bip-hop

ANDREW DUKE : sprung
(Bleep 12)

BiP_HOp is proud to unveil Sprung, the first album by Andrew Duke outside of his full lengths released on Cognition Audioworks. Sprung kicks off with “Hell Yeah!” which moves into almost-‘80s-ish electro-beats that never pick up an ‘80s riff. There’s a subtext of sadomasochism here--you can see the ice cream, but you can’t have it. Dive next into the subtle and microbic “Pharmakoi”, before blossoming with the deviant throbs of “Crablike”, which has actually invoked a physical reaction at higher volumes. Duke’s digital manipulations are involved and complex. “Chromosome 20”, for instance, projects a well-articulated pop-scale (as in a “click” or a “pop”) over a Lustmord-ish synth howl. It’s like being up in the Arctic in that movie The Thing, but instead of one wolf running from the helicopter there are thousands and all you can hear are the ice crystals cracking. It’s mind altering. There are some sorts of sounds, like those currently found in minimal electronic music and within the microsound genre, that are designed to warp the neurochemicals in the head into configurations not intended by the manufacturer. Indeed, the whole album gives the impression of the emergence of life with the change in seasons, where the microbes, insects, and slugs are the first to awaken. Some of the soundscapes seem to emulate the sounds of smaller animals and birds rustling through budding growth. “Knot Rocket” sounds like a group of frogs throwing a party at a pond. The amphibians are out! The heavy and muscular “Ut Ut” closes Sprung and signifies the awakening of the bears from hibernation, lumbering about en masse. Sprung is organic, wet sounding techno that skitters along a range of frequencies, from scurrying subtleties to low pulsing rumbles, each brushing different areas of the sonic spectrum.


how to order
press review (pdf)

tracks	realaudio
	32kb
1) hell yeah
2) pharmakoi
3) crablike
4) chromosome 20
5) felt nh
6) inbox
7) rsvp
8) knot rocket
9) siamese
10) shark circles
11) ut ut

Andrew Duke is one of Canada’s foremost techno/new electronic music sound-assemblers. He has been performing live and recording his own music since 1987. His output has been compared to that of a wide range of artists--Autechre, Thomas Brinkmann, Kit Clayton, Coil, Richie Hawtin, Oval, Senking, Techno Animal, Skinny Puppy, Mika Vainio, Reinhard Voigt, Wish Mountain, and Zoviet France to name a few—yet always presents a unique and distinct “Andrew Duke sound”.

In addition to music performance and production, Andrew Duke is one of the leading international online/radio show hosts for cutting edge electronic music. His show, Andrew Duke’s In The Mix—at one point syndicated to over 5 million listeners worldwide each week--airs live on Halifax’s campus/community station CKDU and places Canada squarely on the map as a hotbed of innovation.

Cognition Audioworks was formed in 1990 by Andrew Duke to release electronic and experimental music; Duke had previously operated the now-defunct Incognito Musique and Digitalis Recordings from 1987-1990. Cognition Audioworks' online home is the Cognition site (techno.ca/cognition); Cognition was included in The Wire magazine’s listing of 100 essential websites (UK; October 2000 issue).

forthcoming releases: Consumer Versus User (Phthalo, USA), Physical and Mental Health (Folding Cassettes/( ) Dial, USA), Second Opinion: Physical and Mental Health Revisited (label TBC), More Destructive Than Organized (Bake/Staalplaat, The Netherlands), Highest Common Denominator (Piehead, Canada), plus material on Sampler 2 (souRce research, UK), 45 Seconds of:(Simballrecs, USA), BiP_HOp Generation v.5 (BiP_HOp, France), Installment 5 (Masstransfer, USA), Lambda (Megahertz, Germany), and a yet-to-be-titled compilation (pHinnMilk, Finland); also, collaborations with Mike Donovan (( )Dial, Folding Cassettes, Plug Research, ~scape) and Nicole Elmer aka Neutral (Ant-zen, Hymen, Mad Monkey, Planet Mu).

DISCOGRAPHY (selected):

released on Cognition Audioworks: Sit/Stand: Live Humidity (2001), “09X90” EP (2001), “Erosion” EP (2000), “Orchestral Suite for 707, 727, & Strings” EP (1996), Ginga (1996), Numeric (1995), “RZ Tracks” EP (1995), “Schotoma” EP (1994), Ashes And Ceremony (1994), Drowning
In Oxygen (1993), and Communion (1993).

compilation appearances: Integral Components (Component, USA, 2001), Looping Spork Part 1 (Tuningspork, USA, 2001), NSCAD 2001 (NSCAD, Canada, 2001), Nightwaves Volume 1 (Eleven Wave, Canada, 2000), East (Impulse To Injury, Canada, 1999), Digital Sects Volume 2 (Matrix,
USA, 1996), plus projects released on Surreal Sound (Belgium & The Netherlands, 1995), Enlightenment(UK, 1994), and Cognition Audioworks (Canada, 1993 and 1990).
online: material appears on Tiln (tiln.net, a site which features artists such as Kim Cascone, Richard Chartier, Duul Drv, eM, Pimmon, and others), Reactor Recording (reactor-recording.com), NewMusicCanada.com, and Cognition (techno.ca/cognition)

soundtracks: works have been recorded for and used in theatre and film, as well as in radio advertisements

remixes: a wide variety--both sanctioned and not-so-legitimate--from 1984 to the present

CONTACT

Andrew Duke
1096 Queen St #123
Halifax NS Canada B3H 2R9

andrewduke@cognitionaudioworks.com
http://cognitionaudioworks.com