Artist description Geomatic have been exploring the possibilities of underground audio for over a decade, and Control Agents is their first full length CD, a musical examination of the artists' preoccupation with mental manipulation and mind control, in the form of insidious yet alluring rhythms, and passages of paranoia inducing ambience.

Music Style gothic-industrial dark ambient

Albums Control Agents

Press Reviews This new release from the Triumvirate label is a CD from a band I don't know at all. According to what is written in the booklet, there are two musicians in Geomatic, they recorded this album in 2000 and I suppose this is their debut album. Anyway, for its first total newcomer, the label funded by Law has done a very good choice, since "Control Agents" is a very good and solid album. Geomatic's sound is very difficult to describe. Somewhere between electronics (loops, beats, synthetic lines), and dark industrial (solemn tunes, slow drumming, samples from ethnic instruments), "Control Agents" is a thick and opaque melting pot of influences and sonorities, that sometimes gets ambient, and sometimes would almost make your feet move. A track like "Implanted Thoughts" is very synthetic / modern sounding, while "Stimulating Electrode Implant" is more drone based, and "Intruders" is a catchy and dreamy track relaying on tribal (seemingly acoustic) drumming. And this later element might be what unifies this CD. From the opening "Auxiliary Transmitter", Geomatic seem to have a predilection for tribal like percussion and sounds, integrating not only percussions, but also strings that could have been sampled from some traditional oriental music. And the talent of Geomatic is to make everything sound cohesive. A lot of very diverse elements are used, but they are all very well integrated into the whole, and you don't feel like listening to a compilation or to a collage. "Control Agents" has a dark, obscure unity that mixes with success electronica and dark industrial, resulting in something that stays enjoyable for the whole CD, and often surprises. You could think this is a mix of a Cyclotimia like work with samples mixed with the most arrhythmic tracks from Black Lung and the whole thing written with one ear listening to Raison D'etre and the other one focusing on interesting and original electronic sounds. The Black Lung comparison goes, by the way, a little further, since the booklet is full of references to conspiracy theories and has quotes (at least one of them having been used in a Black Lung disc) about how the USA have secretly planned to develop machines to control people's minds. Anyway, you can loose the disinfo friendly background if you like, but I was very well surprised by "Control Agents". Well done and obviously a CD that took a long time to record, this is something I really like. Maybe the most accessible release on Triumvirate so far, it might very well be my favorite too. Recommended. NICHOLAS, "RECYCLE YOUR EARS" ONLINE MAGAZINE********************************************************************* If you're familiar with Dark Duck Records, you're no stranger to the sounds of Serge Marinec & Andrei Vasiljev (aka e. Voice p. aka Geomatic). From Geomatic comes a fine debut full-length offering of deep ambient and dark tribal gothic soundscapes. As usual with these guys, the sound quality is pure and clean if not audiophile quality. The opening track "Auxiliary Transmitter" begins with dark ambient thematics. A tribal beat takes over with some soft middle-eastern overtones. Some deep (and I mean deep) bass kicks through the track to rattle your speakers. "Skinner Box" (appropriately named by the way, or maybe I would have named it "Dungeon") opens with the sounds of heavily reverbed water droplets. Then distant rumbles invade along with stark harmonics. The clanging of chains joins the mix in a really cool way. Deep breathing and sounds of terror emerge and create a very frightening atmosphere. What's cool about this track is not what's there but what's NOT there. Vast empty spaces and gaps which allow the heavy deep reverb to just linger is what makes this track so great. "Implanted Thoughts" starts out with organ drones, tribal rhythms, and deep male-voice type chants which sound like they could have been recorded in the middle ages in some huge European church. A bassline joins and a steady smooth minimal techno type beat kicks in and gives the track "groove." "I.G.O.S." features minimal ambiences and lots of textural thematics. Clanging, whooshing and droning sounds float and swirl around you. (Very cool effect when listening on headphones). "Stimulating Electrode Implant" starts with deep drones which rumble, ebb and flow and mixes nicely with sounds of the oncoming thunderstorm out my window. 6:30 into the track, after your implanted electrode has been stimulated, a disjointed beat and a recognizable melody kick in, but the sinister theme remains. The track ends with a sample from an ethereal gothic choral piece (ala HOS's Choral Masterworks from Russia). Very nice track. "Intruders." Harsh drones start off the track. Then tribal rhythms join with deep bass and textural whooshes and some very nice ambient themes. Sounds a little like a Robert Rich track from the Seven Veils CD. "Thoughts Get Louder." The album concludes with deep ambient organ drones and whooshes. Faint calls can be heard, and melodic themes kick in. Deep rumbles and a dark flute solo playing soft middle-eastern themes close out the track. This track sounds like the deep ambient brother of the e. Voice p. track "Entered Apprentice." Final Thoughts: The sounds are so diverse, and the quality so good on this CD it's very difficult to tell what is on the CD and what is outside. This music should mix with your environment very well. It was a little more tribal then I expected from these guys but they do it very well and I hope to hear more like this from them in the future. They never stray too far from the surreal and the strange with liner notes featuring links to web sites covering topics such as mind control and human experimentation. This, my friends, is true dark ambient. Play this in your house on Halloween and you're guaranteed to scare the hell out of the kids. Stephen Philips (Dark Duck Records)****************************** GEOMATIC "Control Agents" CD Thank God, there still are Industrial musicians, who don't immediately start sampling like being hypnotized as soon as Guido Knopp's [a well known German documentary director, focusing on 3rd Reich and holocaust reports • translator's note] historical documentaries twinkle over the screen, but take up controversial themes nevertheless and know how to gain interest for that. Geomatic, the newest signing on Mitchell Altum's Triumvirate (Law, Dissecting Table...), deal with facts like the CIA's Mind Control Program and deliver a lot of interesting and helpful internet references within their CD booklet for "Control Agents". Technically this is the first work of these two Lithuanians, who have lived in the Netherlands for a long time now, but have already been involved in professional sound research in Lithuania in 1983 and worked up these sounds later under the name "e. Voice p.", amongst others, within a self produced short movie. However, the present album represents their first audio publication. Musically, Geomatic deliver a very clear sound that in parts even shows danceable, soft rhythms. Dark Ambient would certainly be the wrong name for the music. Yet not danceable in the sense I myself consider negative, but in the style of good Delirium tracks or SPK tracks of their nondisco era. Even Lustmord's new album (also this influence sounds through) comprises rhythmic elements, which fit in overall and don't make the mistake of dominating over the music completely. Instead of the area of Dark Ambient, I would rather classify this album to the spheres of Underwater Ambient/Interstellar Ambient. Friends of S.E.T.I.'s music or Predominance's recent album will have true joy at this work. But also old Industrialists, who well remember the first steps of SPK (those who love "Doctrine Of Eternal Ice"...) and Lustmord in these fields, will recognize these by miscellaneous echoes. Even those who fear the word "rhythmical" may relax, because these elements find application on only a few of the seven tracks. Marvelous to see Triumvirate didn't entirely focus on the noisier way, but, as proven with this release, show readiness to walk on paths richly faceted! ["IronFlame" online magazine, translated by Marco Koch of STATEART]

Location Amsterdam, Noord-Holland - Netherlands

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