Zheng Hao - Harmonium II
Released: June 28
The follow-up to last year's first installment, which utilized a harmonica to control its tonality, Harmonium II takes a different approach my using recording equipment as instruments themselves. Divided into two different sides, Hao utilizes two different setups for each side to achieve these long textural soundscapes for each track. The first utilizes a Zoom field recorder and a pair of headphones to create feedback that she then routes in through her modular setup. The result of this little experiment results in deep and powerful low oscillating tones, at first. As the track progresses, new and unusual sounds make their way in including something that sounds almost like writing on a chalkboard that is accompanied by the squelching of a signal being manipulated, pressed, and detuned by the routing of the modular setup. But as this effect fades, the low tones return and are now accompanied by the squelching heard earlier. The setup is rather creative and the result is something interesting as well - very drone, but also a bit more with the manipulations of the signal.
The second track takes a slightly different approach by using a mixing desk and a reverb pedal, though it's unclear if these run into the same modular setup. But it starts out with some rapid and soft beeps as the lower tones slowly grow around them. Compared to the first track, this has a definitively more mechanical quality to it, sounding much more like malfunctioning machinery. The drone slowly grows over the first several minutes until hitting a point in which it can't seem to grow any more intense. The slow morphing of the tones eventually gives way to a fast beeping tone, one that feels like its trying to run past the rest of the track, This part in the track is one of my favorite moments here as it is the most chaotic a track on this album gets as all tones seem to struggle for their place in the mix.
The whole album is rather meditative, until its not. It has this wonderful in it though - a balance that doesn't allow anything to become too busy or too stale. Hao balances these two imperatives quite well, only letting it become momentarily frantic and never dull.
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