MUDDERSTEN
“Karpatklokke”

Henrik Olsson, objects, friction, piezo. Martin Taxt, microtonal tuba, electronics. Håvard Volden, guitar, tape-loop.
Muddersten is a type of mudrock whose original constituents were clays. It looks like hardened mud and, depending upon the circumstances under which it was formed, it may show cracks or fissures, like a sun-baked clay deposit. Fertile clay and fat soil, compressed, dried out and turned into stone. Still delicate flowers will find their way through its cracks and fissures, prosper in its barren ground.
It´s all about hydraulic; the phenomena that liquid is almost impossible to compress. Plants soak up water by their roots and pump it into their expanding cells. The cells are built up mainly on cellulose which won’t break under pressure, nor will the water they contain. Once the pressure from below is too strong the surface will break.
The names of the improvisations on this record are perhaps not all that important; skyggesildre, kjempeløk, stjerneskjerm, blodstorkenebb, strid kråkefot, høstfloks, sibiriris. In the end nothing is really all that well defined anyhow and the circumstances remains unclear. Clay, rock, water, flower, cellulose and photosynthesis. The hardened, the flowing, the persistent and the growing.
Nevertheless, the relentless striving and the drought stillness seems constantly present simultaneously in these sessions. Motion and friction, like wild flowers pushing their way through an unforgiving mudrock.
Water fighting dehydration.