Headphones. You must have headphones. Berlin-based producer Carsten Nicolai, who releases music as Alva.Noto, has assembled an album of tones so pure it would be a shame to sully them with the reflective surfaces of your listening area. There should be as little space as possible between your eardrums and the pulsing diaphragm of the speaker trying (possibly in vain) to translate Transform's pristine sound waves into vibrating pockets of air. If the technology were available, one might consider wiring the bitstream of a CD player directly into the auditory cortex, thereby eliminating the inevitable distortions introduced by irregular vibrations of the eardrum. Alas, such a brilliant invention is unlikely in my lifetime, so let's stick with the headphones.

Like Ryoji Ikeda, whose +/- album is a major influence here, Carsten Nicolai is concerned with the fundamentals of electronic sound production. Sine waves, white noise, clicks, pops and beeps-- that's about all there is to the ten untitled tracks of Transform. Synthesizers could make all these sounds when Brian Eno was a wee lad eyeing the acoustic guitar hanging in the shop window. Music this minimal is like good cooking in that the ingredients are simple and the genius is in the arrangement. Transform is like a hot cup of delicious miso soup.

Nicolai's keen sense of rhythm is the first thing you'll notice about Transform. Track 4 has a particularly propulsive drive, with a thrust of bass static, stop/start buzzing in the upper register, and something approaching a beat coming from the glitches in the midrange. The bass hook that leads into track 6 has something of a pop quality, with a classic ascending/descending motif (just don't hold your breath for a chorus). Nicolai sticks to clear rhythm structures and arranges his glitches in riffs, and memorable patterns abound.

When he's not forcing his battery of microtones to dance the mashed potato, Nicolai delves into icy atmosphere. The tones here are as dry and cold as a drafty apartment with baseboard heat, and not even a hint of reverb colors the individual sounds. The studied aridity of the recording reinforces the need for headphones; hearing even the slightest echo from the back wall would negate what Transform seems to be going for. Track 2 is nothing more than a sine wave in the 400 Hz range that wavers slowly from ear to ear, topped with a cricket-like chorus of static that cuts out occasionally, leaving behind a single lonely beep. Track 9 is one of the few tracks to leave the grid behind, as hesitant, irregular crackles mimic the sound of a frightened animal, and another crystalline drone adds an ominous cast.

While Transform is a solid success on its own terms, the record lacks a certain spark that might push it into greatness. There are no moments of wonder, where you pause and listen closer, straining to understand how something so little could affect you so much. It is possible to achieve the sublime with these limited ingredients (see Ikeda, for one), but Transform is merely good.

-Mark Richard-San, November 26th, 2001