Medium is the third release from Bristol, UK-based Emptyset (aka James Ginzburg and Paul Purgas) and is the first recorded live. Spanning just five tracks and a mere 21 minutes, it was recorded on location in a remote mansion in rural Gloucestershire, UK. Much like To Rococo Rot's Kölner Brett, the music was composed as a kind of soundtrack for the architectural space. The project, supported by the Woodchester Mansion Trust, was recorded by sound engineer Mat Sampson, who used careful microphone placement to reflect the intricate details of the space, adding texture to the sparse layers of sine waves and distortion. The resulting mini-album is being released on CD and a limited edition twelve-inch, including a poster of analog-processed imagery by Clayton Welham and Sam Williams, who produced the video for "Function" and will be creating another piece for Medium using footage captured within the Woodchester mansion. Spooky and even more compositionally minimal than the bass glitch duo's previous work, it doesn't quite live up to the heady sub-bass thrill of 2011's excellent Demiurge, but it is a welcome stop-gap between albums and further evidence of Emptyset's intent to ceaselessly experiment and explore new avenues for their unique sound.
Read an interview with Emptyset here.
(Subtext)Read an interview with Emptyset here.