Clockwork Menagerie by Isan

when everything falls into place, something great can come to happen.
robin saville and antony ryan from leicester did a lot more than was actually planned when they were founding their integrated services analogue network. they not only found themselves a very nice little corner in the world of electronic pop music but also unconsciously helped to launch the label they now preferably release their records on. like this one.
this compilation of early material coming from long-out-of-print singles and compilations was a long time coming. mostly because there should be many more people out there who should be able to listen to these tracks than those lucky few who were able to get the original copies in the short while they were available. for instance there’s eusa’s head, isan’s first ever recording which surely had to be rescued from collector’s vaults. it’s nice to hear the first steps of a group that nowadays tends to remix people like depeche mode. but this is no highly official or definitive collection but more a collection of favourite tracks you should be able to listen to at all times.

these tunes seem to come from a different era when small labels like earworm, liquefaction empire, bad jazz or wurlitzer jukebox were continually presenting interesting and exciting new bands, mostly on neatly packaged limited edition 7”es. one of these was the melodious masterpiece damil 85, isan’s debut-7” for wurlitzer jukebox, which at the time seemed as mysterious as it was great. nobody knew where this was coming from or who this dubious dr. ivanovich was who did things that may not have been necessary.

for a fact, isan do exist but they’re not so much a working unit as may have been supposed by many. robin saville and antony ryan actually live and work separately from each other and just found a liking for releasing their music under the same banner. this principle works astonishingly well. as different as their respective styles may be – it’s up to the listener to guess who did which track – the tracks seems to be secretly interlinked in a way that goes beyond profane explanations.

the music ranges, depending on from out of whose vintage analogue equipment it comes, between simple melodies on swinging, feather-weight beats and rhythmically complex and transparent sound installations. may this be the right balance between pop and art. maybe like an unlikely mixture of plone and seefeel.

for morr music this compilation the realization of a very old idea. the tracks gathered here have given essential impulses in the development of the label’s style and ideology. in a way the group and their label follow the same path and that is to go into the future with the past in mind.

Antony Ryan and Robin Saville.

isan.co.uk
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