Carl Michael von Hausswolff

Minimalist sound artist CM Von Hausswolff gives his two cents on the state of overdevelopment in various urban environments the world over in this, his second disc for the Sub Rosa label. It's hard to say precisely how the music here relates to town planning: Von Hausswolff concentrates on conjuring the kind of stark, austere glitch-driven soundscapes found on his work for labels like Raster Noton, using what sounds to be entirely synthetic sources, so again, it's difficult to establish any concrete link between what we're hearing and the subject matter. This turns out to be of little consequence however. Musically, Three Overpopulated Cities is a fascinating piece of work, lacing together threads of digital distortion and warm tones of heavyweight sine drones to fashion an extremely subtle, severe sound world, akin to the more radical works of Alva Noto or perhaps Richard Chartier. Perhaps the idea here is to contrast notions of excessive urban activity against the singular, pristine - if slightly menacing - universe Von Hausswolff has summoned up, but regardless, there's plenty in the way of microsound kicks to be derived from these recordings.