urlaub auf balkonien
written and produced by martin juhls
whether it′s marsen jules composing beautiful orchestral-ambient music using carefully sampled fragments of sound or krill.minima creating warm, exotic soundscapes from novel combinations of ambient, electronica, and dub, martin juhls is the german artist behind these well known aliases and the inviting, poignant, and atmospheric sounds. "urlaub auf balkonien" is martin′s most recent netlabel release using his moniker krill.minima and is his second virtual album on thinner under this guise.it was four years ago that krill.minima made his debut netlabel appearance with the thinner release "zwischen zwei und einer sekunde" surprising listeners and reviewers alike with its personal and inimitable experimental concoction of ambient and dub influences. appropriately subtitled "exotic warm ambient dub", the album opened up a whole new corridor of sound for those listeners who savored more experimental/unusual variations of electronic music. other virtual albums by krill.minima appear on the stadtgruen and misamah netlabels along with physical releases on the genesungswerk and microcosm music labels not to mention numerous remixes and compilation appearances on various labels.
with "urlaub auf balkonien", krill.minima presents nine pensive songs of laidback, ambient-dub in its most refined form rich in elegiac melodies, reverbed chords, glassy pads, relaxed bass lines, warm vinyl hiss, and ever so gentle beats. in germany, "urlaub auf balkonien" is an idiom that alludes to spending one′s summer holidays at home, and the album is thematically centered around taking pleasure in relaxed german summer days. however, "urlaub auf balkonien" goes beyond locale and ethos, having a more universal relevance, reflecting in sound a varied, introspective, and sensual array of summer moods, feelings, and images. as you listen to these songs, a layer of melancholic ambiance is evident. drifting in and out, this melancholy is emblematic of the depression that arises as summer nears and the mind seeks respite from the dull routine of daily life. but embedded even deeper into the fabric of the songs is a more prevalent atmosphere of contentment. a holiday mood effortlessly manifests itself as the relaxed sounds redirect the mind away from the mundane to thoughts of carefree, warm days and balmy evenings.
text written by larry johnson
reviews
tokafi | germany | 10/2007
Martin Juhls cites the cream of the crop of the academical and independent experimental scene as influences for his anything-but-ordinary ambient project krill.minima, but most of them have probably been godfathers merely in motivational and technical terms rather than being a blueprint: More emotional than Stockhausen, too mellow and dreamy for Sonic Youth, not deconstructive and dadaesque enough to bear any similarities to either Einstürzende Neubauten or their figurehead Blixa Bargeld, krill.minima is simply too personal and idiosyncratic to be a pastiche. And yet it is obvious that Juhls aspires to much more than just following in the footsteps of Pole and the clicks n cuts scene. One of the names dropped in relation to him has been Erik Satie, which suddenly makes a lot of sense when spinning the first track of his current full-length „Urlaub auf Balkonien“: „Sommerdellen“. While atmospherics made up of ever-so-gentle bubblings and waves of hiss create an abstractly figurative morphic field, the right hand playing the dream piano juggles two notes in hypnotic slow motion as the right one squirts blobs of shimmering irredescence on the screen of the third eye. As could be expected with thinner, dub plays an important role, magic echoes setting up the tent under which crackling fires of scratches and dots, as well as sinister and silent drone threads rise to the sky like incense. Just like it is never 100% clear whether the music resides in major or minor key territory, its mood mysteriously sways between intimacy and estrangement without ever straying from its hermetically sealed path. As the album progresses, tracks get longer, more self-reflective and increasingly deep and dense, immersing the listener completely: Jules may build his pieces from sparse source material, but he weaves the individual elements tightly together in fascinating moodscapes. „Strandpalast“, the pre-finale, is a magnificent fluffy vision of a day at the beach from the little cosmos of one′s small balcony – the album as a whole an aural holiday which promises just as much relaxation as two weeks on a lonely island.click here for more reviews
