With a catalogue of substance already behind him Matt Atkins, aka Platform, now delivers an absolutely stunning new 20 minute work. Categories of Dust is, simply, an incredibly detailed and atmospheric drone / soundscape work that for me is up there with the very finest releases in the genre. The balance between the chords that drift into the mix along with the crispy, static-laced noises is tense, fraught with drama and, ultimately, incredibly well put together as well as having a delightful subtlety. The flow is clever and almost makes you believe the piece is ebbing away halfway through, but instead it slowly fades back in after what can only be called a natural intermission. Listening to this on headphones is a real feast for the ears - the noisier tones form a wonderful counterpoint to those resonant textures and the whole thing plays out with the perfect arrangement. This is the highest of quality releases and if you're a fan of the micro-sound work of the likes of Richard Chartier or Fourm this is absolutely a must-listen. Limited edition, as always and one of the best releases of the year so far for me. Awesome.
(SmallFish)
We've had a few CDs in by Platform over the last year or two. And here's a brand new one called Categories Of Dust. These are normally pretty limited to 50 ish copies so they don't usually hang around for too long. It's predominantly sound art I guess. This is one 21 minute long track constructed of samples recorded from around his house using a a well sensitive node microphone. You lost yet? These were then processed into the resulting 21 minute long track which I'm listening to at the mo. I'm pretty sure that's a kettle I can hear. I right fancy a brew. Fans of Machinefabriek will lap this up I think. It's a headphone listen for sure with crackles, static and fizzes popping up filling your ears with the kind of awkward sensory delights usually reserved for 8 o' clock (table for two please). There's some nice ambient moments in here and if you like long pieces of music with not much fluctuation in tone or melody then this is for you!!
(Norman's)
Platform’s Matt Atkins further reduces his sound in this latest release, Categories of Dust. Intrinsically a field recording, this piece takes sounds recorded with an ultra sensitive studio microphone, sourced from within and around the artist’s home. Atkins homes in on sonic particulates, visceral clicks and reverberations, disembodied spectral voices and luminous sine waves, engendering an active fabric that is at once hallucinatory and transcendent. Clocking in at some 21 minutes, the piece shifts parameters, undulating between the intense and the expansive, echoing some of the sentiments of Bachelard’s “The Poetics of Space”, and utilising that most personal and private of spaces..the home.. as both instrument and studio. At times there is a generous use of reverb that acts to smear the sounds, creating washy swirls of activity, approaching near-ambience, only to be brought back into sharp focus once again by the slow introduction of domesticity. A worthy recording for a burgeoning new artist whose work is getting stronger with every release. Recommended. BGN.
(White_Line)
Matt Atkins' Platform project turns out to be a busy bee, with a number of releases in a relatively short time span. Not everything was great, but his 'Categories Of Dust' belongs certainly to his more interesting works. One piece, twenty-one minutes, of recordings made around the house with a very sensitive microphone, which were then 'processed, re-processed and layered'. Platform enters here the world of microsound and does that with some style. Crackles, deep drone basis and hiss work fine in this piece, which may have a bit too much reverb here and there, but throughout this piece works along the lines of all the other micro-nists, such as Roel Meelkop and Marc Behrens. Not yet entirely their class, but this is his best effort so far. Sounds flow into eachother and have, certainly towards the end, a nice ambient texture to it. Let's hope this new road will be his main one for the future and that he expands further on it. (FdW)
(Vital Weekly)
Interesting and at points darn unsettling what-the-heck-was-that? minimalism here which was apparently recorded mostly using sounds from the artist's home which made me think two things. Firstly, that's kind of cool and very inventive, and secondly if I heard some of these noises around my home I'd probably want to move out sharpish. Ghostly voices and clicks and unidentifiable sounds float in and around proceedings, and being one long 20 minute-plus track it can get a little oppressive and feels a bit the audio equivalent of that brief time before your eyes open in the morning unsure if you're awake or dreaming. Quite different to the other CD of his reviewed here and not for everyone, but worth checking out if this kind of thing is your bag.
(Collective Zine)
credits
released January 1, 2009
Matthew Atkins - Field recordings and processing
MRMCDR08
MRM is a DIY label for experimental music curated by Matt
Atkins, a London based sound and visual artist whose principle interests are reductionism, chance, repetition and texture. He uses objects, percussion instruments, occasionally a laptop and cassette recorders to create sound collages in both the recorded medium and live....more
supported by 14 fans who also own “Catgories of Dust”
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