The San Francisco-based label Aural Films celebrates its 300th release this month with a new album from m00m entitled Sun Rise. The label, which specializes in “soundtracks for movies that do not exist,” is helmed by the prolific musician Jack Hertz, who joins fellow electronic experimenter Christian Fiesel to form the duo m00m. While we last heard from the pair in 2018 when they released their Moog-powered self-titled debut, this newest effort soundtracks a story of an “alien race of “Knobutrons” invading the Earth by the power of sound.”
Luckily, Hertz and Fiesel, long-time collaborators who have joined forces across multiple projects, are particularly suited to dealing with an alien threat of this sort. While neither artist is married to a particular style or instrument, both are restless electronic experimenters continually pushing the creative potential of sound into new directions. On their self-titled debut, the two explored the cosmic side of Krautrock, creating a spaced-out ambiance that bubbled with a funky residue of the primordial. On their newest journeys, m00m continue that tact while heading out for the deeper space of unknown galaxies.
While Sun Rise often features the gentle ambiance of pulsing quasars and moon dream drift, Knobutron mind-control lurks behind each padded space patch in the form of shearing tones and menacing bass throb. An occupational hazard of a sort for electronic cosmonauts like Hertz and Friesel, Knobutrons are particularly adept at controlling musicians’ brains through synthesizer dials. Anyone who has gotten lost for a day in the patch bay knows this. However, this pair is up to the task as they channel alien tones into an aural universe of wonder and awe.
