Holger Hiller

One thing’s clear from the off. Mr Hiller – nothing if not the quintessential Mute artist – is a dab hand at the old Pro Tools (or, if he’s an analogue snob, which I very much doubt, scissors and sellotape).

I’m only teasing. HH knows how to shred sound, but he also knows how to stitch it back together again, applying imaginary soundtrack techniques to the kind of practices first perfected by fellow pioneers such as DAF and Einsturzende Neubauten (there’s even a track entitled ‘Then I Cut It Up Into Little Dream Units’).

In fact, Hiller’s been at the industrial coalface since the early ’70s, studying improvisation with Lilli Friedeman (herself a student of Paul Hindeman), composing video operas, collaborating with performance art collectives, touring Europe and Japan with video installations, getting into electronica and advertising, and presenting workshops at the Vienna Art School. In short, he’s been around the arts block a few times.

In a way, this, the Hamburger’s fifth album, reminds me of how the new skin of Tokyoite technology has been hurriedly grafted onto ramshackle old areas of East Berlin. In other words, pieces like ‘Micki Mouse’ and ‘Once I Met A Snowman’ are kinda Cornelius meets that other Holger (Czukay, from Can) refereed by a cyberpunk scribe such as Neal Stephenson.

Be warned though, the guy’s pop sensibility is zero. This one’s strictly for connoisseurs of noise and students of the pulse.