Lydia Domancich, Jean-Mathias Petri - So Watt Mp3

Flute is all about air and breathing, while the Fender Rhodes is how to use electricity. Now if you reverse this for a while, you'll get a short definition of this album! Lydia Domancich and Jean-Mathias Petri first met in 2001 but their ways crossed again in 2010, ultimately resulting in this duo project where the written meets the improvised, bound by a mutual curiosity for sound research. And without a warning, you'll find yourself embarked on the opening track, where flute(s) display an unequalled rhythmic creativity, bouncing against slashes of supportive but dark keyboards. From now on, the point of no return is reached and you will go forward through various moods: atonal parts giving finally birth to sweet lullabies, mad bass key runs, jazz loaded chord changes, experimental ambient bits, fragmented icy parts, ghostly sampled voices, sequenced segments and more. Lydia shows no mercy in the way she treats her Fender, from an agressively, anxiously distorded attack to a sweetly phased sound, releasing all the tension; Petri's flutes - a true war arsenal - can sound like birds or elephants, radio short waves or be the elegant classic instrument we all know. Both players have in common the chameleon-like ability to disguise, morph or transgress the sonic qualities of their respective instruments, thanks to a clever use of pedals, samplers and MIDI controllers. If there is a common thread uniting all this collective work, then it's not a thread but an electric wire, since it's all about electricity; just look at the titles and enjoy the latent humour lurking around (So Watt, Sweet Ohm); I even made one for their next album: Volt Face ... well ... probably only worth for those digging French! The electric connection can also be pursuied and applied to the interplay between the two; I perceived here and there some tiny phase problems; their experimental research doesn't always bring the best result, leaving at times the impression of unanswered questions, lengthy circular bits and forced transitions instead of a natural move to the next thing; those are anyway only perceived as minor occurrences and do not harm the global picture, which brings us back to the fact that this is all about electricity! WE humans are energy but when two of them also happen to be creative, excellent and super sensitive musicians sharing together their molecular experiences, then electricity induces heat and the energy delivered reaches higher levels of pleasure and physical excitation, which ultimately may be the reason of this album!