04/11/2024
Great review by Frans de Waard in Vital Weekly, about 'All These Moments Will Be Lost' by Ontzieling (aka Michael Paap).
"If you have been reading my reviews religiously (and there’s no reason for not doing so), you know I am a sucker for music with a dystopian character. Sometimes, it’s because I believe to hear this in the music, and sometimes because the musician or label latches this word on the music. Of course, it’s one of those catch-all phrases, and what I hear doesn’t mean something you hear. For me, it’s not just about a darker tone, which can easily be captured with an even more vague dark ambient. Still, it’s also about a certain graininess in the music, coupled with field recordings of abandoned industrial parks, faulty electric wiring and nuclear facilities. None of this is present in the music of Michael Paap, from Rotterdam, going by the name Ontzieling, ‘denouement’ in English, and with the coming All Souls Day, right on time. He uses a Eurorack modular synthesizer, and each of the four pieces is “an unfiltered glimpse into a moment, a live creation captured in one continuous take”. And while there may be no field recordings present in the recordings, there is a graininess in the music that makes this very dystopian. And what’s more, in the rusty pipes of Ontzieling, there is still room for the faint trace of melody, the dying breath of civilization perhaps, best exemplified in the opening piece ‘Tonder Zon’. But don’t let this melodic touch deceive you; it’s a small component in the soundtrack of urban mystery – Rotterdam, perhaps? I am curious to know how he feels about the state of his home turf, with quite a few explosions in recent times. Darkly meandering about this is some great, maybe some grey stuff. It is a great record, with only one downside: at 20 minutes, this is also a concise record. Why not 40? Why not a CD of 50 minutes? I was into this and it was over, and I went back in, and then again. Something powerful, and I would love to learn more about his music."
🔗 vitalweekly.net
🔗 escrec.bandcamp.com