Artist : Pole
Album : Steingarten
Label : Scape
Genre : Electronic
Bitrate : 193 kbps avg
Source : CD (LP)
Playtime : 00:45:08 (65.8MB)
Rls date : 2007-03-03
Store date : 2007-03-19
[Track List]
1. Warum 4:57
2. Winkelstreben 5:04
3. Sylvenstein 5:06
4. Sch÷ner Land 3:35
5. MΣdchen 5:38
6. Achterbahn 4:55
7. Dⁿsseldorf 4:26
8. Jungs 7:17
9. Pferd 4:10
The music of Stefan Betke, a.k.a. Pole, is constantly in a
subtle state of flux. His recordings are evidence of his
musicÆs evolution, milestones along an open-ended journey.
But this does not mean PoleÆs albums are provisional or
incomplete; on the contrary, they express a kind of
perfectionism always aimed at reaching an imagined musical
core.
The way Betke strips layer after layer of sound, working
toward a minimalist essence, everything is possible. For
Pole musical reductionism isnÆt repetitive or deterministic.
It involves constant motion around an ideal core, the
smallest possible unit. As a result, all of PoleÆs releases,
despite their differences, are united by a central question:
How can one extract the most intensity from the least amount
of material as possible. Consolidation and purification as
mutually beneficial processes.
It does not make any sense to try to approach Stefan BetkeÆs
music with buzzwords or narrow musical categories. At the
beginning there was, however, an often repeated anecdote,
namely that of a minimalist dub musician who found his style
by chance, if not accident. In 1996, Thomas Fehlmann and
Gudrun Gut gave Betke a Waldorf-4-Pole filter, which had been
damaged in a fall. Betke found it made beautiful static noise
û a kind of crackling -- that became an integral part of his
first series of recordings. The releases were just sequentially
numbered (ô1ö in 1998, ô2ö in 1999, ô3ö in 2000) so no titles
would interfere with peopleÆs interpretation by preconceptions.
The covers only differ in their colour û blue, red, and yellow,
the primary colours of the spectrum from which all other colours
can be mixed û mirroring the fact that for Betke, this series
offered a musical equivalent to the three primary colours, able
to be mixed in infinite combinations. The track titles ôStadtö
(City), ôFremdö (Strange) do not really go a long way toward
explaining the sounds, either. For Pole, titles only serve the
purpose of making it possible to discuss tracks - they do not
constitute any statement about the music. PoleÆs
minimal-electronica and dub remains abstract, but not empty.
From the very beginning Pole has been using a warm, groovy, and
elastic sound, but doesnÆt lose himself in dancefloor
functionality. The music can be heard as sound-architecture,
as well as a story.
Stefan Betke, who was born in Dⁿsseldorf - after a couple of years
in Cologne - now lives in Berlin and works as a DJ, remixer and
studio operator. In 1999, together with Barbara Preisinger, he set
up the label ÿscape. These days heÆs cut back on his DJ-ing to
devote more time to his own music and his production work. But
DJ-ing allowed him to keep on the lookout for new sounds to
incorporate into his own music, too. His sets ranged from dub,
jazz, and minimal music to hip-hop, the latter leaving its mark on
PoleÆs second series of records, which consisted of the two EPs,
ô45/45ö and ô90/90ö, and the album ôPoleö (mute, 2003). For ôPoleö,
Betke abandoned the static noises and, for the first time, worked
with vocals, which were supplied by rapper Fat John from Ohio (US).
Since 2005, Betke has also been working as part of a live trio, with
bass (Zeitblom) and drums (Hanno Leichtmann). After numerous live gigs
with this line-up, a mini-album is planned for 2007, which is set to
update BetkeÆs musical ideas in an even broader format.
But neither hip-hop nor dub were the defining elements in BetkeÆs first
two musical phases. Betke has never been a reggae or hip-hop artist.
His music isnÆt based in a scene or in private experience, but in musical
structures, which he decontextualizes in order to integrate them into his
own personal musical language. In BetkeÆs 2007 release ôsteingartenö there
are no more references holding the music together. Electronics, loops,
minimalism û all of that is there, of course, but now itÆs all operating
in a space all its own. BetkeÆs work, created in a vacuum, independent of
musical trends and clearly defined reference systems, is not predicated on
anything or prefacing anything - itÆs a timeless artistic achievement.
www.pole-music.com
www.myspace.com/poleartist
www.scape-music.de