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dictaphone m.=addiction (city centre offices)

designed by oliver doerell and roger döring, dictaphone is the meeting of two minds who think jazz but practice electronica. having previously written theatre and film scores, doerell and doring here construct - as their label calls it - 'processed electronica slow-motion jazz'. the strangely titled 'm.=addiction' has a restless spirit; showcasing typically crisp cco production-line beats alongside a more adventurous avant-garde edge that is increasingly found on this imprint. hugely melancholic, this record features as much saxophone, clarinet and double-bass as bpm's, giving it that cinematic sound which certainly comes naturally to its creators. two tracks also break free from this misty stranglehold to venture into more familiar areas for electronica fans. 'tempelhof' is ace, where malka spigel intones abstract spoken-word gushes over softly cushioned rhythms while 'la piscine' heavily samples the sound of children playing, a move which would make boards of canada proud. three years in the making, 'm.=addiction' seemingly didn't come easy to doerell and doring. so effortlessly free and imaginative, this is one habit which just makes time slip away.

(8) ­ reviewed by ian fletcher

Moving hands

Dictaphone / m.=addiction

One of the most intriguing albums I´ve heard this year. Dictaphone is, as are many things nowadays, a project. The project features multi-instrumentalist Oliver Doerell and clarinet-/saxophone player Roger Döring. Its beautiful music filled with melancholy and emotion. Its a meeting between old and new, its sounds modern but at the same time Dörings saxophone and clarinet keeps it rooted in the past. Still, like I said, it sounds very modern and could be music for smoky bars in a decadent future signed Philip K Dick.

Its really hard to describe the music but its been called slow motion jazz. I kind of agree on that description, but its not enough. This music is much larger than that. It sometimes reminds of The Legendary Pink Dots and their total defiance towards being labelled. Sometimes it reminds so much of The Legendary Pink Dots that I get surprised when the voice of Edward Ka-Spel never appears. The thing that this Dutch band lacks but Dictaphone doesnt is the feeling that its modern music. Music for our times and times yet to come.

I know that Ive been pretty vague so far and thats because its music you feel more than you listen to. Its very cinematic and ambient with electronic and acoustic instruments perfectly intertwined. Its beautiful music for blue days. Magnus Nilsson

kinda muzik

DICTAPHONE | M.=ADDICTION
CD, City Centre Offices / Lowlands

Dictaphone is being heralded by Wire's Colin Newman as 'timeless, unusual and beautiful'. And while about its timelessness we will not make any comments (way too early for that, we reckon), the attributes "unusual" and "beautiful" cover most of the ground that Brussels-bred Oliver Doerell and his mate Roger Döring are operating on. Most of the tracks are jazzy and cinematic landscapes irregularly perpetrated by glitchy electronica. A comparison with those other Brussels residents Tuxedomoon imposes itself almost immediately, but we found traces of musique concrete and a fascination with sound-building à la Asmus Tietchens is recognizable too. The unusual part of it has to do with the strange build-up that, like in the title song, stretches the build-up so slowly that the climax reaches its apex not before the very end of the track. 'La Piscine' has no structure at all. It meanders calmly through a mix of swimming pool noises and Satie-style piano musings. 'Lügen' combines environmental sounds with a swaying melody that has a definite free-jazz undertone and fades in pure static. 'Sonne Free' does the same with melodica, sax and invasive clicks and cuts. 'Dictaphone', the song, is populated with a dense variety of sounds that seem to emanate from self-made toys and a variety of old music boxes. A voice-sample from a french-spoken movie adds more dreamy disconnections that eventually break down in noisy disturbances, from which emerges a deep new-wave bass that evolves towards electro pop jazz ultra-lite. Many albums would suffer from such a load of references and ideas. But Dictaphone carefully keeps boredom out of the mix. 'Tango Doerell' is another hybrid case in point. This time we have disturbed glitch-tango with harmonica and castanets, paired with a dramatic string section. Far out! The rest of the album calmly verges between the haunting descriptiveness of good soundtrack music and the quiet, almost imperceptible abstractions of the click-tech movement. 'Outside (wird geistvoll gefickt)', for example, may be an intermezzo of under a minute, but even this miniature shows that by making music out of mere shreds of sound Dictaphone have a voice of their own. And it is a voice we @ volgaTowers have taken an instant liking to.

