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| Legends Magazine NEX (Nihil Est eXcellence)-Viz Milieu The French word "milieu" means surroundings or environment. Ukrainian Andrey Kiritchenko's Vilmilieu is a caustic manipulation of his surroundings, a harsh embellishment on his chasteless environment. Another unholy experimentalist in a disturbing underground of vexatious sound tweakers, Kiritchenko operates under the pretense that Nihil est Excellence (or NEX) "processes and plays with environmental sounds revealing the music that these sounds hide within themselves," further stating, "this does not mean it plays with the everyday sounds that usually the listener tends to block out or ignore." However, NEX, though more ambitious and somewhat more effective than others of its ilk, is exactly what the artist name would imply, an excellent demonstration of audio nihilism. Subwoofers beware, Vilmilieu will give it a workout of the damned. Off the bat, Omro Epsle features catatonic hissing and scratching against Kiritchenko's microphone, which takes a severe beating recording various crunches, wrinkles, warps, clangs, pings and an assorted flotsam of noise hidden in the confines of a seriously bitter ambience, normally loud, like rocket thrusters. Omro Epsle has a Blair Witch feel to it that quickly loses novelty as Vilmilieu agonizes onward with its abysmal neuroses. Ole Ma (Revisited) sounds like a classic horror film score in the beginning, then succumbs to a merciless drubbing on the microphone with jangling, smacking and, in an amusing bit, a digital recording that will remind many of those Mattel handheld football games from the eighties. Water Rustle is a ten minute sordid affair that gives the listener exactly what NEX is looking to portray, more of the same warps that rise in a vicious crescendo (a theme recurred throughout the disc), eventually playing on one's nerves as drips and droplets plink and gurgle here and there, leaving for an angry experience, as if Kiritchenko has found a way to upgrade Chinese water torture. To his credit, though, Water Rustle features a notable soothing synth tone and rock out guitar that rewards the listener for putting up with his tripe. Pass Nod, Set Nil and Diora are more grueling tests of the listener's mettle, like a shrink's instrument of punishment, nearly Pavlovian, though only the truly deranged will be frothing. Set Nil has a grinding repetition like a generator that refuses to quit, while Diora features more static and blips overpowered by a hedonistic distortion. Only on Dihedral does a moment of hope come to the listener, as a female voice materializes like a voice of reason in a thoroughly reasonless project. She disappears as fast she arrives, as the listener is suddenly punished for his impudence with ear-splitting shrills, that is undeniably deliberate by Kiritchenko. In other words, his respect for his audience is grossly lacking. The freefalling Amedrs has a plummeting sensation that will guarantee a feeling of taking a nasty trip down a bottomless pit, as the listener begs for death, knowing that the eleven minute terror trip of Uter will prolong his fate. Never mind the welcome synth tone at the four minute mark that is like a comfort for the plunge; it carries on too long and immediately loses substance. Before Kiritchenko has had his final say, he subjects the listener to a thirty-eight second parting shot with Wan Vex (Revisited), a blitz of hyper cuts that has the listener falling to his knees and pointing towards the disc removal button with a whimpering forefinger. However ingenious Kiritchenko's craft is, he, like his peers, are somewhere else than most in terms of his musicianship. It's as if they all collectively were abandoned in their basements and left to fend with their Spooky Sounds records. Where this fascination of sixty-plus minute ordeals of savagery stemmed from, it is creative only in certain aspects, given that there is a coinciding medium to lend itself to. As for full-length, stand alone recordings, they are irresponsible and likely soundtrack candidates for Hell if there ever were. Slayer, move over. |
| Twilight-zone NEX (Nihil Est eXcellence)-Viz Milieu Ukrainian Andrey Kiritchenko introduces his new side-project, centred on researching in low-noise experimentations and soundtrack-ish effects and structures. As if they were locked up in sound environments of abstract films, our senses perceive the infinite variations and inclinations that the artist wishes to follow. An exigent job and made with extreme precision, released with refined intuitions and complex recordings. Capturing sounds with a microphone and then the art of moulding frequencies, motionless at first and then alive and throbbing. Presences, moving in the shadows, wrapped in uneasy stillness, mechanical progressions secretly observed by sensors of a peculiar, hugely microscopic dimension. Organic breezes alternate with synthetic saps in an encounter of impalpable eclecticismes, obstinate virgin frequencies searching for a dynamic spirit, ductile deliriums for incredible sensitive shapes. We fall into oblivion remaining alert, and we go gently astray in the iper-reality. A must-have for lovers the amazing experimentations of Cordell Klier. Unknown echoes intimidated by plaintive metamorphoses... |
