Icarus

Icarus started off as a drum & bass duo and got carried away with slicing and dicing. Surgically altered beats are still in the operating system of this unit but not in a linear sense. Icarus can’t be described as glitch-y either. They simply have great communication within their partnership. The liner notes refer to "concatenative synthesis” as their methodology. They let loose a series of algorithms to rearrange small bits of a large music library into new forms. This is not a random process but neither is it as comparatively linear as chopping up one break beat to modulate over the course of a song. The three dimensional possibilities of a method of synthesis affecting rhythm, texture and pitch in spontaneous ways are not at all academic here but continually exciting. Over 70 minutes, Icarus have their way with simple sounding notes that turn into mountains of sound and tribal rhythms of non-existent cultures. There is always the sense of a continuing dialogue to break it down as far as possible to reassemble it, especially with the spellbinding 15-minute-plus live pieces "Inf(ae)rence 1 & 2.” This is expert improvisation that still maintains one foot in IDM.