Polwechsel, Polwechsel (CD)

I'm a huge fan of the Polwechsel/Fennesz collaboration Wrapped Islands, from 2002. That album reflects a maturity of Polwechsel's ideas that was only beginning to show through on their debut. Originally released in 1995 (though I have the hatArt reissue), Polwechsel clearly displays the group's careful, pointillistic palette and slowly-evolving approach to their pieces. Some of the characteristic whining and floating sounds that now seem so canonically Austrian were not yet fully developed, and the influence of similar thinkers like AMM, Voice Crack, and Hugh Davies was far more manifest. It's a promising debut, from a group that more than delivered on this initial promise.