| industrial.org NEX (Nihil Est eXcellence)-Viz Milieu It's a strange mood that Nihil est excellence finds themselves in on this interesting release from DTA Records, not all that out of character but a bit closer to the raw oxides of computing engines than their previous efforts. It is a most organic of glitch visitations that is presented here with a steady procession of drone and ambient elements ever circling like an ubiquitous but ethereal shine in the ozonated air, like a massive static potential forever waiting to arc. Instead of a direct perusing of sharp vertical meter clips and millisecond dropouts, the vantage point is from outside the computer, past the door of the machine room and out through the opening of the ventilation vents of this secret Ukraine based facility. The disc trails off after 62 plus minutes but never seems to lag with the most aggressive criticism perhaps that of ocassional inactivity. Microsound is one genre that I feel has a dangerous path to traverse - too sparse and you might as well be buying polystyrene bags filled with air but overly dense and the creation of tension will be seriously diminished. Nihil est Excellence however demonstrate excellent targetting skills out in these badlands as the listener never suffers the impression that they have been deserted by the musicians busy partaking in excessive onanism. No, any quiet time seems intended as but a chance to reflect on what has previously transpired and to allow a shallow breath or two before the next effervescent wave hits. It's an incredibly subtle album for the most part which reminds me of other Ukraine based acts, offering temporal slices of that same animated crystalline other wordliness purveyed by the likes of Alphonse de Montfroyd and his Nexsound siblings. As mentioned previously, "Vizmilieu" is a most organic type of glitch / microsound exploration wrapped with a heady shroud of ambience and drone. Most of the sounds have the ring of heavily processed found sounds, like the optical out of a professional minidisc recorder getting discombobulated by a writhing sea of formulae in a MAX or Csound chain. The resulting components are allowed to twist and bubble until all their energy is spent or the center of gravity shifts so far as to require a shifting of weight. While not at all traditional "glitch", I consider it part of that realm due to the at times intense digital feeling of the sounds here with the artifacts far more important than the long since submerged original sources. It is like some microscopic inspection of that macro and vast where the tiniest imperfections or most miniscule signal leakages are zoned in on and magnified until they take on outlines broad enough to be seen with the naked eye. The erosional forces of whirrs, tines, tings, distant insect buzzes and almost chordal winds grind off the edges from these infintissimal landscapes, creating further intriguing forms from the flowing debris. This is heady stuff and with or without the aid of volume and it has a mass that is hard to shift completely out of your line of sight even if you foolishly chose to do so. Calm to the point of an inaction at times but with enough latent electricity that the your subconcious is still well aware even if your foreground processes are off in la la land. A beautiful and most contemporary exploration that I can heartedly recommend to fans of the Ukraine sound and coldish environmental sounds in general. |
| chaindlk NEX (Nihil Est eXcellence)-Viz Milieu Andrey Kiritchenko is a gifted and rather prolific Ukrainian composer who's put his country back on the map in the experimental electronics field with the activity of his own label Nexsound and, obviously, his releases for appreciated underground labels like Ad Noiseam, Soulworm, Autoplate and, this time, DTA. While releases under his own name delve into the glitch/click'n'cuts sound, Nihil Est Excellence is a weirder, more disturbing creature. "All sound sources recorded with a microphone", but the creepy layout, merging abstract numeric sequences and an underwater larva, gives a more correct idea of what to expect from "Vizmilieu". The expressionistic, non-descriptive use of manipulated field recordings could be loosely associated to Lopez's or Hudak's reasearches, but Kiritchenko's approach is absolutely personal and unique - sound sources are mangled into layers of droning frequencies, soft falls of ashes and echoes, rubbles and scratches. The result is frankly bewildering: these sounds could equally come from a wood, a hospital machinery or a storm of solar winds. Far from being a report of a phenomenon whatsoever, NEX's alien constructions aim to build a world of their own. At times it's like having that larva stuck in your ear, digesting sound before letting it ooze into your eardrum. A strong exercise of discipline and invention; I'm now looking forward to hearing the upcoming collaboration with Francisco Lopez, the meeting of such talents must be no less than fascinating. Review by: Eugenio Maggi |
| noize NEX (Nihil Est eXcellence)-Viz Milieu DTA-Records, die Zweite: Nihil Est Excellence bewegen sich eher auf dem Territorium der Klangskulptur, als auf dem rein musikalischen. Die Vorbilder der Fluxus-Bewegung und Klanginstallationen la John Cage oder Philip Glass sowie die Grenzmusik von Therre Themlitz lassen sich an Struktur und Herangehensweise gleichermaen ablesen. Es werden ausschlielich Naturger€usche verwendet, die ihr natìrliches Klangspektrum selbst entfalten und hierfìr auch die nætige Zeit bekommen. Vizmilieu ist im Grenzbereich zwischen Klangskulptur, Environmental Art und sph€rischer Musik anzusiedeln. Nihil Est Excellence schæpfen jedoch durch eine geschickte Nachbearbeitung der Naturger€usch auch fast das gesamte hærbare Frequenzspektrum aus, was die Platte interessanter und musikalischer macht. |
| Lefantastique NEX (Nihil Est eXcellence)-Viz Milieu Derrière ce nom sibyllin se cache un ukrainien, Andrey Kiritchenko, à la tête d'une discographie ambiant/expérimentale/electronica plus que respectable. Si ça ne vous dit rien non plus, il va falloir boucher cette lacune: voilà un artiste confidentiel dont l'univers est tout bonnement fantastique. Compositions parsemées de sons microscopiques, structures étranges sorties tout droit du néant, tissu d'incidents sonores et rencontres de sons concrets enregistrés au microphone, "Vizmilieu" est en tout état de cause une expérience musicale qui sort de l'ordinaire. Ici, c'est l'irruption de sons incongrus (Cle Ma) qui fait office de rythme, et l'alternance de bruits identifiables mais difficiles à identifier qui retient l'attention (Water Rustle) au sein de compositions millimétrées ("Pass Nod"), voire franchement subtiles ("Dihedral"). Promenade dans un monde flou ou l'environnement sonore est à la fois un magma changeant et une trame linéaire d'accidents et d'irruptions de bruits minuscules, "Vizmilieu" serait signalé comme "curiosité" trois étoiles s'il y avait un guide Michelin de la musique. Vaut le détour, donc. Célia Schneebeli - Août 2003 |
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