From Amsterdam, Gert-Jan Prins has established himself as one of the central electricians in improvised music in the last three years.
Before this one knew of him as a drummer who could be heard with Johannes Bauer or Luc Houtkamp, among others.
As an electronic music he has appeared with Mats Gustafsson, Misha Mengelberg, Fred van Hove, Lee Renaldo, William Hooker, Thomas Lehn, Peter van Bergen or with the Music In Movement Electronic Orchestra (see GROB 2067).
He uses instruments he has developed himself, that, for example, convert the optical signals of a television into acoustic ones or that form rumbling beats from radio frequencies. One cannot say "his music sounds like A..." Surely it has something from Merzbow, the brutal quality, or from Panasonic, the graininess or the radiating peeping. But that's not quite it, since his sound draws completely from his materials (TV's and radios). So like Prins only Prins can sound.
Live is his third solo recording. The first, one based on composition models, appeared on his own label, X-OR. Sieben, the label project from Frank Dommert (Entenpfuhl, Sonig) and Georg Odijk (A-Musik) published a maxi last year. Live, as the name says, is a live recording, his first recording of this kind.
Live results from improvised tracks that he recorded during performances in 1999 and 2000. It allows us, for the first time, to experience the unique sound aesthetic of Gert-Jan Prins in appropriate, perfectly (en)compassed form. The cover art work is from Frank Dommert.

Gert-Jan Prins (also on GROB2067 and GROB427)

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GROB211 Franz Hautzinger - Gomberg