VERTONEN /

CRIPPLED INTELECT PROD

interviews index

THIS INTERVIEW WAS MADE IN 2000 FOR THE 4TH ISSUE

Blake is not a common person. He is the instigator of Crippled Intellect Productions label and also the noise activist behind VERTONEN. If you are interested in VERTONEN you can also check non-C.I.P. releases like "calibrations" (cassette on loud cat), "Trigger Field" (CDR on Solipsism, reviewed here). I take the opportunity to ask him what has been so far the complete discography of his label: "before the vinyl started up, I released a series of ten cassette-only releases, all of which are out of print. These cassettes more or less documented most of the sound projects I was involved in from 1988 to 1998.

[C01] Charlie-Core "Charlie-Core" Lo fi sound experiments (pretty much all recorded in a two day period), with six tracks revolving around the theme of freeing Charles Manson, Juvenile at best. [C02] Sound & Vice "Sound & Vice" More lo-fi sound experiments. Also juvenile at best, noodlings which hopefully panned out into more interesting material. [C03] Derail Release "Conceptual Disaster" a primarily percussive trio with some more traditional noise experimentation as well. [C04] Vertonen "Sound Knots and Orchestrations First solo release. Tape manipulations, processed field recordings, more noise experimentations. [C05] Ehnemho / Arc "wax/finite" (split) Ehnemho was an improvisational, percussion-driven creation with guitar and electric clavichord on top. Arc was a little more ambient/experimental, still with percussion and electric clavichord, but the guitar was more loopish / percussive /abstract, and we added a banjo. All Arc recordings, like Ehnemho, were improvised. [C06] Loopspool "Loopspool" Again, all improvised recordings. Loopspool was even more ambient and, as the name implies, loop driven. [C07] Vertonen "anastasia" A more rhythmic sound, with close to side-long pieces dominating. One side was a little more "ethnic" with detuned guitar, and percussive elements; the other side featured a more "mechanical" interpretation. [C08] Vertonen "There is Peace in Providence" An aural interpretation of a time and place and the events which shaped the (inevitable) temporal existence of such a place. Pretty "Zoviet France-y" by any standard. [C09] Handmaiden Synergetics "Handmaiden Synergetics" A collaborative project with former Derail member Marcelo Cavallari. [C10] Vertonen "The Captive" Compositions somewhat of a noise companion to "peace in providence," recorded while living in an illegal basement apartment in Queens, NY".

To go further in my investigation I ask Blake several simple questions:
Why did you start such projects, The choice of name, Their aims?

I start any project for the same reason: to create something, which gives me satisfaction; to fill a void. This has also been the aim of all the projects. As for name choice, the label name, crippled intellect productions, was something I came up with when I was about 17. I don't think it really reflects what the label has been about for about 10 years though, so I prefer to simply go by C.I.P. and maybe I'll assign new words to fill in the acronym. The spider logo was something I just sketched out one day and since I really liked it I just sort stuck with it. As for choice of names, vertonen is German for "set to music" and I feel like what I'm doing is gathering sounds, assembling them, and setting them to, or rather into, I suppose, music. Derail was decided on by the three members in the band; I think our reasoning was that a lot of our life stuff sounded like a train wreck... arc, god knows where we pulled that from. Ehnemho is a phonetic rendering of NMO, which is how I labelled all the practice tapes for that project. "NMO" actually stood for "ninety minutes of..." and we left it at that because we couldn't think of a band name. As for the autonotext project, I think I was just into word-banging at the time and came up with that... it does have bearance on the fact of the project being based on text, be in textual permutations, pieces for voice, etc.

What do you currently listen to?

On recent rotation: ennio morricone, non, alu, phonophobia, patsy cline, sun city girls, misfits, the user.

How do you create your tracks?

Usually compose on four tracks.

What is your most wanted wish?

It's not exactly a "most wanted," but I’d really like to learn first hand the entire record manufacturing process; from cutting the lacquers to plating to pressing the vinyl.

