Controlled Risk

WRWTFWW Records presents the official reissue of Controlled Risk, the Swiss electronic jazz and experimental computer music album by Bruno Spoerri and Reto Weber.

Originally released by Konnex Records in 1988, the album was recorded live to two-track at Powerplay Studios in Maur, Switzerland, on April 20 and 21, 1988. It catches Spoerri on saxophone, synthesizer and Synthophone opposite Weber’s arsenal of percussion, with virtually no safety net between action and tape.

Hand-played rhythms collide with digital processes, saxophone mutates into electronic signal, and acoustic gestures trigger strange synthetic responses. “Das Stück mit der Maus” salutes computer-music pioneer Laurie Spiegel and the possibilities of controlling music with a computer mouse; elsewhere, on “Drum Song,” “Berimbau Electrico” and the title track, it can become difficult to tell where Weber ends and Spoerri’s electronics begin.

This is physical, funny, raw, hyper-alert music, with technology treated as an improvising instrument. Controlled Risk is an adventurous, joyful and seriously strange document from two musicians exploring the sparks produced when humans and machines are allowed to play together.