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alm 69
ragle gumm
"2nd"
7 december 2010

photography : delphine ancelle-b.

ragle gumm is a total mystery, even for us. we got this submission one day with absolutely no details about it, just an e-mail address to contact the artist... the only thing we know is that another work should be released sooner or later on elsie and jack. "2nd" is a very strong piece, full of processed voices, surprises and breaks . you can feel the industrial electricity when you listen to this piece! be curious!!!

tracklisting :
1. 2nd

reviews :

Norman Records
Ok, here's what Taalem are saying about Ragle Gumm...'Ragle Gumm is a total mystery, even for us. we got this submission one day with absolutely no details about it, just an e-mail address to contact the artist... the only thing we know is that another work should be released sooner or later on Elsie and Jack.' So, this is some genuine mystery shit. I feel like Scooby Doo right about now... to the Mystery Mobile! I'm gonna make the assumption that this is the second release from said mystery artist and I'm also going to assume that said artist owns a computer and loads of effects pedals and that. Yes, tonight Matthew Ragle Gumm is gonna kick it ambient drone style for y'all. But this is no ordinary drone and, to an extent, it ain't that ambient either. It begins serenely enough with a sweeping of ambiance but soon evolves into a disorienting clash of found sound and twisted vocal manipulation, not to the degree that it oppresses the listener but enough to suggest evolution and change within the composition... something I'm a big fan of. So yeah, this is an ambient drone recording where things actually happen. Ace. This one is also twenty minutes long and is contained within a 3" CD which is then contained within a 3" case branded with a white sticker that tells you stuff you need to know. (Business Lady)

Vital Weekly
Now that Drone records stopped releasing 7" records, there is only one long standing drone label left to follow, and that's Taalem, who reach now their 70th release with these new three releases. [...]
Ragle Gumm is a total mystery, even for us, so says Taalem. He (she?) send a work out of the blue and otherwise it seems there is a work from him coming on Elsie & Jack. Apparently this work is full of voices, by claim of Taalem, which I must admit I don't hear, but its an interesting piece of music. Obviously the majority of is drone based, but Gumm throws in some sampled rhythm patches, which he chops up for good measure. That adds a curious feel to the piece, like high voltage electrical charges being sparked off. Sometimes the piece is on the verge of collapse, but it never really does, fortunately. The drones presented here are in a much more upright fashion, direct in your face and as such quite nice. Who is Ragle Gumm then? [...] (FdW)

Textura
taâlem's latest releases, which brings the label's total up to seventy, share many things in common. The three-inch format, of course, is common to all, but each release also features a single ambient drone-styled work of approximately twenty-minute duration. There are clear differences between them, however. Perhaps the optimal listening sequence is to precede the disturbing Ragle Gumm release with the less harrowing one by Encomiast and then conclude the session by basking in the serenity of Mark Bradley's. [...]
Radically different in character from Malpais is Ragle Gumm's 2nd where streams of processed voices—phantom choral and a guttural croak, for starters—and industrial churn are violently destabilized by jarring ruptures, every one of which feels like a seething electroshock charge. After Gumm dials down the initial dark ambient intensity, another electrical blast appears, setting one's nerves on edge all over again. The piece twists and turns throughout its twenty-minute duration, and the listener is kept on pins and needles never knowing which part of the site—relaxation lounge or torture chamber—the piece will visit next (if the piece is a mystery, so too is the creator responsible for it, as taâlem received the submission with no accompanying details about the artist involved except for an e-mail address). If Malpais is relatively becalmed and soothing, 2nd is nightmarish and unsettling. Think Coil more than Eno in this case. [...]

Obsküre Magazine
Après une interruption de quelques mois, Taâlem reprend ses activités avec, comme à l'accoutumée, trois nouveaux mini-CD explorant les facettes les plus inventives du drone et de l'ambient. [...] On ne sait en revanche rien de Ragle Gumm, si ce n'est qu'il(s) tire(nt) leur nom d'un roman de Philip K. Dick, ce qui est en soi une preuve de bon goût suffisante, et que devrait prochainement sortir un autre disque chez Elsie And Jack. Adepte des ambiances plombées de la musique post-industrielle la plus sombre, Ragle Gumm fait de 2nd un périple aux frontières du dark ambient, où des chocs sourds et des voix d'outre-tombe imposent un sentiment permanent de menace. Impressionnant ! [...] 80% (Jean-Fränçois Micard)