What will be your future releases for CIP and Vertonen?

future projects for C.I.P.: *)panicsville/vertonen collaborative 7" *)brutum fulmen CD *)hanged man's orgasm CD *)A Z'EV 10" with two tracks from a 1993 performance at the Performing Garage in NYC. In metal jacket, limited to 333 copies. Each jacket is sequentially hand stamped and each inner jacket is autographed by Z'EV. The project that would never die. Or, rather, never be born. As of July 2001, we're at one year, seven months and counting. future projects for vertonen include: CD on the groundfault label possibly a CD on my own label

Now regarding vinyl there is the five record 7" series:

1) Vertonen: Lock up! 1-15 b/w Seizure. Edition of 300, released summer 1994. still available. lock grooves backed with an atmospheric piece. 2) Vertonen: Strip Mining/Camche. Edition of 200, released fall 1994. Out of print. 3) R/B: "two nights." Edition of 200. Original material recorded summer 1994, released summer 1996. Out of print. The only non-Vertonen release in the series. As the booklet says, "Two Nights" was the result of two nights of recording with Reni Tulsi while I was on vacation. Improvised dronish retreats and attacks. Clear bluish vinyl, Japanese rice paper jacket, and the record and booklet were then wrapped in used typewriter ribbon. 4) Vertonen: The Women Men Leave Their Wives For (A Crush of Petunias b/w Dies Irae). Edition of 400, released February 14, 1997. Still available. 5) Vertonen: Heat (Wedding Engine b/w Shake and Two-Die Town). Edition of 300, released April 1, 1997. Still available. The last in the series.

Then there are other 7"ers:

*) Autonotext is scheduled to be a three record series focusing on vocal and text treatments with other audio supplementation. Each record is in an edition of 200 and comes with a booklet and various inserts. The first volume, which features material from Sherman Johnson and myself, was released May 1998.

*) Soundtracks for Locations: Crawl Unit/Vertonen split 7" edition of 303. limited quantities remain. (Crawl Unit: Phase for South River Road in Rain; Vertonen: Wards Island Circulation) Joe and I had discussed a split release for a couple months before deciding on the concept of making recordings for, or deriving recordings from, a specific location. Comes with descriptions of the locales.

*) Coeurl/vertonen tour 7" edition of 133 in hand-screened covers, computer skritch and squeal from coeurl, phasing and feedback from vertonen.

Finally for CD, CIP has released also:

*) Z'EV: an uns momento (life sentense and save what?) I believe Z'EV is one of the most versatile, important, and sadly underrated musicians the U.S. has produced. Known primarily for his innovative percussive work, Z'EV's short-lived (1980-82) uns project combined his interest in sound poetics and voice treatments with dense sonic landscapes; the result was-and still is-challenging, unique and rewarding. This 70 minute CD combines two long-unavailable recordings: Life Sentence, originally released by Subterranean as a retrospective in 1986 in a cassette-only edition of 100, and "Save What?", a document of the final us performance, originally released by Kremlin in 1982 in a cassette-only edition of 50.

*) Crawl Unit: Everyone Gets What They Deserve. Released March 1999. The fourth Crawl Unit CD, which I'm happy to say has been considered by more than a few folks to be one of his finest. drones, field recordings, and other electronic sound all deftly assembled and processed by Joe Colley.

*) Gunshop: The first CD by Chicago's premiere experimental duo. gunshop (Joe Mason and Jason Soliday) create improvised compositions utilising rewired, rebuilt, broken and home-made electronics, including toys,

effect processors and household appliances. The resulting sounds range from sonorous minimal drones to jarring bouts of electronic noise and everything in between. A challenging and enjoyable release in a nice anti-static bag.

Bhreus Kormo: This CD is one of my favorites because it accomplishes two things: presents some fantastic underrepresented and/or new sound artists, and all proceeds are going to the Howard Brown Quality of Life study, the first study to look at the differences between lesbian and heterosexual women with breast cancer. artists include brutum fulmen, irr. app. (ext.), skin crime, seam pith, coeurl, bran.... pos, negative entropy, seafoam, john wiese, vertonen, and josh norton cabal.

*) Nuisance Beacon: the first CD release by the sound artist m.o. cavallari. dense, layered drones and rhythmic pulsing.
CRIPPLED INTELLECT PRODUCTIONS

B. Edwards/C.I.P. Po box 378681, Chicago, illinois, 60637-8681, U.S.A.

vertonen@earthlink.net

http://www.crippledintellectproductions.net/

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