Reviews:

Finding
the right words to describe "Faces" has proved a
more elusive task than it seemed. My initial encounter with
Stendeck, mediated by an already established inclination toward
such noise/ambient projects as s:cage and Gridlock (incidentally,
Mike Wells is credited with mastering the album), could not
be anything but one of intrigue, and later, admiration. Behind
Stendeck is Swiss artist Alessandro Zampieri, a classically
trained pianist who turned to electronics as a mode of musical
expression, and has since cultivated an enthralling and shamanistic
sound. "Faces" is a sublime journey through mind-bending,
supple synths and ample chords, punctuated by crunchy, ductile
beats. Distinguished by meticulous layering, rich veins of
percussive noise, fat bass saturations and annihilating crescendos,
the album is indicative of an imagination both otherworldly
and tremendous. A difficult style in which to excel, the industrial-ambient
interface Stendeck envisions is as emotionally penetrating
and introspective (just look at the song titles) as it is
epic and exuberant (just... listen).
Although the entire album is riveting, the portion bounded
by three ostensible interlude pieces, "A Perfect Place
to Say Good-Bye" (piano), "She Watched the Corners
of the Roof and Then She Left" (glitch/beats) and "The
Porcelain and the Girl I Dreamt About" (bells/chimes),
contains some of the most engaging music on "Faces."
One after another, these several tracks coalesce into a logical
progression for those in need of soulful resuscitation. "Behind
Waterfalls" opens with a sticky, percolating synthesizer
rhythm, soon subsumed in the background by a melodic helium-trip
groove. Interweaving notes in "The Woman Who Burnt on
Her Bed" offer the sensual paranoia of building flames,
and the heartbreaking "Steal Flowers to Make Drugs"
builds off of aboriginal drones while edging into breakcore
territory. At first muted, a jarring shift makes the off-key
bleeps and rough beats of "Nocturnal Manoeuvres Before
Dawn" that much more effective.
Without question, standouts also inhabit the first and final
portions of the seventeen-track "Faces" in equal
measure. The menacing, falling chords and counter-beats of
"Anywhere Out of This World" mirror the keening
tones and emotional outpouring evident in "All the Things
I Wanted to Tell You But I Didn't" (as the title suggests).
"Like Falling Crystals" is a powerful breaks-rich
hymn to the divine, later countered by the primal atmosphere
of the brief but unnerving "Frames and Teardrops."
Finally, "Faces (Where are You Now?)" erodes away
with a long and melancholy piano outro trailing into cathartic
nothingness. Thus what I experienced in "Faces"
was a transmutation of polarities - joy and terror (fecundity
and desolation, light and dark, etc.) became interchangeable,
and in essence, exhilarating.
Dutton Hauhart [9.5/10] - CONNEXION
BIZARRE
Stendeck
turned a few heads with the release of "can you hear
my call." Comparisons to Gridlock were fairly obvious
and while it was an excellent album there was some concern,
at least in my mind, as to where he would take it next. After
all, another album of more of the same just wouldn't cut the
mustard.
So here we have Stendecks 2nd album. And has there been some
kind of musical progression? By god yes! Stendeck's Faces
is starting to show the individual, well... face, of Stendeck.
And it's a great face indeed. Occasionally you will still
get a taste of Gridlock but it's very clear that he is forging
his own road now, the fat pads and melodies are still there
but the drums, construction and general feel has changed quite
a lot. In fact the whole album has a really positive feel
to it which is something that tends to woefully lack in a
lot of albums in this genre.
Faces is a long album. At 17 tracks you might think that it
might be a little too much to swallow but the whole album
has such a great flow to it that it carries you through with
complete enjoyment and satisfaction. With tracks like the
powerful and melodic "Like falling crystals" and
the excellent organic pad harmonies on "Steal flowers
to make drugs" it's almost easy to forget about the great
gritty rhythms and (if I'm not mistaken) real instruments
such as guitars that fill out this album. But these are merely
details, the important thing is the feel and in this the album
excels. It's a paradoxically both simple and complex album
like a crystal chandelier and conjures up similar imagery
while listening to it with that distorted but clean and patterned
feel that binds the album together.
Faces has pretty much been on repeat on my MP3 player and
has not become boring once. I recommend this to anyone who
loves melodic and gritty IDM.
