Mechthild Von Leusch - Ou Wirnith, Rungholter Tänze, Erstes Buch album mp3

Interesting album I came across on a blogsite (thank you music bloggers!).
Music here is more on the experimental end of electronica using vocal samples, flanged rhythmic pulses, drones.
The album comes across as a dna splice of Cluster, Eno, Conrad Schnitzler etc. Very dark and disturbing in moments and lighter and uplifting timbral planes. It IS NOT mainstream, dance or too avant and it is accessible music given the right time of the day.

This is another tasty album - and another limited run of 1000. There are 11 tracks on it, most of them consisting of very similar grey rhythms. However, don't let the 'similar' put you off. This album should be viewed not as a collection of tracks, but as a mood album segmented into nearly a dozen pieces. It opens with a sombre spoken piece in German which evolves into a soaring harmonic 'vocal' piece, presumably using a Mellotron or similar, called "Legenden Des Windes". This is by far the least interesting piece on the entire album. Next comes "Rungholter Tanz 12", the first of nine rhythmic pieces which change mutate, transform in some wonderful shades of pigeon grey. It patters along with a 'damp' sound while 'heavenly' keyboards are played over the top. The rhythm reminds one of breathing, of horses at a goodish canter, of miners working frantically at a rich vein while the pit fills with water. "Rungholter Tanz 5A" has an echoing machine feel to it, the reflected sound an intergral part of the rhythm. This is BRUCE GILBERT modern Performance Art dance music territory, similar but different enough to keep it unique. "Rungholter Tanz 8" is built around what sounds like a didgeridoo pulse, another piece of grey music which would have sat neatly on the "Dome #3" album, except this would probably have been the best track, "Rungholter Totentanz" is so familiar I know I have heard it before - a moody piece, creating an atmosphere of something 'impending', a tension in the air which can only break in violence or pain. "Rungholter Tanz 4" is a nervous, jumpy dance music with odd breaks in it to liberate gaspy noise. Imagine all the machines in all the factories heaving themselves from their foundations and forming primative 'human' tribes? Well, this is the type of ritual music they would play. "Rungholter Tanz 13" is a lot more straightforward, a basic, continual rhythm with some interesting muted electronic sounds and what sounds like found machinery growing along with the music. "Rungholter Tanz 3" comes next, a slower, more complex piece with what sounds like heavy chains numbering among it's multitudinous noises, a great arena of sounds and treatments, fascinating and mesmerizing. "Rungholter Tanz 10" is another fairly upbeat piece, again a complex rhythmic piece, with percussive sounds but not drums, nor do they sound like synthesizers. I strongly suspect he either uses noise gates or envelope generators to get the short 'drum' sounds, and uses taped noise to get the sound. You certainly cannot buy these kind of sounds at your local Rock Music Instrument store. "Rungholter Tanz 6" is quite different, not unlike a carillion of 'flat' bells - bells with no resonant ring to them. This pattern carries on for a while before decaying to almost nothingness once more. The album closes with "Telos" which, like the opening track, features text by Gesprochen Von Wieland Klumpp. The music itself is huge and echoing, as if recorded in a vast underground chamber. The rhythm itself is mainly echoes which bounce along seemingly great distances.
The back cover suggests that the musician responsible for this died in 1989. I certainly hope this is wrong, as the world really needs more of this sort of music, and more people who are willing to avoid convention to do it. As mentioned above, the only people I can think of to compare it to are DOME / GILBERT & LEWIS, although there may be others out there (and I'd like to think I was one). Again recommended.

Originally reviewed for Soft Watch.

The second album of Mechthild von Leusch’s "Rungholter Tänze" is a limited edition of 1000 hand-numbered copies. Isn´t it the same with this first album?