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Kommissar Hjuler & Mama Baer / Ninni Morgia & Silvia Kastel

The Banshee Labrynth, Edinburgh
Monday April 18th
4 stars
Two couples stand side by side in a projected snapshot at the back of
the stage. The fashions are retro, the pose casually studied somewhere
between a 1970s terrorist cell and the anti-Abba. In the flesh, a
blonde woman is slumped on all fours on the floor, babbling profane
gibberish in free-associative tongues into a microphone. Her partner
behind her, a dark-haired man, manipulates an old-fashioned cassette
recorder. Further back, a dark-haired woman stands behind a vintage
Korg synth unleashing shards of white noise into the ether. The small
man next to her scrapes out minimal abstractions from his electric
guitar, gradually steering things into full-on metal.

These two noise duos playing together in a German/Italian avant
provocateur supergroup alliance are closer to live art in their sonic
extrapolations. Together they conjure up the ghosts of Throbbing Gristle by way of Popol Vuh and Diamanda Galas all the way through to Les Georges Leningrad's infantile Dada in this most
beguilingly insular of spectral confrontations.

The List, April 2011

ends
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