$32.00
In stock
Gen Ken Montgomery, a New York-based visual artist and sound composer, is absolutely genuine; he has no training in traditional music or art. He was never a follower of any direction or school. Instead he founded his own school of off-beat DIY-electronics, driven by irresistible curiosity and ingenuous enthusiasm for sound experimentation and process-oriented performance. His music is dense and full of polyrhythms and counter harmonies with singular control over layers of randomly pulsing, bleeping synthesizers and drum boxes. As a composer in the early ’80s Montgomery created multi-channel sound works often performed in total darkness. He began his sound explorations with electronic toys, cheap synthesizers, and household gadgetry, for which he had a special fascination. His ever-present objects of affection are electric machines including an ice crusher (“Icebreaker”), aquarium pump, refrigerator, shoe shine machine, hand massager, and laminator (“Laminator Model 2291”). Postcards contains 41 (!) tracks. Twenty-two tracks on the first LP, compiled from his first tape, Gen Ken & Equipment (1981); his second tape, Collaborations (1982); his third official tape, Kalckreuth Keks (1986), recorded at Conrad Schnitzler’s studio; and several live recordings under the name KMZ with Michael Zodorozny of Crash Course in Science. The second LP includes 19 songs from the fourth official tape, Beatmusik (1981-84) released by Sound of Pig, New York; songs from his fifth release, Room to Roam (1984); and three previously unreleased tracks from the same time period, one also as KMZ.
