reviews:

WIRE
Kotra (born Dmytro Fedorenko) and Kateryna Zavoloka represent the vanguard of Ukrainian electronics, and on their third collaborative release, the two are found jubilantly smashing the attributesof 50s computer music, 70s jazz fusion and contemporary electronica within the crucible of granular synthesis. Wag The Swing jumps all over the place through the album's 24 tracks dotted with semi-obliterated audio samples which Fedorenko and Zavoloka constantly scrub across a revolving set of digital filters. There's a playful exuberance to their scattered bitstream, even when their immediacy and spontaneity with these sounds lacks any commitment. Howewer, these squeaks and whirls become far more oherent and less self-indulgent when grounded upon their broken electronic breaks and granular bass guitar grooves, which fall somewhere between Karl Blake's all-thumbs monstrousness in The Lemon Kitens and the wilful technicality of Jaco Pastorious.
(Jim Haynes)

De:Bug
Ich freu mich schon eine Weile drauf, diese CD zu hören, weil sie einfach so sagenhaft gut aussieht in ihrer Obergröße und mit dem feinen urainischen Golddruck. Und die Musik ist - jedenfalls für das, was ich als Vergleich heranziehen kann - auch sehr goldig. Plinkernd leicht fast, Digitales wirkt hier eher am Rande, das Schreddern geht eher auf in melodischen Parts und auch wenn das stellenweise schon ganz schön abstraktes Puppentheater werden kann, hat man nie das Gefühl, dass die einen einfach nur beeindrucken wollen. Es ist allerdings definitiv die vielseitigste Platte, die ich von dieser Kombination bislang gehört habe, und die Waage zwischen dezenten Grooves, waghalsiger Avantgarde und stillem Klang unter der Lupe ist exzellent
(bleed)

Vital Weekly
The long awaited - well, at least by some - collaboration of Kotra and Zavoloka. They already had a teaser EP, but here is the full twenty-four track CD. They play their music using "bass guitar, empty vinyl player, blank cd matrixes, voice and other machines" - by the latter I assume they mean the extensive use of computers. As said twenty-four tracks, which means that none of the tracks are very long. This sketch like approach works well. Some tracks are rhythmic, almost in a swing like mood, but throughout they add a strange element to the tracks, to add something unusual to the music. Of course there are also some more abstract pieces. It all makes the music very vivid. Combining the best of microsound, electro-pop and serious composition, this is a highly enjoyable CD, which comes in a cover that made me think they have money to burn.
(Frans de Waard)


Cracked
I missed out on reviewing the Zavoloka versus Kotra EP titled „to kill the tiny groovy cat“ on Nexsound (check it out as a free download on www.nexsound.org ) but the mixture of electroacoustic noise and funky electronics was remarkable already. Especially in contrast to the large size and drone orientation of their earlier live-collaboration „ untitled live “ as part of the nexsound live reports, the harsh disruptions and swift changes from one soundlayer to the next, came almost as a surprise. On the other hand, Zavoloka's collaboration with the techno-artist AGF was all based around beats, beats and more beats, with a complete change and fresh start every minute. Structurally, only Gintas K has laid down a more strict and theoretically organised work in the last months on „60 x one minute audio colours in 2kHz audio“ – but fortunately we are still far from such terrain. Usually, such formula-based analysis of sound are hard to bear and boring to hear. „Wag the swing“ is the latest of Kotra and Zavoloka collaborations and it contains a surprise in each of its 24 tracks.

There is something interesting about the small or short form in musical experimentation, because it demands focus and concentration. It seems easy to dwell on an electroacoustic idea for ten minutes or longer to really sink into it and feel its texture and layout, but if you ask yourself to chose just two minutes of your droning, where do you start? Searching for the core of the idea or the sound you have built and then reducing all the work you have had so far to this singular moment demands a lot of willpower and strength, because it means cutting off and throwing away a lot. Not a lot of difference to mainstream rock, it seems, were some artists get away with one basic idea over the course of various albums and become superstars, while others throw a dozen ideas into a single song and have to starve as critic's favorites. „Wag the swing contains at least 24 ideas worked out into full tracks and with a bunch of manipulating and producing strategies thrown on top.

Highlights include the blistering noise meets bassline meets spacey echoes„analogue tender“. „Out of nowhere“, the starter of „wag the swing“ uses a simple line of (bass?-)guitar notes and then re-arranges, manipulates and de-constructs them into a gently flowing electronica track that would have
come expected on 12k. Other tracks are hacked and distorted aural bricollages of sounds and bitstreams, rendered in chaos or seeming chaos. Harsh sounds change tone with vibrant, organic ones and plenty of holes in between („a taste of live life“). The amount of traceable soundmaterial is
astounding as well as the many cuts and slices in other tracks. The latter one starting to impress like a noise artists parody of the drum'n'bass excesses of late. Then there are funky moments that simulate heavy minimal electro, straight bass lines working fervently against the rhythm of the noise basis underneath or beside (most prominent on a track entitled„swing you, swing me“ which brings up pictures of the bassplayer in one room and the noise producer in another with no audio connection between them), sometimes working with it heavily („moonlight in mirror“) and even glitch noises.

Trying to take in the whole album as one big piece of music the most impressive fact is the sheer number of ideas and the clean cut production. I am positive that this is pure homerecording, except for the mastering, but you'd never hear it. At the moment it seems as if the interests of Kotra and Zavoloka are straying into various directions at once and that they haven't decided yet on which leads to follow, which is all just fine. They don't have to. „Wag the swing“ is irritating and startling due to its jumpy incoherence which renders it a mixbag of tracks, but if you focus on detail and try to detect the overall lines that hold it together (you won't be able to and if you find them you're probably mistaken, but trying to find them is the main chore) it is a fascinating travel.