Igloo
Magazine
A much anticipated release for me. I loved the debut ‘Can
You Hear My Call?’ and was eager to see where Alessandro
Zampieri would take us next. Stendeck has always given us
some long track titles, and this album is no exception. But
the titles do have a personal meaning to the man, that is
plainly evident. ‘Faces’ is another journey into
what you feel is Alessandro’s emotional states and experiences.
It’s utilising life’s experiences that does somehow
set a lot of artists apart from others and Ale really plays
on this with every note, clever IDM sensibilities with emotional
soaring synth lines as always. While Stendeck does have obvious
influences he does create his own drama and unique style.
I can spot a Stendeck track a mile away.
Faces is genuinely more full on than the last album as a whole,
and is a more progressive release in its entirety. Rather
than any track standing out as a whole (as in the debut album),
it is one of those immersive journey’s you must experience
in full.
TY [9/10] - The
Enochian Apocalypse
After the
cool debut-cd “Can you hear my call”, Alessandro
Zampieri aka Stendeck strikes back with this intelligent piece
of electronics entitled “Faces”. Stendeck composes
an ambient form of electronics, which can be linked to bands
like Iszoloscope, Haujobb, Displacer, Gridlock ao. First there’s
a clinical and sterile ambient atmosphere, which next is recovered
with intelligent electronic arrangements. There’s a
little experimental flavor hanging over the songs, but the
sounds remains totally accessible and enjoyable. The down
tempo rhythmic makes it fascinating whole the instrumental
pieces never bore. Stendeck also stands for refinement and
an eye for details, which is perfectly illustrated by the
discrete piano parts on a few songs. The best examples are
the songs “The woman who burnt on her bed” and
especially “Faces (where are you)?” which is the
last song of the album. A few spoken vocal parts could add
a little bonus to the songs although there’s no reason
to complain! A cool surprise from the Swiss border!
(DP:7/8)DP. - Side
Line
Hints
of classical and soundtrack influences infuse Stendeck's newest
album with a subtle beauty.IDM is a tricky genre. Veer too
far towards technical beats and experimental sound manipulations,
and no one except other electronic composers will ever want
to listen to you. Veer too far in the other direction, and
you end up with soothing new age pap. Alessandro Zampieri,
the man behind Stendeck, deftly sidesteps both pitfalls on
his newest album, a masterfully crafted opus that subtly integrates
acoustic instrumentation and cinematic moods with modern glitch
and techno elements. The result is both technically avant-garde
and emotionally affecting. Faces starts softly with "The
Day I Saw You Cry for the First Time." At first, tones
ring against one another like glass, then gradually a cold
beat begins to resonate beneath, and eventually layers of
rich, decadent synth pads fill out the sound in a wash of
melancholy. From that auspicious beginning, the album journeys
from moments of bittersweet acoustic instrumentation to cold
abstraction and everywhere in-between, often within the span
of a single track. "Like Falling Crystals" begins
as futuristic hip-hop, with science fiction synths drifting
over a head-nodding breakbeat, but lovely organic strings
move in toward the track's latter half to soften its hard
edges. "The Woman Who Burnt on Her Bed" employs
deep piano chords for similar purposes, juxtaposing their
mournful harmony with more abrasive rhythm patches, and "Steal
Flower to Make Drugs" starts off with the distorted beats
and breaks of slowed-down power noise, but gives way to majestic
washes of electronic harmony. If there's any flaw to this
material, is that Zampieri seems to have found a bit of a
formula for creating his tracks: start off with noisy down-tempo
and bursts of distortion to hook the IDM purists, then throw
in some gorgeous soundtrack stuff to win everyone else over.
As it's presented though, Faces doesn't feel like a collection
of formulas; instead, it gradually alternates between colder
and more emotive moments, with each shift and return feeling
less like a distinct song than a movement within a larger
whole. While Faces seems especially geared toward fans of
the expressive techno experimentation of artists like Autoclav1.1
and Ginormous, Stendeck's music is exquisitely crafted and
gracefully arranged enough to appeal to anyone with an interest
in electronic music.
