Kyle Bruckmann (oboe, english horn, analog electronics) and Ernst Karel (trumpet, analog electronics) are EKG. Based in Chicago and San Francisco, the duo comfortably straddles the line between acoustic instrumentation and electronic manipulation while maintaining impressive footings in each camp.
no sign is a thoughtful combination of sweeping improvisation and composition tempered by microscopic sonic textural elements. There is a constant balance to be struck between these two and the album seesaws between fleeting moments of uneasy victory for each and those beautiful stretches when the two exist in harmony. Within this largely temporal dichotomy, the wind, brass, and electronics share duties which results in a world where the instruments are as likely to hold longer tones while static and blips scurry around them as a warm and fat electronic drone is to be chased by clipped flurries of notes from one of the horns. Despite the distinct properties of the acoustic and electronic instruments, EKG's use of analog electronics both alone and in reprocessing source acoustics helps bridge and erase any gaps and yields an overarching organic quality.
no sign is organized into seven pieces whose titles are progressively smaller units of time ("Years" down to "Seconds"). However, rather than strictly following an ever-constricting progression, the duo takes a more nuanced approach to the concept of time. It seems that for EKG, there are remarkable structural similarities at each unit of measurement much like there might appear to be subtly mutated reproductions of form in different magnifications of a fractal view. The awareness of these similarities results in a consistency of tone throughout the release even though each piece has its own internal logic and structure.
EKG is capable of a langorous lyricism ("Days") while in other cases this tendency is willfully crushed ("Hours") and ground down into a gritty landscape of fine-grained glass and silt. Open and inviting tones draw the listener in at the same time tenser noisy outbursts work to alienate. Tightly controlled grainy textures splutter to life and dissolve into hovering drones. The sequencing can be jarring (as when the largely open "Days" collides with the claustrophobic "Hours"), but the effect is of an irregular pendulum's swing - a fevered and woozy oscillation through tension and release.
I find the pieces where the majority of movement is fluid more successful and listenable ("Years", "Days") than those that are more hesitating and disruptive ("Months", "Hours"), but that is in large part personal preference rather than any defect in workmanship. Each method and style fits into a larger context and continuum and those willing to ride out the occasional rough patches with the promise of reconciliation just around the corner will find much to like here.
