats that is no serene scene, that’s for sure. It does instead have quite a lot in common with that quasi-industrial mover Light Curve, the song that really kicked it off for Cedie, three years back. It’s not exactly the same though. The treated tablas and the sighing, echoing female vox really stand out. The slightly exotic sounds key into a kind of world-beat feel (but the good kind). It reminds me quite strongly of some of those old illbient experiments, welding together music from other corners of the world with nutty idm. In particular I got a very pleasant echo of Talvin Singh’s delicious collaboration with the Master Musicians Of Joujouka, You Can Find The Feeling.
You sure can, Talvin and Cedie does again on the EP’s other single to date, Inertia. The same echoing reverb roars out chiming beats and a very similar sighing, female vocalise. This time the vocals are attributed to avant-jazzer Amirtha Kidambi. I don’t know if it’s her or just some anonymous vocal sample elsewhere on the record. I’ve a feeling that Cedie may have been listening to a lot of the same twenty year old dance music that I really like, because this time I get strong vibes of the Orbital classic, Halcyon And On And On, although, once again, Cedie’s take is far less ambient: shocking and jolting its trebly, percussive way to glory.
There are some more meditative moments to be found, if, instead of indulging the singles you take a more traditional approach and just start from the beginning with opener Airlock. The name amped my suspicion that it’s evoking some jaunty ride on a submersible vehicle. It almost seems a bit too obvious: the bubbling, aqueous noises and the quiet thud of an engine sample backgrounding the seven-and-a-half-minute expanse. Cedie uses that canvas as a kind of a sketch pad: slotting in different percussion as he feels like it. It’s an amiable if sometimes aimless journey and a curious choice to open with, especially given the shock and awe of what’s to come.
Gradient is an unusual number for Jansen, kicking off with jittery, splintered samples and beats shivered into tiny subdivisions. What’s most notable is its lack of reliance on heavy reverb for atmosphere, giving it a direct and playful quality that you wouldn’t expect from this master of mood. Granted, some of that does leak in about halfway through as the beat skritchings are played off against ambient synth harmonies; but the frivolity is, happily, allowed to work its way through to the end.
Pulse is almost like a launch-pad, as Cedie revs himself up for the two thunderers that are to come. It sounds like them, but without ever really taking off itself. I think this might be the closest the EP comes to the style of film music Cedie’s been making for the last couple of years, scoring some short films like The Narrow World and Machine.
Outside of the film music and this EP, I don’t know what Cedie’s been up to over that three years; I’m guessing he’s been pretty busy. Stillness, sorry for saying it again, is anything but: it’s full of the crazy, electrifying dance music ideas that made everyone turn and look, back at the beginning of Cedie’s solo career. Could you have expected more after three years? Possibly. These ideas worked out into a thoughtfully tracked LP? Yes please. For now you’ll just have to content yourself with another handful of exciting possibilities. Empty yourself of desire, meditate on stillness alone.
- Chris Cobcroft.