Matthew Johnson [4/5] – ReGen
Magazine
Auch
auf dem zweiten Album des Schweizers Alessandro Zampieri geht
es rein instrumental un elektronisch zur Sache. Anders als
auf dem Debüt, in dem zarte und ruhige Sequenzen ein
bisschen roh mit krachtigen Drums verwoben wurden, erscheint
„Faces“ weitaus homogener und durchdachter. Ingesamt
lässt er es auch hier ein bisschen ruhiger angehen, was
der Faszination allerdings keine abbrucht tut, ganz im Gegenteil.
Das Zweitwerk forder geradezu dazu auf, in den Klangsphären
zu versinken und sich den Soundtüfteilen hinzugeben.
Ein echter Ohrenschmaus für Liebhaber von intelligenter
elektronischer Musik!
Julia Beyer – Sonic
Seducer - 06/2007
SONIC
SEDUCER soundcheck June 2007- 2nd place for stendeck
1. Pink Turns Blue "ghost" 8.10
2. stendeck "faces" 7.90
3. Down Below "Sinfony23" 7.35
4. Menticide "N.M.E." 7.25
5. Paradise Lost "In Requiem" 7.20
6. Download "FiXeR" 7.20
7. Pankow "Great Minds Against Themselves" 7.15
8. Samael "Solar Soul" 6.60
9. Xandria "Salomé - The Seventh Veil" 6.50
10. This Et Al "Baby Machine" 6.40
11. Elend "A World in their Screams" 6.35
12. The Deep Eynde "Bad Blood" 6.30
13. Visions of Atlantis "Trinity" 6.05
14. Autumn "My New Time" 6.00
15. Reptyle "Consequence" 5.95
Das
letzte rein instrumentale Album, das mich auf Anhieb dermassen
gefangen genommen hat, war « Golevka » von The
Evpatoria Report. Diese famose CD erschien 1995, was verdeutlicht,
wie selten wirklich gute gesanglose Platten vom Himmel fallen.
Natürlich erscheint „faces“ allein deshalb
das etwas Besonderes, weil das Projekt des Schweizers Alessandro
Zampieri noch weitgehend unbekannt und damit einer echten
Entdeckung gleichzusetzen ist. Andererseits braucht diese
Platte keinerlei Boni. Zampieri zaubert mit ganzen 17 Stücken
eine absolut verzückende elektronische Traumwelt herbei.
„faces“ ist voll mit IDM, wobei damit nicht nur
Intelligent Dance, sondern auch Intelligent Dream Music gemeint
ist. Stendeck arbeitet mit grandiose Flächen, die sich
vorsichtig und filigrane Melodien und vertrackte Rhythmen
winden. Dabei ist der Sound keineswegs immer zurückhaltend.
Immer wieder werden die Beats verzerrt, schwillt das Geschehen
lautstark und impulsiv an, um sich im nächsten Augenblick
wieder sanft zut Ruhe zu setzen „faces“ ist wie
das Meer: mal wild, mal zahm, aber immer faszinierend und
stets Sehnsucht erweckend.
Deckard – Zillo
-June 2007
S’il vient d’un background industriel, le Suisse
Alessandro Zampieri, qui évolue sous le nom de Stendeck,
s’est bien vite affranchi des limites du genre pour
développer une musique solaire et éthérée,
où le moindre élé ment, rythme ou texture,
apparaît d’une grande finesse. Un talent et une
originalité qui ne se démentent pas sur Faces,
son troisième album où Stendeck pousse plus
loin encore ses subtilités de création.
Tel un voyage émotionnel, Faces vous entraînera
ainsi au seuil de la dissolution lumineuse (« Like falling
crystals »), dans une mélancolie pianistique
insurpassable (« A Perfect Place to say Goodbye »),
dans des ambiances cosmiques et mystérieuses («
The Woman who burnt on her Bed ») , ou au travers de
contrées bien plus noires (« le sale et tourmenté
« Steal Flowers to make Drugs ») san qu’aucun
de ces mouvements n’apparaisse jamais impersonnel ou
inféodé à une école. Un monde
à part entières se déroule ainsi, lentement,
sous la main de l’un des musiciens plus inspirés
du moment.
A découvrir d’urgence !
Jean-François Micard – D-SIDE
Il nuovo
atto del progetto italo-svizzero, è un soundtrack di
spessore per un inesistente film. Si preannuncia una pellicola
drammatica e commovente, quella di "Faces": di vellutati
pianti e oscuri tradimenti, di suggestioni zen, di meccanici
massacri da prima pagina, di cupi drammi interiori che sfociano
in agrodolce follia e di disperazione dell'impossibilità
di comunicare ciò che sentiamo ad un altro essere umano.
