Solo bass played and composed by Kasper T. Toeplitz. Layers of noise full of details like the voice of dead machines !
“A purely formal présentation of Almasty would point that it is a composition for solo bass – electric bass, which implies a few electric/electronic machines around the string instrument, which change or modifiy its resonances somehow, but nothing more that what is seen those days around any electric instrument. And Almasty is also a solo composition, as it is recorded and presented as it was played, live, one evening of november 2015, in Bagnolet, just outside of Paris (even if it was not the first time the piece was played) : no overdubs, re-recordings, no samples of the instrument replaced later in the final mix, no compositional work in the studio, except of the reduction of the original 4 tracks in a stereo, as the piece is written to be played on 4 speakers disposed in an arc in front of the audience.
And of course all this has no importance at all, it is not an "instrumental solo" which hopes to show a supposed virtuosity, nor is it an introspection of the musician facing himself : Almasty is best defined as a composition originating from an "electronic thought" of the music, which happens to be played on a basse just because the composer, which happens to also be the interpreter of the piece has some pleasure, or just a familiarity resulting from the years spend with the instrument, when playing the bass. But what Almasty is, is an electronic architecture, lasting just about one hour, layers of sounds, noises, textures, a constant attention to details of the resulting sounds, dust or splinters, from the macroscopic to the powerful breathing of some machine, a never revealed presence – the Almasty. And the cover, a painting executed by Daria Gabriel, is of a similar density of texture.”