CLARA MONDSHINE

Apart from possibly hearing a track from some of the Innovative Communication label compilations long ago, this artist is a new acquaintance for me. It isn't an all-too-rare female electronic music artist as I wished: Clara Mondshine was one of the three aliases used by Walter Bachauer, "a composer, musicologist, journalist and radio director. He founded the Meta Music Festival in West Berlin which took place between 1974 and 1978. Bachauer passed away in 1989" (Discogs). Memorymetropolis is the second Clara Mondshine album, the others being Luna Africana (1981) and Visions of Audio (1988).

This synthesizer music is much more sharp-sounding -- and, in a way, colder -- than I expected with my fairly good knowledge of the -IC- catalogue. The label founded by Klaus Schulze released albums of Software, Steve Roach, Robert Schröder, Baffo Banfi, Peter Seiler, P'Cock, Mind Over Matter and dozens of others, and formed an essential part of my intensive electronica/New age listening era in the early nineties. Had I listened to this album back then, I probably wouldn't have much enjoyed it, as it's sonically pretty hard and techno-oriented compared to the more spacey and softer music of the label.

All six pieces have a rather outdated, cold and noisy soundscape that makes me think of the early generation computer games. In my opinion the best German references don't necessarily come from the Berlin School. The certain playfulness has something in common with the Düsseldorf-based branch of the 70's Krautrock, bands like Harmonia, NEU! and Cluster. Of the other -IC- artists perhaps Robert Schröder comes closest, but I certainly prefer Schröder's better produced soundscapes. Artists such as Jean Michel Jarre, Jan Hammer and Giorgio Moroder are also worth mentioning for the pulsative grooves, but the overall production of Clara Mondshine misses the sonic finesse of masters like Jarre.

The second track 'High Moon Enters Heaven' would be a decent spacey tune without the restless cymbal crashes that get to my nerves. The repetitive patterns of extremely sharp synth sounds are dominating the title track. I'm not actually charmed by any track, which means that my personal rating has to be only two stars; an interesting contrast with the preceding five-star reviewless rating.

Luna Africana is the first album of Clara Mondshine signed on Klaus Schulze's label "Innovative Communication" (Wahnfried, Software...). With conventional ingredients ever used by Schulze in his kosmsiche synthesised suites, Luna Mondshine draws an imaginative, picturesque spacious adventure through static drones, synth grooves and hypno repetitive abstract pulses. The album starts with textural dark buzzing drone waves. After an haunted-nocturnal introduction, the follow up fails to keep the attention of the listener. It delives floating synth frequences and perpetual drum machine effects. The ambience has a certain charm and can be compared with the synthesized cosmic symphonies of Berlin's electronic pionniers. However It admits more relationships with the lo-fi spacy atmospheric exercices we can hear on Georges Garside, Colin Potter's early tapes. Without surprises, Luna Africana stands as a pleasant musical experience, providing a few sonic magnetic moments. Next to Robert Schröder solo efforts, Clara Mondshine figures Among the best projects published on Innovatice Communication.