Gustavo Jobim: Trapped in a Day Job

Man kann es sich vor seinem geistigen Auge geradezu bildlich vorstellen, wie ein kreativer Geist in Büros, die an Hühnerställe erinnern, zur Produktivität angehalten wird und dabei abstumpft. Immer die gleichen Arbeitsvorgänge in geringen Variationen, immer die gleiche Strukturierung der Arbeit in festgesetzten Zeitabläufen. Der Mensch, der mehr Maschine als Lebewesen ist. Das ist die eine Seite. Und es erinnert musikalisch schon stark an Kraftwerk. Aber auch an Cluster.

Gustavo Jobim schreibt in der Betrachtung zu diesem Album, dass er sich besonders von Cluster inspiriert fühlte. "Moebius Tape" (benannt nach Clusters Dieter Moebius) war das erste Stück, das er für das Album aufnahm. Nun, Cluster mag hier Inspiration gewesen sein, aber Jobim schafft es zwischen Düsseldorf und Forst an der Weser (bildlich gesprochen) seine ganz eigene Idee einer modernisierten Form der alten Kraut-Electronic in Tonfolgen umzusetzen.

Trapped in a Day Job ist bereits das fünfte Album von Gustavo Jobim, einem Brasilianer, der einer der begabtesten Erben der deutschen, elektronischen Musik ist! In der Musik von Jobim finden sich Anteile der verschiedensten Kraut-Electroniker von Tangerine Dream und Klaus Schulze über Cluster und NEU! bis hin zu Kraftwerk. Seit dem Jahr 2000 arbeitet Jobim an seinem speziellen Konglomerat, das sich zwar deutlich auf die deutsche elektronische Avantgarde der 70er Jahre von Berlin bis Düsseldorf stützt, aber doch eigene moderne Handschrift erkennen lässt. Wobei gerade dieses Album deutlich von der sonst bei Jobim vorherrschenden Vorliebe für die Berliner Schule elektronischer Musik abweicht.

Die sich stetig wiederholende ebenso dynamische wie differenzierte Rhythmik gepaart mit irgendwie simpel klingenden, versponnenen Synthiesounds sorgt auf Trapped in a Day Job geradezu zwingend für eine ungewöhnliche Lebendigkeit. Das repetitive Element wird besonders bei den beiden Longtracks genüsslich ausgespielt. Änderungen im Klangbild vollziehen sich nur ganz allmählich. Jobim ist dabei ein äußerst konsequenter Musiker: auf akustische oder elektrische Instrumente wird vollends verzichtet. Das Album wurde allein auf einem sehr kleinen Software Synthesizer in kreativen Arbeitspausen in seinem Büro eingespielt. Alles kommt aus der "Dose": Die treibenden Electro-Beats, die harte Bass-Spur, die sich darüber in kurzen Zirkeln entfaltende Synthie-Melodie.

Der Sound auf Trapped in a Day Job ist mechanisch, synthetisch, minimalistisch und verspielt. Der Prog-Hörer mit Zugang zu elektronischer Musik wird sich der seltsamen Dynamik und Frische dieser Aufnahmen in der Schnittmenge von Zuckerzeit und Mensch-Maschine kaum entziehen können.

Das Album kann über die Homepage als Download oder auch per e-Mail-Anfrage an Jobim als CD-R erworben werden.

Brazilian artist Gustavo Jobim is certainly one of the most interesting and promising acts on the current EM scene. A while ago I reviewed his CD album "Round Mi" that featured a nice mix of Berlin School influences and Minimalism; as well as a few of his download-only releases. All of his works were quite different but he managed to maintain a high quality of his output, whatever the chosen style of music. This particular album was recorded at work. This means that all tracks were recorded using office PC running a basic synthesizer / sequencer software (TS-404).

"Lets Fly" gets straight into sequencing. It's minimal and yet hypnotic and captivating. Actually, you only hear sequences here, about 4 or five of them. Some of the sequences serve as rhythm, some provide the melody and some act as bass... you get the picture. Simple, but effective. The music is not static, as Gustavo changes notes on the fly, alters filter and resonance parameters, resulting in a lively concoction of electronic pulsations. It is interesting to trace the intricate road this piece takes, guided only by the author's imagination and the instrument's limitations.

