Label info october 2015:
When rant was courageous in breaking their own musical pattern and instrumentation on land, they even go a step further now on margo flux. It is already almost impossible to tell what kinds of intruments and objects we hear, but nevertheless the two musicians switch their basic instruments on top. Merle Bennett plays guitar on two pieces and Torsten Papenheim plays the drums on folia.
The basic approach to developing and composing the music is still the same as it has always been – it's a collaboration in every way, interlocked in creation and performance. Again new is the approach to recording margo flux. It was a much more open and fragmentary process, developing the music over the time of the recordings. The origin of the album is the work uthlande which came into being in 2013 as a remittance work for the Garagenoper Festival in Berlin and is rant's first scenic work, playing the entire stage with light and sound installation using contact mics, dictaphone and sampler.
rant recorded margo flux in Berlin on their own for the first time. The piano parts where recorded by Oliver Prechtl in Stuttgart. Extremely important for the outstanding sound of the album is the great sound engineering by Nicolas Wiese (Berlin) and the mastering by Alexandr Vatagin (Vienna).
Quotes from international press:
Eine jaulend klagende Gitarre interagiert mit einem verstörend hyperaktiven drum-set in nahezu unverfremdeter Tonlage (gut, zum Ende hin steigert sie sich in ein elektrisch hallendes Jammern hinein) - das ist nicht nur ein "Apercu" im wahrsten WortSinn, sondern auch der Einstieg in die neue Platte des Schlagzeug/Gitarre-Duos Rant (das aber auch Piano, Zither und Minidisc-Recorder verwendet). Das Spektrum reicht hier von industriell stampfender LärmSchleifenMusik ("Impasto" - so schön kann strukturierter Krach sein!) über keineswegs monotone, sondern hochkonzentrierte Exkursionen in die Klangkosmen der Instrumente und mit wohltuender Penetranz ausgekostete Schwingungsanalysen ("Samisdat") bis zum frickelig-organisierten Chaos des knappen "Kassiber" und klingt mit einem Becken-induzierten elektronischen Eissturm aus. Eine großartige Platte, mit der Merle Bennett und Torsten Papenheim einmal mehr ihre "open-mindness" unterstreichen.
Westzeit (Germany)
Auch wenn mittlerweile eine Fülle weiterer Utensilien zum Einsatz gebracht werden: Schlagzeug und Gitarre bilden weiterhin zusammen das Rückgrat des Rant'schen Klangkörpers. Neu ist, dass Drummerin Bennett und Gitarrist Papenheim ihre Stamminstrumente gelegentlich dem/der jeweils Anderen überlassen. Auf Basis seines erfolgreichen Bühnenstücks uthlande (2013) versenkt das Duo gediegenen Kammerpop in der Stille, stapelt Distortionlayers und vollmundige Akkorde, zerteilt den Raum mit 12-Ton-Sägen. Das vierte Album ist variantenreich, bleibt dabei aber in Haltung und Ästhetik konsistent. Abstrakt, aber nicht akademisch. Avantgardistisch, aber ohne Allüren.
freiStil (Austria)
Contrast is a word that describes their music well. In each track they chose for a different sound, although dominated by guitar and percussion. Also the tracks differ a lot in structure. What they have in common is that the music is always stripped down to its essence, and transparently recorded. Each piece breaths a sympathetic simplicity. Their music sounds fresh and engaging, and has a positive, sometimes even childlike, atmosphere.
Vital Weekly (Netherlands)
Dem groovigen Rocking von 'apercu' mit seinem Gitarrendrone folgt das pianistisch getragene 'tympanon' mit perkussiven Verzierungen. Bei 'kassiber' plonken und krabbeln das Piano und die Gitarre plinkplonkig umeinander, 'impasto' ist geschruppter Noise, der mehrfach innehält, aber dann doch weiter tobt. Dem getüpfelten Tamtam von 'folio' sind Cymbal, Klimbim und gleichmäßige Rockgitarrenriffs beigemischt. 'Epitaph' ist dann wieder krabbeldrahtig, und Bennett lässt dazu Schrott vibrieren. Bei 'samisdat' ticktackt gitarristischer Klingklang als schneller Minimal-Puls. Bei 'vestibül' wird zuletzt im Innenklavier gepickt und geharft, dazu kommt wieder gitarristischer und perkussiv bebender Noise auf, der zum Ausklang hin verhallt.
Bad Alchemy (Germany)
Last noted the excellent duo rant – Merle Bennett and Torsten Papenheim – with their 2011 album land, and enjoyed their unusual and highly energetic means of collaborating together with guitar and drums. Even with the occasional misfire it’s clear this duo have found a rich seam of experimentation that allows much in the way of fecund production. Their commitment to innovation is not about aping styles or genres, so there’s none of these tiresome lists of old records which they claim to “dig”. Instead they work hard on margo flux to find new ways of expressing themselves, using a range of percussive and stringed instruments, including guitars, piano, and zither, and clearly thinking hard about their respective approaches, even before the microphones are turned on. Almost every track is different, and it’s almost impossible to classify or pigeon-hole the music…now acoustic, now amplified, abstract noise for five minutes followed by something resembling a version of slowed-down fusion jazz-rock that’s been taken apart like Meccano pieces and reassembled in the wrong order. Their working method this time around was apparently “a much more open and fragmentary process”, and involved realising the music as they were recording it. A dense and satisfying series of statements has resulted, packed with musical information. One of the steps on the way towards margo flux was another project called Uthlande, commissioned by the Garagenoper Festival in Berlin, and comprising a much more ambitious piece of stagecraft; rant used contact mics, dictaphones and samplers as well as their usual guitar and drums set-up, and the finished product appears to be an impressive sound-and-visual installation type thing, judging by available excerpts on Vimeo. The lessons learned from Uthlande have passed into margo flux, and we’re all the richer for it.
The Sound Projector (UK)
