'Don't believe the Hyph'

Simon Reynolds doesn’t like Hyph Mngo much.

Should this be a surprise? Well, the url is blissout.blogspot.com . . . isn't there more bliss washing about in Hyph Mngo than in Chainsaw Calligraphy?

Maybe the problem is the still standing in for a video on the YouTube clip that's getting linked to. I mean, check out the visuals on this Wax Doctor clip. Then are those LTJ Bukem sets that always seemed to be orbital shots of some metallic toned planet. Liquid drum’n’bass. Mmm. Liquid . . . like propafol. Plus isn't there a definite Mngo >>> mango >>> Goa >>> trance >>> snooze chain of suggestion going on? [Edit 26 August: for clarity, I'm not suggesting this is intended by JO, but something subconsciously affecting how Simon might hear it.]



Back to the post: the phrase ‘moist’n’milky minimalism’. Is Hyph Mngo really minimalist? Those synths are so saturated and saturating, the snap and kick of the rhythm so thoroughly . . . present. Whether or not the vocal is an enraptured hymning of a certain contemporary philosopher as Dominic Fox wondered ('BADIOU! . . . BADIOU!'), it's still enraptured by/ enamoured of something.

I'm not sure Chainsaw Calligraphy is strickly maximalist either. It’s stripped-down, nuts & bolts. Like (say) The Ramones, it's both maximalist and minimalist, depending on your angle of approach. Compared to close relatives – Talking Heads' uptight jerks and twitches, Patti Smith’s oneiric drifts – The Ramones were chainsaw calligraphers, demented wall-of-sound maximalists. They did end up working with Phil Spector after all. But compared to the prog and glam which preceded them, they were Roundhead iconoclasts, mowing down multinecked virtuosi and art-school peacocks alike. You use chainsaws to cut down trees, tall poppies, and in both 16 Bit and The Ramones there's a vein of purest avant-yob reductionism.

Ultimately, like Grievous Angel, I just don't see the need to choose between 16Bit and JO.* But if I had to, then yes, I would rather dance to Hyph Mngo.

*Just waiting now for this biographical morsel which makes JO the Son of Nuum to break. And the SR interview hopefully.

Recommended Reading

A great diary by David Keenan of his tour as Jandek’s drummer; superb piece on Philip K Dick by k-punk; audacious essay on The Dark Knight as a sequel to I’m Not There at Rouge’s Foam (and more Dark Knight, sort of, at Planomenology). Constant bubble of ideas at Object-Oriented Philosophy. (One very marginal thought in this post made me laugh; reminded me of when Claude Makalele was still at Chelsea and was universally acknowledged to be under-rated. Er...) The blog of fellow Wire contributor Phil Freeman. And Admiral Greyscale’s blog.

Edit: almost forgot, the Impostume on Scarface.

Derek Went Mad

Somewhere in a shoebox at the bottom of cupboard I have a school-age tape of Dance Before the Police Come with – I think – a Blade album on the reverse. It didn't really leave much impression at the time, half of it being that British brand of post-Terror Squad aggro speed rap that already seemed out of date by '93. The other half, the inchoate breakbeat/hardcore stuff just didn't register, I didn't really have any context for it.



Playing the vinyl after a recent charity shop trawl, this track was a minor revelation. The Amen break, the disembodied vocal, the sense of psychological fragility; the singer's defiance undercut by the distracted tone, as if he's not even sure it's his own voice he hears singing. Looking back it connects dots between Burial, Gavin Bryars and the dread-drenched fevers of jungle records to come. It's a real omission from Soul Jazz's Rumble in the Jungle. Its sheer spookiness is only amplified by the video – burning crosses, wang chun exercises, and amphetamine dashes down institutional corridors.