Come fantasmi in sala d'attesa le immagini viaggiano e si
plasmano durante l'ascolto, colano frenetiche dai neuroni
fino alla retina, escono dalle pupille e si proiettano sull
schermo bianco davanti a noi con tale naturalezza e ispirazione
da lasciare commossi. L'album però ha una doppia forza
che è fondamentale e rende questo tipo di dischi "grandi"
anche ad un ascolto disimpegnato, di sottofondo non si perde
nemmeno un grammo della qualità di questa perla. Emozionalità,
energia, impegno e illusoria semplicità quasi catchy:
prossimamente nel vostro stereo.
Alex Karl - Ritual
Come sto
dicendo già da qualche tempo, la fase di “sterilità”
che stanno attraversando alcuni generi di nicchia (da sempre
ampiamente trattati nelle pagine di Ver Sacrum…) è
davvero preoccupante, e non fa presagire proprio nulla di
buono. Tra questi generi è senz’altro incluso
l’ambient (ma anche la sua variante “oscura”,
identificata dallo stesso termine abbinato al prefisso “dark”…),
che negli ultimi anni ci è stato propinato da una miriade
di band (o forse sarebbe meglio dire di one-man projects?)
senza un minimo di talento e di buone idee, interessate solo
a riproporre la copia esatta di ciò che altri hanno
già fatto molti anni fa. Detto questo potrete capire
come mai guardo con circospezione tutte le nuove release che
vengono in qualche modo associate al tipo di musica a cui
ho appena accennato, ma devo ammettere che l’ultimo
lavoro di Stendeck (alias Alessandro Zampieri, “manipolatore
di suoni” originario di Lugano che ha all’attivo
la pubblicazione del demo A crash into another world e del
cd Can you hear my call?…) mi ha colpito per la sua
complessità e per la cura con la quale è stato
realizzato. I diciassette brani contenuti in Faces si fanno
notare per la loro pienezza e corposità, ma la trama
“disomogenea” che li caratterizza e la loro particolare
struttura (ottenuta grazie all’accostamento di “soundscapes”
ariosi e avvolgenti con basi rhythmic-noise un tantino edulcorate…)
gli conferiscono pure una certa solarità, che personalmente
ho trovato molto gradevole. Non c’è quindi solo
introspezione in questo disco, anzi direi che la giusta chiave
di lettura sta nella comprensione delle emozioni che il suo
autore ha cercato di trasmetterci, sensazioni che hanno sì
avuto origine nella mente di un singolo individuo, ma che
(attraverso i suoni) ogni ascoltatore può interpretare
a piacimento, adattandole alla propria personalità.
Come dicevo si tratta di un album del quale vale la pena notare
ogni singolo dettaglio (concetto applicabile sia alla musica,
sia all’eccellente artwork che lo accompagna…),
che farà la gioia di chi è stufo marcio di ascoltare
materiale dozzinale e deludente (spesso pubblicato anche da
label famose e blasonate!) e pretende decisamente qualcosa
di più…
Grendel - Ver
Sacrum
Ascoltando 'The Woman Who Burnt On Her Bed' e la title
track coloro che amano i Gridlock non potranno che amare la
creatura dello svizzero Alessandro Zampieri. Stendeck nasce
come riflesso di un'elettronica intelligente e mai del tutto
privata della possibilità di muoversi e dilatarsi in
direzioni molteplici. Senza eccessivi condizionamenti l'ambient
a tratti sussurrato di 'Faces' si appropria di battiti down-tempo
per regalarci una personale lettura della relazione tra spazio
e tempo. Un secondo album che non si preoccupa di apparire
troppo lungo estendendo la sua vitalità onirica anche
oltre la mera conclusione dei pezzi previsti. 'Like Falling
Crystals' e 'Steal Flowers To Make Drugs' hanno forse il difetto
di suonare troppo auto-compiacenti ma nel silenzio della vostra
camera, dopo una stressante giornata di lavoro o un lungo
orgasmo di sapere sapranno ammaliarvi. Non so cosa ne pensate
ma tra una tempesta elettrica e l'altra trovo che dischi come
questo siano come una manna dal cielo per il mio stereo.
Divine - Dageisha.com
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