"Moebius Tape" strikes a quirkier note, initially sounding like some cartoonish frog choir. The tempo is slightly slower but it's basically the same thing - sequencing and just sequencing. This track is really heavy on the bass. I am thinking about the tracks' title now. Although it does refer to mathematics, I am indeed reminded a bit on the music of Dieter Moebius. At least this track has the same type of quirkiness to it and the textures are a bit similar too. I found it interesting how the piece seemingly decays towards the end, the sequences becoming more distorted, dirty and hallucinating.

"Cat In the Blender" has perhaps the catchiest groove of them all. I can't help but nod to the rhythm while listening to this. It has nice resonance-laden melodic higher-register sequences as well. A pity that this track is so short (4+ minutes only).

We then get "Nightlife In Mars" that is more upbeat, with a galloping bass sequences and other pulsations possessing that strange, dirty experimental quality that make them sound pretty cold and alien. Sounds like Goa Trance played by the Max Rebo Band on a bad day.

"Arcade Times", naturally, brings in the cheese. If you like old computer games or are a fan of Chiptune, this is more or less the stuff you're after. However, apart from the bleepy sequences, you get pretty noisy resonating textures here that make the whole thing sound rather intense. It is the shortest track of the album.

"Mindbender" weaves another net of electronic pulsations. This time, however, Gustavo goes for the total overkill, both in terms of the quantity of sequences and the overall intensity.

"Icecream Waves" is the only slow track here. In fact, it could be called "sequencer ambient" if you can imagine such a thing. This is probably the kind of stuff Cluster would have made back in 1976 in Forst, had they had access to sophisticated sequencer software.

"Inside the Machine" adopts a more asserting groove with some really strange background sequences, some of them even reminding on the cheesy sounds that Tomita used in the 1970's. However, the format is grand - this massive track leaves an impression of a Klaus Schulze gone completely sequencer-mad in his studio.

There are not enough albums out there relying solely on the sequences. And Gustavo Jobim's "Trapped In A Day Job" is an important statement and the proof that such artistic limitations can be ultimately rewarding when filtered through a creative mind of a musician. Recommended.

Well, the recording is a lot about repetition and the very slow tweaking of sounds along metallic pulsations and robotic rhythm variations. In addition, it has a strong psychedelic, hallucinogenic and profound weird veil over it. The slowly unfolding compositions all feature minimal sequenced structures that soon become quite annoying on every piece, and I sincerely doubt if this tasteless music art can be taken seriously.

Trapped in a Day Job was literally conceived during Gustavo Jobim’s working hours by means of a small (only 250 kilobytes) software synthesizer, TS-404 V1.05 Beta. This software is built around four layered independent sequencers, each assigned to a small, also independent, synthesizer. So the TS-404 is aimed at creating short rhythmic loops or fat synth lead lines, which the musician can use for other arrangements. After some experimentation on this software, the Brazilian tones sculptor discovered its full potential within long minimalist musical pieces. And so Trapped in a Day Job got out of its embryonic state. Using the four sequencers ensemble for both rhythmic and melodic patterns, in a continuous, repetitive play, Gustavo Jobim concocted quite a syncretic album where the music leaves the way to a palette of videogames tones which roll in circle through a pleiad of metallic pulsations.

"Let’s Fly" opens this eclectic album of Gustavo Jobim with heavy and resonant pulsations which evolve on a long minimalist structure liven up by chords which turn in loops. Chords which subtly stretch their harmonies on a hard, stroboscopic and robotic tempo where heavy metallic pulsations sound as extraterrestrials' suction cups in a kind of techno that Kraftwerk would deliver on vitamins boosted with LSD. And if there is a key point in this extreme pandemonium is this subtle permutation in harmonies which untie us from a redundant geometrically musical figure.

Longer, "Moebius Tape" is also much harmonious. The musical skeleton always rests on metallic beatings which resound to forever and a day, but the limpid sequences pour with a more beautiful fluidity and form a strange paradoxical harmony with its multiplied doubloons which shape a curious automated ode, making forgot its pulsating metallic skeleton.

