Artwork and tape design by Sam Lubicz (333 Boyz)
Rami Abadir is a sound designer, music producer, and composer born in Cairo, Egypt, now based in Berlin. Over the recent years, he has been creating pieces of abstract, experimental electronic music via collaborative efforts such as 0N4B (ANBA, Aural Electronics) together with Mostafa Onsy, and especially his solo project called AِBADIR. Among his other activities, he also consistently contributes with his inspired writing and musical and cultural knowledge as editor of the music section of the pivotal Ma3azef magazine.
ABADIR already appeared on international labels such as the German Kaer’Uiks, Hush Hush Records from Seattle, and the Italian Yerevan Tapes with courageous expressions of conceptual laptop electronics that dwell with ambient, atonal music as well as heavy-rhythmic, post-club sharp energy. Today, we’re glad to be presenting the latest outing from the Egyptian artist, namely Pause/Stutter/Uh/Repeat, out on Genot Centre in digital and limited C46 cassette edition.
Mastered by Roland Nagy and out tomorrow July 4th, the record represents the 46th entry in the ever-amazing catalog of the Prague-based experimental, album-oriented label, and it’s also accompanied by four different remixes by kindred artists such as Sarah Badr aka FRKTL, the Greek duo Ice_Eyes, sound design champion Fausto Mercier, and the legendary ZULI, each contributing to the 46 minutes on tape with their peculiar styles (respectively free-form manipulation, frenetic hyper-fragmentation, bass-heaviness, and emotive grandeur).
Photo by Bassem El Qassabi
Pause/Stutter/Uh/Repeat, originally submitted as Rami’s graduation project for the MA Digital Media program at the University of Arts in Bremen, Germany, is a canvas for lightweight, cinematic compositions where tension is accumulated and dramatically released in a continuous, exciting process of abstraction and re-contextualization. The actors in the – at times overwhelming, at times docile – pieces are clanging, snapping sounds, and deep kickdrums interacting with aseptic background textures, while the starring role is undoubtedly covered by multiple voice fragments and enunciations that are densely manipulated, arranged, and repurposed as a means to investigating human language and, in particular, the hesitation phenomenon.
“[Filler words] may be considered superfluous to our interactions […]. But, if we listen closely, we’ll find them loaded with deeper layers of meaning […]: hesitation, thrill, discomfort, uncertainty, surprise, shyness, contemplation […]”.
Tapping into recent language studies that link hesitation in everyday spoken language to necessary mechanisms for efficiently conveying messages, Rami’s work transposes the fragmentation of typical semantic exchanges in the form of dismantled, collage-like post-club music which resorts to intense, highly-energetic percussive outbursts and dissonant elements to craft conceptual, meta-meaning sound blurbs. We highly recommend you check out this stunning release via the embedded player below, and also possibly support the artist’s work by buying the tape or the digital edition at this link. What you’d get in exchange is an outstanding, exciting, and – most importantly – fun listening experience, the ultimate result of a stimulating conceptual exercise. Enjoy!
But first, follow ABADIR on SoundCloud and Instagram. Also, check out Genot Centre on Facebook and SoundCloud.
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We are a non-profit organization registered in December 2018, operating since late 2015 as a webzine and media website. In early 2017, we started our own event series focused on arts, experimental, and dancefloor-oriented music. We reject every invocation to “the Future” meant as the signifier for capitalistic “progress” and “innovation”, fully embracing the Present instead; we renounce any reckless and ultimately arbitrary division between “high” and “low”, respectable and not respectable, “mind” and “body”; we support and invite musicians, artists, and performers having diverse backgrounds and expressing themselves via variegated artistic practices.