“What we have here is a sublime album which mixes both poles of the Berlin School style”
1 Init Mind I 23:05 2 Init Mind II 23:18 SynthMusik
(CD 46:23) (V.F.) (Vintage and New Berlin School)
I received this INIT MIND at the same time as Electronic Ballad at the end of 2015. And if I remember well, I had been seduced as much at the listening of this 3rd solo album of Fryderyk Jona like with Electronic Ballad. At that time, and it’s always like that anyway, my desk was full, and my PC even more, of albums to be chronicled. Months have spent and one day I listened to this album again. I was blown again! I had to talk about it. But when? And then I receive Warm Sequencing last month. The occasion is thus quite dreamed to speak to you about an album that I would have had to speak to you in 2015. And here is why …
After some seconds of dark ambiences, a sequencer movement launches a lively and fluid line of rhythm with a delicately jerky flow. A wave of bass warms the atmospheres while jingles as well as charming effects of percussions give a little more relief to these crystalline sequences and to a rhythm which shines of beautiful electronic effects. On these hybrid oscillations, the chants of the synth borrow a style of cosmic Funk, a little as Klaus Schulze in his Dreams era. Conjugating the art of the minimalism marvellously, Fryderyk Jona shows talent and control by adding to Init Mind I all the fineries of the EM of the 90’s on a structure which also frees perfumes of the analog era. Pulsations of bass drum, a light permutation in the minimalist approach, short more aerial and especially very good percussive effects are supporting the subtle variances of this first part of this album At times, Fryderyk Jona strips his structure by keeping elements which feed a crescendo that we feel bursting all the time, adding as much depth as suspense to Init Mind I. The awaited explosion won’t come here. It’s rather a rhythm always relatively soft which is rocked by beautiful glittering effects like an astral water and good more pronounced bass pulsations that the Polish synthesist offers to our ears. The synth takes the fineries of a forsaken saxophonist with beautiful solos while quietly the anticipated swiftness takes finally the top, just a little before the finale of Init Mind I where we simply just can't stop to make a link with the The Dark Side of the Moog series. If Init Mind I sways between seduction and indecision, its older brother will leave us no chance!
The onset of Init Mind 2 is also dark, although that some more translucent synth layers sweep its landscape. It’s the beat a bit Groove that gets out of these vapes a little before the 120 seconds which decides between both minimalist figures of INIT MIND. Here, the percussions are also seductive as in the colossal Miditerranean Pads from Klaus Schulze. Electronic bongo drums resound in the 4 corners of our hi-fi room while the bass line shapes a rhythm as slow as a moonwalk with a wavelike motion of which the repeated pulsations lead towards a more accentuated level. In symbiosis with this very hypnotic tempo, the synth lays a wave which vacillates like a flame while delighting our ears of solos which sing as those of a quite shy guitar. This wonderful movement switches off its magic at around the 8 minutes, diving into some meditative moods and hesitations between a revival or the total abandonment to soporific ambiences. At this point the synth layers caress us like the hand of a restless mom. And 3 minutes farther, the rhythm refuses the resignation by making burst percussions on a delicate movement of sequences which is waving like the flame of before. We always float on the wings of those synth solos which are melancholic and melodious. These solos bring us towards a guitar endowed with an acoustic texture and a rhythmic pattern as heavy as sensual where Fryderyk Jona spreads the perfumes of his fantasies. Magical that I tell you! Magic in an album which plunges us into a universe that we have never wanted to leave.
Sylvain Lupari (December 1st, 2016) ****½*
Available at Fryderyk Jona Bandcamp