Bedroom Breakcore: “With Prison Cell Was Embraced” and “Darkwil Breakmasher”

Two new breakcore/D&B releases have appeared online from a couple of ancient Russian towns; these recordings give voice to an interesting conflict between the weight of history and flippant innovation. The two locations in question are Pskov – almost on the border with Estonia – and Odintsovo, situated on the southern edge of Moscow. Let’s take a look first of all at Pskov, which was first mentioned in chronicles as early as 903. Over subsequent centuries, the town’s location on the edge of Russia and Estonia/Lithuania meant that it was destined to witness a staggering amount of battling and bloodshed. The fortress shown in the image at the top of this post was attacked no less than 25 times over the course of the fifteenth century alone.

Once Peter the Great conquered the region in the 18th century, it was subsumed into Russia. As a result, Pskov may have been saved from borderland melees, but it also lost its importance as a frontier trading place. As a result, it went into rapid decline.

One would think that economic underdevelopment would be a preferable option to constant gunfire, but even it that were so, the two world wars of the twentieth century threw the town back into the heat of battle. Although Pskov was now well inside Russian lands, modern artillery was still able to hurl shells over great distances, hour after hour. As a result, many of the area’s ancient fortresses were destroyed, simply unable to withstand the pounding. To this day, it is generally accepted that Pskov could become a major tourist destination, but an enormous injection of funds is needed in order to restore the older buildings to their former glory.

The city authorities might first tidy up the residents, and then turn to the architecture; first the t-shirts, then the turrets.

Pskov, therefore, is a town associated with wars of attrition and final stands, perhaps most famously in March, 1917, when Nicholas II abdicated the throne here. Standing on the edge of an empire, with political options reduced to zero, surrender was the only choice left. In fact, it was hardly a choice at all; the Czar was backed into a philosophical and physical corner.

And now, from the same location, comes a series of recordings – and related outlooks – from the one-man outfit known as With Prison Cell Was Embraced. That odd moniker is indicative of some equally peculiar phrasing elsewhere, whenever our musician (aka Nikita Tenetko, shown above) tries his hand at English. Wishing to tell the outside world, for example, that he is open to collaboration with other projects, he informs us in (very) large characters on his MySpace page that he is “located to cooperation.”

The state of his English grammar is reflected sartorially, too.

Given this and other examples of his struggles with syntax, the name of this musical project should – it seems – be taken as an expression of isolation. Tenetko has, in other words, been ensconced or “embraced” in/by his domestic “prison cell.” Justification for that interpretation comes from the few sentences in Russian used to contextualize his solo recordings. He speaks of himself in the third person, which only adds to the sense of isolation or distance from a world outside that dungeon. “Due to the fact that society constantly misinterprets his ideas and intentions, he has been forced to remain alone. Locked up in his room. Rarely going to the window, he continues to write strange music in fits and starts. He is always dreaming of moving away…”

Pskov, just as its “incarcerated” resident(s), finds it difficult to remain in step with the twenty-first century. Locals ponder their options at a town meeting; much head-scratching ensues.

Seemingly as a result of these humbling conundrums, of increasingly reduced degrees of agency, Tenetko tries hard to establish a sense of individuality, come what may. “He is one of the few [local musicians?] who always leaves his mark on a given style. He composes grime and hard-techno material, together with rave and breakcore tracks. In each of these genres, Tenetko establishes his own sound. It doesn’t matter whether we’re dealing with minimal house or some kind of crazy darkstep.”

Very (very!) keen to convince us of this wide range of talents, he then reels off a list of other styles within his grasp: “new rave, nu rave, trash electro, emo electronics, breakcore, darkstep, dnb, technoid, grime, hip-hop, schranz, hard techno, techno, minimal, ambient, suicide, utopian, IDM, avantgarde, underground, dirty electro, house, speedcoe, screamo, eat my freedom, dubstep, leftfield hardcore….”

The term “overcompensation” comes to mind.

Tenetko defines his general credo, following that rush of tags and labels, with four key emphases: “Style. Beauty. Underground. Vegetarian.” A peculiar melange of subversion and restraint comes to the fore, a simultaneous passion for destruction and preservation, as if degrees of self-reliance have not yet been established with any real confidence. The three tracks on this new EP give voice to that tension, even in the running order/titles: “Customary Curse” and two versions of “Morning Soon.”

Fatalism goes head to head with anticipation and hope. Nobody emerges a clear winner.

A similar contrast can be heard on another new breakcore/D&B release from the town of Odintsovo, which – as mentioned – is not far from the southern edge of Moscow’s regional territory. Dating back to the fourteenth century, it – like Pskov – is a locale blessed with beautiful architecture.

The city’s equally appealing coat of arms shows a deer – representing purity – that lies with its body facing westwards, but looking with a turned head and arched neck back towards the east. It is sometimes said that the animal’s glance over its shoulder is one of pity, as it looks towards Moscow. And indeed, most promotional materials dedicated to Odintsovo include the railway station shown here, as if the town considers itself blissfully distant from the hustle and hassles of the capital.

This assumption of safety leads to more restrained, if not beatific forms of portraiture. Further from Moscow’s car exhaust, everybody breathes a sigh of relief. Nature is restored, be it Mother or human. Everything grows as it should, including hair.

Our second musician – known simply as Aleksandr, and for the purposes of this EP as “ACM” – often goes by the alternative nickname of Darkwil Breakmasher – which certainly expresses a much higher degree of self-confidence than Tenetko. Maybe here, a little further from big-city crime, but within commuting distance of Moscow’s wealth and workplace, we have a generation that believes it has escaped the bruising wheels of history and any concomitant fatalism? Aleksandr’s nickname would suggest as much, as would the bold and brassy drama of ACM’s recordings, which began to appear in 2006 and have tended to operate in the general areas of breakcore, 8-bit, and D&B.

Recently he announced with much pride that the new EP had come out, “Thunder’s Symphony,” the cover art for which is shown below. On one of his blogs, he proclaimed with evident pride: “Hey y’all! I’ve released my first EP  – on the Russian Whispering Net-Label. These are my first experiments in breakcore and D&B ”

Listeners online were appreciative, too: “This really is a pretty good release! You’ve done a fine job with the drums, and the bass has a fat and juicy sound to it!” And yet, within days of the happy event… Whispering went bankrupt, due to the current financial crisis. “The team at Whispering has run up against money problems. As a result, the label’s activity has ceased. You have the opportunity to donate funds to the label, in order that the team might continue their work…”

Far from cannons and other dangers of the past, a musician in Odintsovo has been threatened by a different kind of damage. In towns where one is surrounded by ancient architecture – and centuries of martial narratives (leading to no permanent resolution) the sense of fatalism or Manichean misery must be great. If enemy guns don’t get you, then the monsters of the marketplace will. Hence, it would seem, the suitability of breakcore, of – quite literally – the hardcore breakage that’s required in order to loosen the shackles of “inevitability.”

Taking the place of yesteryear’s guns, urban sprawl claims the palliative greenery, inch by inch. Leveling ancient churches as they do so, brick, concrete, and asphalt make it easier for the woes of Moscow’s markets to reach your town, too. No wonder Tenetko looks shell-shocked.

Download music and images from this site to your smartphone!

Go to www.cloudtrade.com and look for us under far_from_moscow

Next Page »