STEFAN SCHNEIDER MONTI - OASY

1. the red red
2. cool yours
3. power of two
4. never quite arrives
5. huff notes
6. abenda blue arm
7. clean my hands

A beautiful concept album from experimental Belgian imprint Objects & Sounds, who call upon genre-bending composer Stefan Schneider Monti to release 'Oasy', a loop-riddled seven-track album complete with synthesized bleeps and drones. As visually striking as it is audibly, with the cassette wrapped in a custom design from artist Zin Taylor. Limited run of total 150 copies!

Notes from the label - 

Circuits reveal a curious syntax on “OASY”, where Stefan Schneider unravels the irregular regularities of machines. Under his intuition, diverging rhythms coalesce under a cohesive cadence.

Synthesized thought-loops emerge from a random access memory, appearing in various forms from jittery blips and rumbling haptics to whirring drones. His approach draws from cities such as Lisbon, Accra, and Osaka, where sonic streams come all at once from unpredictable directions. The polyrhythms coursing throughout this record likewise evoke a flurry of activity, animated and wholly alive.

Rarely following a premeditated course of action, Stefan senses out frequencies by exploring the possibilities and limits of hardware synthesizers. An intentional improvisation underpins his method as a self-taught musician and sound engineer: “Nowadays, it is quite difficult or even obsolete to separate composing, playing, recording, and mixing from one another, as they are all part of a consistent but non-linear process.”

The eight tracks on this record are each units unto themselves, flickering in a self-generated Morse code. Some are laid under an austere fluorescent light, while others are warmly wrapped in a dense tangle of cables and wires serving as conduits. As if we are observing a schematic being deftly drafted, “OASY” reverse engineers speculative machines through sound.

By design, the industrial and incidental become exquisitely intertwined. Stefan magnifies the fractals hidden in mechanical sequences, where disparate patterns find resonant frequencies. Before order cements itself, “OASY” offers a fleeting mind space—a moment to find speculation in perception.

If you like this, why not check out our other offerings from the Objects & Sounds imprint, as well as our new experimental music releases.