Pan•American - The River Made No Sound
Mark Nelson returns with another extraordinary exploration of sonic spaces with his new Pan•American record, The River Made No Sound. Eschewing the languid vistas which filled his last record (the brilliant 360 Business / 360 Bypass) for even more minimal structures, The River Made No Sound captures Nelson's investigations of the glitch spaces.
The operative words here are "sparse" and "distance." Working from his home studio, Nelson creates haunting electronic environments which are stylized renditions of natural landscapes. "Plains" revolves around a piano melody, a warm series of chords which float over a bed of crackling static and distant digital clicks. Equal parts warm German-style reverb dub (think Pole) and cold Scandinavian ambience (think the spooky side of the Cold Meat Industry label), "Plains" evokes an empty landscape, scoured by wind and filled with ghosts. "For a Running Dog" captures the heartbeat of the animal, a steady pulse driving the track in very much a Cologne-style groove. Whispering over this constant beat is a tonal atmosphere straight off Nelson's recent 12-inch for BSI Records. There are changes and there are constants; Nelson operates in a realm of memory and motion, looking back and moving forward.
"Settled" is the first track that is fully ensconced in the Pan•American of the past. Built around a location recording of a large space filled with people (a train station maybe, the distant squeal of steel on steel behind the hubbub of moving voices and the flat crack of loudspeaker announcements), Nelson adds a plaintive melody, an underbelly of beat textures and the expansive drone which has become emblematic of his approach to atmospheres. "Red Line" rattles around for awhile, the clatter and snap of metal implements finally falling into place, and the track becomes a fast ride down the minimal techno expressway. "Two-sided" continues that minimal beat feeling -- a calm repetition that would not be out of place on a Thomas Brinkmann record -- but the drift throughout is something out of an Angelo Badalamenti score.
"Place names" is a summation of the history and the intent here: those same drifting tones and melodies, the distant hint of motion beyond the horizon, the tiny articulated click of machinery, static, the resolute reverberation of soft beats. Mark Nelson knows the way to the emotional core of your brain, knows how to reach through your ears and directly touch the synapses in your head. He tugs at your sense of memory, at the dimly remembered places you once visited. He brings landscapes back to you, revitalizes dreams of dust and wind, and makes you ache for the solitude and peace of the long horizon. Pan•American records always make me regret having moved to the city.
Pan•American
Kranky [2002]
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