Babylon is Iraq, by Muslimgauze

Babylon is Iraq

by Muslimgauze

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Full Digital Discography

102

releases

Get all 102 Muslimgauze releases available on Bandcamp and save 35%.

Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Hammer & Sickle, No Human Rights For Arabs In Israel (The Remix), Muslimgauze Memorial Mix Part 4, Port Said audio NL, The Remix, Home demo tracks, eye for an eye, Muslimgauze Memorial Mix Part 3, and 94 more. , and , .

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1.	Kaliskinazure _ Momada 15:05	buy track
2.	Kaliskinazure 02:47	buy track
3.	Babylon is Iraq 16:28	buy track
4.	Momada 02:02	buy track

about

Unsurprisingly for a creator as prolific as Muslimgauze’s Bryn Jones was, when he was asked for a contribution for any sort of group project, he would tend to provide more options than necessary. In the case of longtime label Staalplaat’s 1996 compilation Sonderangebot, where Jones would find himself in the company of everyone from Chalemagne Palestine to Reptilicus, the selected track was the characteristically headspinning “Kaliskinazure”, nine minutes of insistent digital percussion bouncing the listener back and forth between samples of wailing women’s voices and a trebly, blurry little whirr that traces the percussion. It’s distinctive enough even among the vast Muslimgauze corpus, but as the continued excavation of DATs Jones submitted to his labels continues, sure enough there’s more to that track’s story, too.

An extended “Kaliskinazure” makes up the second of four tracks on Babylon Is Iraq, although it’s been lost to the mists of time whether an outside editor excised the more drifting, less needling coda that makes up the extra six minutes found here, or whether Jones simply submitted both versions of the track at different times. This more complete version of “Kaliskinazure” is surrounded by shorter tracks, with the opening “Kaliskinazure — Momada” sounding not very much like either track it references (instead being a barely-there wisp of far-away sampled wind instruments and what sounds like treated cymbal sounds) and the title track constantly coming to a full, roiling digital boil. The lengthy “Momada” closes out the album with a different, more tersely internal arrangement surrounding the same percussion pattern that will be familiar to any Sonderangebot fans, although the way the quieter atmosphere transforms the feeling of that rhythm indicates once more than Jones’ way of reconfiguring his pieces over and over was perhaps more purposive and even more effective than he’s sometimes given credit for. The result is a fascinating expansion on one of Muslimgauze’s strongest stand-alone moments, as well as a fitting tribute to an artist who would never give you a track if an album would do.
such strong powers of suggestion.

credits

released May 24, 2020

All Tracks Written, Performed, Mixed By – Muslimgauze. Recorded, Engineer, Mixed By – John Delf. unreleased material.

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about

Muslimgauze Berlin, Germany

Muslimgauze occupied a strange place in the musical world. He was a powerful, prolific innovator, releasing albums that were alternately beautiful and visceral, full of ambient electronics, polyrhythmic drumming and all kinds of voices and sound effects. The recordings earned him a devoted following in underground, experimental and industrial music circles worldwide.

The New York Times 1999 ... more

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