Following his debut vinyl EP Futile Demise, released on Tormenta Electrica in April, comes Gruth’s first limited edition cassette release. An exploration into ritual ambient using neoclassical techniques and ideas taken from modern minimalist classical music, Laments presents a new dimension to Juha Puuperä’s Gruth project. A majestic prologue, ‘Lament I’ opens with a sinister yet beautiful orchestral soundscape before finding its own chord, which repeats as a coda. The piece is composed entirely of violin recordings by Gruth’s regular partner-in-crime KuJo, the mysterious sound designer and violinist from the woods of Helsinki.
‘Lament II’ blends the vibrations of an Orthodox church choir with found-sound recordings from a beach in Guarujá, Brazil. Both the pieces are reminiscent of the contemplative minimalist music of composers the likes of John Tavener, Arvo Pärt or Henryk Górecki. Delivered in a neoclassical fashion, the repeated passages gradually metamorphose into a deviated embodiment. This tape forms a part of Gruth’s nightmare concert concept; an organised event where the audience is invited to sleep for the duration of the night as a careful selection of music is played for the entire duration of the journey
