The Wormhole presents…

 

 

WHO#12 – Marta De Pascalis – Her Core c/w Howlround – Hard Core

Vinyl Split LP, 2 tracks, 37:15. Edition of 200 copies. Recorded live at "A Can of Worms", Iklectik, 29.ix.17 by Ilia Rogatchevski. Cut by Jason Goz at Transition Mastering Studios, London, 30.x.17. Artwork by Stefan Fähler.


VINYL SOLD OUT AT SOURCE
Download the LP from Bandcamp


Track listing:
A: Marta De Pascalis “Her Core”
AA: Howlround “Hard Core”


The shadowy forces behind The Tapeworm are delighted to announce the latest release to come flying out of The Wormhole. On a limited edition split LP two of Europe's foremost exponents of the tape loop go head-to-head, recorded within the hallowed environs of a former Buddhist Monastery – with dramatically un-Zen results.

On one side, Italian composer Marta De Pascalis mixes loops and analogue synthesis to create densely layered collages of glowing melodic shards and growling bass distortion, her hypnotic minimal synth figures warping and whirling around each other before dissolving into entropic oblivion. 'Her Core' is a rusty, sand-blasted slab of heaviness that provides the perfect continuation from her two solo albums – a hall of mirrors collapsing in on itself, over and over.

Meanwhile, Howlround is in full contraction mode on 'Hard Core', heading directly into the murky innards of a quartet of vintage reel to reel machines and using live tape delay to create syncopated rhythmic pulses, crackles and squelches that founder member Robin The Fog describes as 'accidental gabber'. Originally rising to notoriety through sonic portraits of entire buildings, here Howlround dramatically scale down the subject matter to concentrate on mapping out the endless psychedelic dimensions of a circuit board, discovering a whole new world of creative potential in the process.

Both sets were recorded live at London venue Iklectik during the fall of 2017 at "A Can of Worms", an event to celebrate The Tapeworm's 100th release. What's perhaps most remarkable about this LP is that it captures a pair of artists in a snapshot, in parallel. Here, Howlround shakes off the back catalogue, stepping out of the comforting confines of the studio. De Pascalis plays harder than ever before. Both artists taken by a moment, into the harsh glare of the unknown. The fact that each has created their noisiest and most abrasive work yet will surely be seen as a happy coincidence. A can of worms, indeed…

www.martadepascalis.com
www.howlround.co.uk


Reviews

Boomkat (UK):

Tape-head-to-tape-head, Marta De Pascalis and Howlround share this split side of coruscating recordings made in a former Buddhist Monastery for The Tapeworm’s vinyl (and other formats) sister label; The Wormhole.

The results are, as they describe them, “dramatically un-Zen”. Up top on Her Core, Italian artist Marta De Pascalis coaxes her tape loops into a swelling tempest of white hot harmonic anguish and guttural bass waves, sustaining and stressing the intensity ’til the thing burns itself out like the condemned final eon of a celestial object.

After that lushly exfoliating experience, Howlround’s side offers an excellent contrast, using four slightly battered Uher tape recorders and two loops to pinch the soundfield and get right up yer nasal cavity for a properly hypnotic blowhole buzz which soon enough expectorates a flood of spectral ectoplasm and wretched pulsating noise.

 

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