FEATURED CD: Jonas Munk - Pan

[Poisoned Youth]

Here's a little old school electronic music gem from 2012 that's probably not the radar of most.




Review from Writing About Music:

Jonas Munk is a multi-instrumentalist from Fyn, Denmark. He is most well known for his work with Causa Sui and Manual. He has also been involved in a large number of other electronic music collaborations as well. This is his new solo record from 2012 featuring 7 tracks ranging from 2 to 8½ mins in length. Orca starts with an analog synthesizer loop like old Tangerine Dream and slowly other instruments enter in but mostly other keyboards but also some guitar. A spacey one floats in and over and some different percussion sounds start to appear as it builds as well. Cool stuff.

Blue Dawn is a short 2½ min piece where the keyboard has this cool spacey, flangy effect and you hear the sound of birds in the background. This leads into the 8½ min track called Current. It starts off with a bass and guitar line that has the feel of Colour Haze but not sound and then the guitar echoes away in a very cool way and some spacey stuff and then comes back again to repeat the cycle. Jens Aagaard plays tambourine on this track, otherwise all instruments on the record were recorded by Jonas. A very Colour Haze like guitar comes in as the analog synth bubbles float into the soundscape. The guitar section fades away as multiple layers of synths take over as they loop over and over and then an organ solo comes in. The guitar does not go away for good though. Very cool track.

Senses is another short track, around 3½ mins long. Another all synthesizer track like old tangerine dream. Flip the record over now and you start with the short title track, Pan. IT features some beautiful guitar playing. Schelling starts with a like fast clock sound and then another analog drone sound joins the musical medley, as the lead synthesizer space takes the lead and this one has a pretty fast pace. The last track, Sea of Orange the main synth loop is quite slow, while he nicely layers the echoey spacey keyboard over the top. Very spaced out. A very nice record. This first press in on red vinyl in 500 copies.

[walt]

I bought this cd last year but consigned it to the reject pile.I should dig it out and give it another listen.I can only assume it just didn't float my boat,since i'm usually a fan of this kind of stuff,generally speaking.I don't recall specifics of what i didn't like about the music.Maybe i didn't give it a chance to grow on me,but i have so much new stuff that if something doesn't knock me out the first time or compel me to rehear it right away i lose interest and move on to the next item.

[Trane]

From the samples , this has got a Can-gerine Dream quality to it

Fuuuuuck, Greg doesn't have in catalogue

[Steve F.]

I thought this was a pretty fine release.

[FredOCal]

This was right behind Steve Moore's "Light Echoes" as my second favorite release of last year. An atmospheric beauty of an album. "Current" is an interesting heavier piece that has ties to Causa Sui and breaks things up nicely. Anything Jonas Munk is on autobuy for me right now (Causa Sui, Sun River, etc). Each album has a different feel, but you can tell it's his voice.

[skysaw]

I'm with FredOCal on this one. I came to this album via Munk's solo Manual project, which is more dream-rock-oriented. So this was a bit of a surprise although a welcome one at that. Wonderful progressive electronic music. And yeah, "Current" is the standout track in every way.

[spacefreak]

I bought this cd last year but consigned it to the reject pile. I don't recall specifics of what i didn't like about the music.Maybe i didn't give it a chance to grow on me,

It is probably the fact that Munk serves an overplayed formula, with not that much originality I'm afraid. I liked the album but it was not on my preferences for 2012; a rate of 10 on Gnosis. What worked for me with this album to be a keeper, is that apart from the krautish electronic moves, the music had a nod to the heavy rock riffs of The Machine, Causa Sui and Sungrazer. I would have given him another chance if I were you...