Gunther Wüsthoff – Total Digital

Bureau B

A splinter from the original Faust family, Gunther Wüsthoff presents a selection of his solo work as Total Digital via Bureau B. The title is one which the first three tracks encompass superbly in a triptych of machined doodles, pre-fixed by “TransNeptun”, a series far removed from planet Faust as it is humanly possible.

The first, “Anflug”, throws out some lovely ominous tones, perforated in chirping malfunctions that elongate into erratic atonals; the second – “Ankunft” – has its humming beginnings beestung by tight, squidgy blurs, kniving revs and gaseous vents in a terpsichore of intrigue glimpsing towards the devotional attacked by transitory tear-aways. Two sketchy explorations that are more cohesively poured with the conservatory bounce of “Begrüßung”, where a whirr-encrusted mystery gnaws at your senses like a lawless Autechre.

It’s not until “Dragon Walking” that things lean in a more musical direction, and although I liked the challenge of the first three tracks, this is where the album really takes off for me, and one of the longest tracks to boot. A percussively stippled dance sizzling a Conrad Schnitzler-like imbalance that just hammocks in there, mainlines some serious fluidity cross cut in the Steve Reich-like richness of marimba-ribbed repetition. The prefect prescription that shirt-tails straight into the next (and I must say, the most Faust-like) track, “Alien Crosstalk”, a droning piano pinned gasp plunge-pooled into a mauling motorik of slipping lyricals, a concoction that scoops a giddy hypnotic pull.

It’s a flavour-filled explosion you really need more of, a desire that after the darting jazz-like stabs and child-like enthusiasm of “Just Seventeen” is fulfilled in the form of “Symbol Red (Merzwaerts)”‘s piano and vocal interplays in a Dada-esque comedy mashing both Holger Hiller and Heiner Goebbels down a broken scale stairway. Total Digital is sonic sorcery that the Bureau B imprint is continuously prized for.

-Michael Rodham-Heaps-