The expansion of electronic music is a subject too pervasive to bother detailing. Its consequences are much more unpredictable, though, namely its diffusion into the noise underground. Much of those who once upheld psychedelic, harsh noise, and PE scenes alike have pawned their contact mics for sequencers: Ricardo Donoso neglected the frenetic textures of his duo Perispirit in pursuit of Scandinavian trance and Goa sounds on Progress Chance; God Willing's Ren Schofield eradicated his amorphous composing tactics in aspiring to produce the techno-oriented Container; and Amanda Brown, co-owner of Not Not Fun, commenced Silk, a sublabel devoted to the school of vintage disco.
None of these transitions have transpired more smoothly than that of Pete Swanson, ex-member of ambient-noise-hybrid conjurers Yellow Swans. After parting ways with Gabe Saloman, Swanson self-released a series of brief cassettes, containing distortion-fed drone work in a vein very similar to the band that was later pressed onto his Where I Was album mid-2010. His typically tape-level fidelity was enhanced earlier this year on the funnily titled I Don't Rock At All. Now we're here: Swanson's debut for the UK-based Type label, Man With Potential, a beat-propelled jaunt of synth and guitar.
Pete Swanson doesn't present what many would attribute to the principles of these components; the disciplines of structure and chaos overlap, encrusted in dial-tone grit and begrimed rhythmic timbres. His greatest application of synthesis is professed on opener "Misery Beat", where fevered digital gurgles make a carom against a cutthroat pulse. Remnants of Swanson's guitar drone linger over "Far Out", and his sharp feedback loops overhang an enfolded thud throughout the title track. Nonetheless, these forays prompt listening involvement congruent with his prior noise endeavors.
While favoring both noise and dance models so diligently, Man With Potential doesn't transmit the impression of a 180 for Swanson. To reference some of his earliest work with Yellow Swans isn't much of a stretch, either, considering the industrial backdrops located on Bring the Neon War Home and Psychic Secession. Its impact still prevails, possibly exceeding that of those albums, as the marriage of sweltering electronics and foreboding guitar echoes stands a more ingenious strategy, because it refuses to side with any modes already installed as defined genres. It resembles, it occupies faint likenesses, but on no account does it emulate.
[Pete Swanson Discogs]
[Stream/Buy Man With Potential from Type Records]
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