Asher/Zimoun - Untitled Movement - 5.1 DVD - Leerraum [ ] BGN, WHITE_LINE, 2008. The combined forces of Asher and Zimoun make for fascinating listening. Untitled Movement is a condensation of work, a fusion of the two artists, with dense textural shifting patterns threaded through distempered, disconnected piano tones. Like the beautifully rendered cover photography of Skoltz_Kolgen, this is utterly compelling, whilst also being enveloped in imperfections and accretions, a kind of subtly flawed beauty is contained, as if a drawer full of decaying musical manuscripts has been reverse engineered and given new life. We can hear the muted granular effects of denatured vinyl, perhaps, or the soft coating of dust and pittings that infect old metal..this would make an ideal accompaniment for the films of The Brothers Quay, as it engenders a slightly surreal and uncomfortably dark atmospheric, the result of a bad dream, or an eerie reality. An intriguing listen, fully immersive, and best appreciated with a good surround system in a darkened room. Asher/Zimoun - Untitled Movement Massimo Ricci, Touching Extremes, 2009 Characteristically unobtrusive, this outing features Asher working with Leerraum’s honcho Zimoun. A repetitive figuration whose crucial constituents are the echoes of a piano “from the room at the end of the house” (you know what I mean) repeating suspended chords that never resolve, reverberating both in the environment and in our long-term memory. The cyclic development of this essential sonic physiognomy is perturbed by the ever-present, and increasingly emergent in the mix, “urban soul” consisting of a mixture of dampened traffic sounds and suggestively whispering frequencies, apparently deriving from the use of shortwave radio and (insert your computer-based treatment here). The really impressive aspect is the hard-to-believe contradiction between the idea of metropolitan pollution and incessant din opposed to the relieving character of the soundscape on the psyche, which simply benefits of these presences, totally incapable of a reaction or a movement whatsoever. One just gets caught in this spiral of forgetfulness, even bad memories contaminated and - ultimately - made evaporate. A magic formula that stimulates the dormant facets of illogicality, turning them into a swelling impression of near-conclusion.