KK Null × Kawabata Makoto – “Psychetronic!” Review

The record we’ve been anticipating so eagerly since its announcement in January, was officially released some months earlier, but since our website was yet to be operatable, at that point, the feature was postponed to the future. Past things past, “Psychetronic!,” is the record to bring together the two modes of time, so that there will be no “past things past” anymore. Far from Coil’s concept of “Time Machines,” this is as metaphysical as it gets within the realm of the sonic — and it is overwhelmingly physical as far as improvisation schemes are regarded.

Markedly an inevitable collaboration between two Holy Grail From Hell favorites; the legendary noise manipulators, KK Null and Kawabata Makoto; “Psychetronic!,” most perhaps originates from the incentive that is Kawabata’s recent grown interest in things less rock-oriented, most notably his solo efforts, which have all been more or less focused, experimental pieces of work, testifying to his contemporary classical influences. That alone would remind one of KK Null’s own hierarchy of works, evolving along a similar scale, on a road leading to free improvisation.

Nevertheless, there isn’t any doubt the two improvisers’ careers as composers had each compassed idiosyncrasy of its own. And that is manifest in the approach adopted by each; the Kawabata has been enormously concerned with sequentiality, and most of his pieces have emphasized on extended drone segments, on the other hand, KK Null’s music often relies on the unceremonious, with micro-turns happening subito, and that as well is the bed-ground for “Psychetronic,” meaning the layer of sound introduced by him barely ever allows Kawabata to acquire his formal strategy. Instead, Kawabata tends to welcome Kazuyuki as an attacker that he is, and conceiving him as a percussive duress, he then does something rather bizarre: approaching the event as if it were an Acid Mothers Temple jam and Kazuyuki the drummer, Kawabata’s contributions become chiefly space-rock freakouts that are now and then either rejected by Kazuyuki’s electroacoustic breeding or embraced with a temporary drum pattern.

In “Psychetronic!,” the aura neighboring the listener is also of binary nature; whereas there surges an ever-changing layer of 70’s sonic lava, the song itself appears to have been fashioned in a Martian industrial cooperative. It is true that during the whole performance, Kawabata does not utilize any of his über-noise-generator pedals as in most Mainliner jams, yet, he attacks with the same ferocity and there is little of that Acid Mothers Temple bluesy-tenderness — what latterly engenders an all-inclusive collective, combined with Kazuyuki’s proto-scientific mise en scène.

The length of the record, while certainly more than enough to be considered a full-length, occurs to be atoms short (45″) than what imagined, but with that, usually –when it’s well-crafted material– comes potential for rediscovery thru re-listens that are quick in the realm of avant music — afterall, three quarters of an hour is nothing as compared to an average of 60″-70,” and that undeniably allows one to expose the track more than customary, also making it all feel like a punk trip that takes only the start to reach the end.

Written by Ari Wilson