Afterwards we fall in a series of short tracks where are hiding beautiful jewels, as "Cat in the Blender" of which the naming says everything. We really have the impression of hearing a cat mew of pain on a heavy, metallic and pulsating rhythm. The harmonious and rhythmic structures are in constants permutations, giving thus more wealth to Trapped in a Day Job. "Nightlife in Mars" goes a bit out of the pulsating structure to offer an odd musical structure, taken directly out of video games, as on "Arcade Times" and its frantically loops, which recall me Plastikman’s musical automate and minimalist world.

After the brief interlude of "Arcade Times" we dive into "Mindbender" and its semi spectral and semi alien structure where chords spin of a symmetric way in a minimalism universe of discord. If I ventured, I would dare a comparison between Mike Oldfield and Conrad Schnitzer. "Icecream Waves" is the softest track of Trapped in a Day Job where chords swirl without constraints on a delicate structure reminding Richard Pinhas' universe on East-West.

Beautiful and melodious, but always minimalist and robotic, less violent than "Let’s Fly" and less harmonious than "Moebius Tape", "Inside the Machine" ends this musical essay with a long track with loops and chords as well pulsating as repetitive on a structure to subtle unexpected developments. Permutations strongly nuanced which amaze because of their spontaneity and unpredictability. If it can seem long at the beginning, it subtly changes and evolves for its entire duration. And these fine changes that we didn’t expected make the charms of Trapped in a Day Job.

I read on Gustavo's site that this album would have been a continuity of Cluster works, which incidentally I don’t really know to do such a comparison. But I find many other references which have jumped to my ears, such Daft Punk, Con Man (Conrad Schnitzler), Plastikman and Kraftwerk. Trapped in a Day Job is certainly a strange opus where the musicality can seem doubtful, even if unmistakably present, which demonstrates that from a simple thingy we can manage to create great things. For Kraftwerk fans, it’s a must. And for those who are of curious nature, it’s an album which is amply worth the time we take to listen to, specially when it’s free and available at his site.

Aparentemente (*) gravado usando o computador que Gustavo usa em seu trabalho, não surpreende que este álbum seja escapista.

A primeira impressão é de que assim é que o Cluster poderia ter soado depois dos anos 70, se eles tivessem tido um pouco mais de auto-confiança e um melhor entendimento do zeitgeist.

Mas conforme você presta mais atenção, os detalhes e a produção mostram que este álbum é um produto de uma era mais moderna. Na verdade, este álbum soa mais como o Cluster soaria se O Doutor tivesse os levado no TARDIS para os tempos de hoje, e os deixado não em um estúdio, mas com um PC e com alguém que soubesse como usá-lo.

Deixando de lado as estranhas comparações, Gustavo é um homem que consegue fazer a máquina ter um "soul". Por exemplo, em 'Nightlife in Mars' ele concretiza a velha ambição de Detroit de soar como Kraftwerk tocando James Brown.

Gustavo consegue fazer sua máquina voar, e ele a leva a estranhos lugares. Como um acid house errado, ele pega um ritmo eletrônico e coloca por cima sons bem distorcidos. Eletrônica agradavelmente esquisita.

(*) Creio que não há problema em publicar esta história.

Texto original em inglês:
Apparently (*) recorded using the desktop that Gustavo uses at his day job, this album is unsurprisingly escapist.

The first impressions are that this is how Cluster could have sounded after the 70s if they had had a little more confidence and a nicer touch of the zeitgeist.

However, when you get closer to it, the details and the production betray it as a product of a more modern age. This is more how Cluster would sound if The Doctor had taken them in his TARDIS to now and left them not in a studio but with a PC and someone who knew how to use it.

Strange comparisons aside, Gustavo is a man who can put soul into the machine. For instance, on 'Nightlife In Mars' he fulfils the old Detroit ambition of sounding like Kraftwerk playing James Brown.

Gustavo can make his machine fly and he takes it to some weird places. Like acid house gone wrong, he takes an electro groove and puts some very warped sounds on top of it. Nicely weird electronic.

(*) Allegedly, anecdote published without prejudice.