Ø - Fermionit / Kulmamomentti
Before his untimely passing in 2017, Mika Vainio had been recording a new album under his pseudonym Ø. Rikke Lundgreen, Mika's girlfriend, reviewed his notes and compiled various tracks into a posthumous album. While undergoing this arduous process, she found two tracks that weren't destined for the album: Fermionit and Kulmamomentti. This release compiles Fermionit and Kulmamomentti into a separate release with help from Jimi Tenor and Timo Kaukolampi.
Have you ever wondered what's inside a microchip? What could be going on inside that CPU? Tiny sparks of electric current flow through transistors to copper wire and back again. Tiny nodes of current illuminate the dark electrical interiors as they spark into life. Countless pioneering musicians are pondering these questions, but none quite as intimately as Tommi Grönlund and Mika Vainio, the brains behind Sähkö Recordings. Sähkö means electricity in Finnish, which is almost too perfect when you listen to the ultra-minimalist productions released by the imprint. It seems to take the industrial sound of Detroit and update it. Gone are the massive machines that built cars and ships; it's now the age of electronics, and with that came a new sound pioneered by the efforts of Ø, otherwise known as Mika Vainio.
Ø's 'Fermionit' Sits alone as A journey through the microscopic landscape of electricity. Ø perfectly demonstrates the binaural ones and zeros that scattered data through a barren plain. The truly uncanny nature of 'Fermionit' is within its cognitive dissonance. Beeps and snaps dance in an unimaginable void, demonstrating Mika's understanding of atomic scale and having such a Crystalline idea of how to sonically bring that understanding to life. 'Fermionit' demonstrates how Sähkö Recordings' ultra minimal sound wasn't so much stylistic but necessary to adequately describe the world the duo was trying to capture with the imprint in musical terms. One of the most treating aspects of Ø is the micro rhythms, which slowly develop the tracks unfurl. Something as simple as analogue feedback becomes the kick of a resident flicker becomes a snare, and minimalist grooves shaped by subtly echoing pinging. Throughout much of Ø's discography, a common theme of isolation mixed with the chilling cold is prevalent. Ø developed these, I see landscapes without needing samples, relying only on creating enough space for you to hear those final reverberant delays trickle into nothing.
While 'Fermionit' Feels connected to our world through its bleak and cold sound, both edits of 'Kulmamomentti' via Jimmy Tenor and Timo Kaukolampi incorporate a much darker and brooding tone. The screeches of distorting sine waves begin Tenor's edit, bringing forward a much more macabre sound to Ø's original style. Tenor and Kaukolampi embrace bone-chilling minimalism but add a cosmic nihilism within their approach. Everything feels cinematic and grander, a great counterpoint to Ø's original style. While these edits are gorgeous in their own right, they further demonstrate that Mika Vainio was one-of-a-kind. He seemed unconcerned with trivial things such as musical structure, actual chords, or whether a song sounded happy or sad. He crafted pure electrical noise into these blank canvases for the listener to impart their meaning onto it. His music feels Bauhaus free of emotional input, relying on the form to create meaning, capturing Sähkö and its purest form. A true pioneer of the minimal genre and an excellent composer whose intelligence and creativity spanned years, influencing so many.
Tracklist:
Fermionit
Kulmamomentti (Jimi Tenor Edit)
Kulmamomentti (Timo Kaumolampi Edit Dub)
Label: Sähkö Recordings (2024)
Ø - Fermionit / Kulmamomentti
