Pete Swanson & Rene Hl., Waiting for the Ladies split LP (side A)

Pete Swanson and Rene Hell released this split LP, with each artist filling a side, in 2010, though I have a later pressing from 2012 — from what I can tell they preserved the original packaging design of Waiting for the Ladies.  2010 marks a transitional point for Swanson, who fills side A with one continuous piece.  Yellow Swans had ended in 2008, but his more overtly dance-oriented style had not taken hold.  His piece "Self Help" begins with a noisy and dense section including buried vocals that would fit on a Yellow Swans album.  The piece takes a sharp turn somewhere before its mid-point, and becomes a lot sparser.  The modular analog synthesizer origins of the sounds grow more obvious, as the piece now uses a less dense and less distorted palette.  At times, the sounds have propulsive and rhythmic qualities that hint at the direction Swanson would explore.  Rene Hell's work on side B is split between three tracks that all utilize a similar concept and palette.  There's no clear evolution within or between the pieces.  The analog oscillator tones here are almost pretty, though a rough signal path along the way introduces a tiny bit of harshness.  There are also often sputtering clicking rhythms that move against the tones, creating an odd electronic polyrhyhtm.  The smeary cover image is printed on nice reverse-stock paper, with some digital design elements that don't neatly mesh with the retro-analog content of the music.