Search - Thomas Koner :: Daikan

Serious Minimalism

aberration15 | Greensboro, NC | 07/02/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Don't let the phrase "CD-single" in the listing fool you, Daikan has only one track, but said track is 55 minutes long. Definitely not for those without patience, Daikan proceeds along standard ambient lines--starting very slowly, with only faint rumbles in the background, slowly building until said rumblings reach their peak, wafting in and out of the left & right channels (effect accentuated by headphones), then dying back down again until the last quiet tones rumble off into the distance. Listening to this CD is akin to sitting on a screen porch, hearing a thunderstorm as it rolls in from distant places, has its say, and then proceeds onward towards its next port of call."

Not his best, but not bad at all

W. G. Hardy | 05/08/2002

(4 out of 5 stars)

"I ordered this as soon as I saw that it was available, but then I'm probably a bit sad like that. I have all the albums released by Thomas Koner (not so keen on the techno Porter Ricks stuff that he does though).I felt after a few listens, that this was a retrograde step towards the icy minimalism of the first 2 albums. The last couple of releases (Nuuk and Kaamos) were a little more involving, and a little more developed. I initially felt a little disappointed at this release as I had been expecting this development to continue. However I feel that the material in this album is ground he has covered before.
One other criticism is that the whole album is archived as a single track, and yet there are definite breaks in the flow. It would perhaps have been preferable to break this into 'tracks', although the intention may very well have been to listen to this in it's entirety.Taken for what it is, if you enjoy Thomas Koner, then you'll enjoy this. If you don't, then you wont. I'll take it off the shelf to listen to every so often, but when I want to listen to something by Thomas Koner, chances are that I'll reach for one of the other albums first."

DAIKAN : The Big Chill

yipyipcoyote | 04/10/2002

(3 out of 5 stars)

"This is Thomas Köner's 6th solo cd, and a very difficult one to rate - an hour-long piece recorded live at an art festival. No worries about audience noise though - the background is as black and still as the cover itself. It is classic Köner : beautiful clouds of minimal, reverberated, highly processed gong tones spreading and shifting slowly. But don't expect any surprises, there are no sounds on here that you haven't heard on 'Teimo' or 'Aubrite'. His persistence is unquestionably admirable, but one wonders how many more releases he can continue to produce in this mode. How about adding other concrete sound sources or field recordings next time, sir?"