@c & Vitor Joaquim
De-Tour
Feld 2007

01. Ouvertüre
02. Stuttgart [w/ Fried Dähn]
03. Leipzig Eins
04. Leipzig Zwei
05. Lissabon [w/ Pure]
06. Köln [w/ Harald 'Sack' Ziegler]

If the first excitements about laptop music's novelties are gone already, there are still musicians able to bring challenging perspectives; more mature and rigorous approaches focusing on sound manipulation through varying techniques and their variations. Such is the case of @c, who in (I believe) some six years of existence have matured/evolved just as their competition has become blander and blander... Confident laptop improvisers, they like to play live with other people and record everything to serve as new building blocks for new releases. Their De-Tour - with 'De' for Deutsch - saw them perform in different German cities (along with fellow countryman Vitor Joaquim who joins in Portugal as well, but also other guest musicians), the raw material being subsequently taken for studio post-production, recomposed through digital processing, editing and collage. 'Ouvertüre', apparently the album's only non-tour track, is the most random-sounding of the lot, but as soon as the live thing kicks in, the rhythmic component does too and rides tall in the saddle. Voices are used, basslines are never far away, nor clicks or crackles, while musicality is always kept in sight. More or less related to the Devin Sarno 3-inch for its improvisational genesis, and to Reanimator for the crude and dirty ways. Moreover, it's a highly accomplished piece of work.

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