ORIGAMIBIRO - Collection

It was 2007 when Tom Hill, one half of Wauvenfold – a duo formed alongside Noel Murphy that lasted just long enough to make a name for itself with an album on Wichita – decided to launch a project to channel his multifaceted artistic passions. The result was Origamibiro, a creature of a thousand faces that remained in obscurity for quite some time before transforming, within a few years, into a genuine open-act collective, active on the musical, visual, cinematic and performative fronts. All of this followed an underground path of evolution confined largely within British borders, despite the boost given by the permanent addition of ex-Schmoov! member Andrew Tytherleigh to the lineup.

Shedding light today on the brand's obscure yet fascinating back catalogue is the ever-attentive Denovali who, anticipating as usual the probable release of a new work, has reissued the project's complete output in a splendid box set. Handling and examining "Collection", what strikes you immediately, though it's hardly a surprise, is the incredible care with which the product has been put together: the faded image of a sunset over a desolate countryside introduces the trio of collected works, whose artwork reworks that of the first album, completely overhauling the design compared to the original editions.

Released on Benge's Expanding label in 2007, "Cracked Mirror & Stopped Clocks" is the first offspring of what was still essentially a solo moniker for Tom Hill, a collection of delightful lithographs for acoustic guitar and various samples, set against the autumnal landscape of a bare, faded garden. Something that would have driven Taylor Deupree and his 12k label wild, in a middle ground between Seaworthy and F.S. Blumm, condensed amid the gusts of wind in "Unravelled In Wreathes", the pastoral nostalgia of "Noshi", the minimalist weave of "The Last Of Its Leaves" and "Poised From The Bulb", and the whispers of "No More Counterfeit Bliss" and the gentle "Gathers In Puddles".

Between a falling leaf and a dewdrop, the blend also opens up to more radical solutions, such as the ambient effusions of "Womb Duvet", the warm calls of "Remnants", the woody tangles of the title track, and the gypsy embroidery of "Vitrous Detachment", brushing up against the electroacoustic textures so dear to the Land of the Rising Sun (Illuha, but also the likes of Lycoriscoris and Ametsub). Overall, it's a more than fitting portrait of the project's starting point, ready to set sail toward a decidedly more abstract sonic world a full four years later, on the following "Shakkei", the first recorded testimony of the new multimedia incarnation.

Joining Hill now are Tytherleigh and director and video artist Jim Boxall aka The Joy Of Box, who drag a blend that started out thoroughly earthy, concrete and tied to organic sounds toward a dimension centred on aesthetics and the relationship with image. The lengthy "Impressions Of Footfall" is the masterpiece of the Origamibiro saga, a string-driven symphony that keeps its samples rooted in nature. The acoustic guitar thus loses its undisputed lead role: in the litany of "Sphaera" it's the piano that takes control, while the cello, wind and double bass music-boxes of "Ballerina Platform Shoes" and "Dismantle Piece" lead toward abstract-impro territory, full of dissonance and jagged edges.

In the second half, the sweetness of the early days resurfaces: among the chimes of "Nootaitok" it's expressed in its purest form, before unfolding into the vital joy of the little scene painted in "Quad Time And The Genius Of The Crowd", the serenity of the limpid "Flotsam Drift" and the melancholy of the closing "Brother Of Dusk & Humber", where even the arpeggios of the first album find a way back in. In its original edition, the album came with a visuals film that completed the experience, and its absence here is perhaps the only fault one could find with the remaster operation, which in the end also takes in "Shakkei Remixed", offering a different perspective on the project's second release.

Many names are involved, several of them high-profile: standing out above all are the masters Plaid, who (fittingly) lend a hand on "Impressions Of Footfall", John Burton of Melt Yourself Down (credited as Lebfacturer John on "Quad Time"), the analogue lead feet of the evergreen Isan on "Dusk & Umber", the effervescence of Remote Viewer on a much-loved "Ballerina Platform Shoes", and the folktronic touches of veteran Laurent Girard aka Melodium, again on the splendid "Impressions Of Footfall". Fascinating in both of the different, colourful facets it offers, the Origamibiro project has probably found in Denovali the ideal partner to continue down a path that, for now, is rich with possible ideas and directions – only time will tell which way it goes. From the German label, yet another far-sighted (re)discovery.

N.B. The rating is a composite of those given to "Cracked Mirror & Stopped Clocks" (7.5), "Shakkei" (7.5) and "Shakkei Remixed" (7). The average has been rounded up to 7.5 as an assessment of the reissue operation.

Ride the wave of great music

Add OndaRock to your favorite sources on Google Discover. Don't miss our reviews, milestones and latest news straight in your feed.

Follow on Google

29/01/2014