by da volgaBabe

Brainwashed

Dictaphone, "M.=Addiction"
City Centre Offices
As soon as Dictaphone's debut album starts, I'm immediately put into a new world where I am a private detective in a modern neo-noir film. The streets are unfriendly in these times, and I am one of those who protects the innocent, taking cases for low prices or for free sometimes, just keeping the peace. Every good detective has his cross to bear, and Dictaphone is a perfect backbone to the life of a loner who walks a fine line between the light and the dark. M.=Addiction is full of tracks that ooze modern cool, with electronic and live percussion, guitar, keyboards, and live horns. The beats and grooves are jazz flavored, and the music does lean more towards that genre than any other, but to call this music jazz would be to rob it of its multi-dimensional character. Each track is a different person, a different canvas, a different case to be solved. "Tempelhof" is the scorned lover, needy only of answers, walking the lonely streets wondering why the night has cursed her so. The title track is the shot fired in the night, striking an innocent person. Who fired the gun? Who did they intend to hit? The awkward and sudden silence in the middle of the song asks a million questions in one second. It's as though the compositions call out for justice, for the answers to these questions that haunt them. Few tracks have vocals, but those that do carry a little more mystery, a little more depth, that makes the air they travel throuh palpable. Oliver Doerell and Roger Döring have created not just music, but a storybook of emotions and characters that can be accessed just by pressing play on the CD player. It is a fascinating listen, and I look forward to more cases to solve very soon. - Rob Devlin

Boomkat

ALBUM OF THE WEEK!

DICTAPHONE M.= Addiction ( City Centre Offices )
One of those rare times that a demo has caused consternation within our City Centre Offices family was when Dictaphone s compelling and unbeleiveably complete debut album reached us some time earlier on this year. The main player behind the dictaphone name is Oliver Doerell, a multi instrumentalist originally from Brussels who now resides in the musical heartland of Berlin. The last 3 years have been spent working on the Dictaphone project, assisted by the saxophone and clarinette playing Roger Döring. Their past has been spent in similar fields, Oliver has composed numerous scores for theatre work, and Roger has a film soundtrack for "Alaska.de" which was a major box-office hit in Germany. Their first full length work, M.=addiction is a beautifully crafted work that trancends classification with all its throwbacks to Jazz, Electronica and found sound works. Points of reference ranging from the Cinematic Orchestra through to Boards of Canada and down to a deeply unconscious underground aesthetic, the beauty of this album is in its warmth, its accessability and its undeniably microscopic, home-baked construction. One of the loveliest albums that we´ve released to date, retaining a gloriously widescreen cinematic edge, we are immensly happy that this album is finally available to public consumption, warming up the cockles of any who come in its way. Sublime.

IDJ

DICTAPHONE M. = ADDICTION
(CITY CENTRE OFFICES)

The City Centre Offices label is a collaborative project with bases in two of Europe's most musically influential cities - namely, Berlin and Manchester. Their desire to tap into a continent rich in talented and innovative artists - demonstrated a few months back through The Remote Viewer's strong debut showing on these pages, Here I Go Again On My Own - has borne further fruit in Dictaphone; the highly experimental venture of Belgian multi-instrumentalist, Oliver Doerell, and Clarinet/Saxophone exponent Roger Doring. M. = Addiction sees the pair, stand up, introduce themselves, and lay bear their vices: and, whilst the resulting combination of subtle brass and sombre - sometimes sinister - soundscapes, is unlikely to have the tabloids baying for their blood - they are certainly deserving of a few headlines.

Dave Stenton (4/5)