Gaz-Eta
An inaugural release from Kotra's new label Kvintu is a duet by Ukrainian noise/computer music gurus Kotra and Zavoloka. Kotra [in real life, Dmytro Fedorenko] and [Katya] Zavoloka go to great length to come up with just the perfect sounds for today's world drenched with electronic sounds. All sounds garnered on the CD come from bass, empty vinyl player, blank CD matrixes, voice and "other machines". Packaged in a gorgeous red and yellow cardboard package, the CD is chock full of short pieces [24 in all]. It's the short form of narration that allows the two electronic artists to come to grips with their craft. This is an ideal platform for both artists as the brief experiments allow an out-there aspect in their music to come through in a clearest possible fashion. Their approach to micro sounds is to let the bleeps, squeaks and glitches speak for themselves. It doesn't matter so much what the sources for this music is. What counts is the final effect. Believe it or not, some of these tracks have an actual dance sensibility. "Swing You, Swing Me" features a persistent bass sample that is smothered in bee-like humming of the electronic atmosphere, while "Moonlight in Mirror" features a pulsing break-beat that drowns itself out in these small bass-less beats. Many of the shorter pieces are glimpses at total abstract music. Neither sense nor reason seems to have been used, yet still, they live and breathe. Similar to small organisms surviving on a desert, this music has very little chance of survival, yet strange enough, it does just that. With each coming minute, its existence makes perfect sense, if only to remind us that people still create music that is full of stubborn vitality and resilience.
(Tom Sekowski)


WordPress / Startlingmoniker
Always lush, but only part-time melodic, Kotra and Zavolonka's Kvitnu release “Wag the Swing” is an often-fractured continuation of many ideas the pair began with their earlier collaboration “To Kill the Tiny Groovy Cat,” from Nexsound.

Constructed with bass, record players, blank CDs, voice, and “other machines,” much of “Wag the Swing” lurches from one place to another– and while everything sounds great, the brevity of many of the tracks leaves listeners little time to “inhabit” each of the strange presentations before moving on to something else. Although many tracks could easily take listeners along for quite some time, only six of the total twenty-four go beyond three and a half minutes.

Still, there are a lot of interesting sounds, and the production values are to be commended. “Swing Me, Swing You” pits a simple bass line– almost a portion of a bass line, really– against whistles, gravel scratches, popping cable noise, and a near-random pseudo-waterphone sound. The track doesn't come together as much as it is forced to get along. Before four minutes has passed, you're dropped into “Silver Poem,” which at barely over a minute long, is little more than a sniff of static, feedback, buzzing, and flapping strings. This might work inside the relatively common harsh noise “hit ‘em hard and retreat” aesthetic, but there's nothing harsh about this release. Despite the abundance of clipped glitches, splintered bass, and sauntering crackles; “Wag the Swing” avoids painful territory. Think Oval, not Merzbow.

Nevertheless, the times where this album fails is more due to the sheer number of new ideas being presented than any musical drought. Ironically, with so little time for listeners to adjust to the next new idea– and the subsequent array of new sounds– these incredible differences become somewhat similar, confused and mashed about in your mind; a sort of clamor unheard.

Before I finish I really have to mention the cover art for this release, which looks like a graphic score illustrated by a space-age retro enthusiast. The image you see here does it no justice– this is a gorgeous cover, with metallic inks, raised lettering, the works. It matches the extreme level of detail heard on the album, and begs to be prominently displayed.

Connexion Bizarre
"Wag the Swing" represents approximately one hour of audio insanity. If a Ukrainian Folk festival were to be hijacked by Cevin Key, and all the participants force-fed amphetamines, the resulting sonic chaos would be a fair approximation of the chaotic noises generated by Kotra and Zavoloka on this release.

Once the initial shock wears off, I'm left in awe at the skill exhibited by these two. As a studio-bound producer, I have masses of respect for anybody willing and able to throw themselves on the mercy of a crowd and generate fresh, creative sounds from scratch - no midi, no sampling, just their eclectic list of "instrumentation", including bass, empty vinyl player, blank CD matrixes, voice and other machines. Quite cryptic, don't you think? This bizarre ensemble notwithstanding, the pair manage to jam together some of the most unique arrangements I've ever had the dubious pleasure of listening to. The most impressive thing for me was the apparent ease with which they juxtapose completely incongruous ranges of sounds - like the melodic bass stylings of the opening track, "Out of Nowhere" compared to the post-industrial lunacy of "Analogue Tender" or "Hidden Fields".

The other aspect of this album that really strikes a chord with me is its tongue-in-cheek attitude (like the eleven-second track, "Long Story Short"): Kotra and Zavoloka are more than creating music, they are actually playing it, and enjoying every minute. Also, the presentation of the album - both in its superb, clear mastering and its playful, unique packaging - is a great reflection of the energy and drive they bring to experimental music. This recording is definitely worth investigating further, especially for fans of glitch and IDM, or just connoisseurs of everything avant-garde.
(David vander Merwe)


e/i magazine
Kotra and Zavoloka are the dilettantes of the Nexsound cadre (further aligned with their Kvitnu imprint), two chaos technicians having a blast in their digital sandboxes, kicking dirt in their friends' faces, thumbing their noises at the bourgeoisie. The software autopsy the duo enact during Wag the Swing's 24 tracks skims across a veritable who's who of glitchery, cut-ups, plunderphonics and much other somersaulting chicanery. Sounds spill out from the speaker fabric as if K&Z decapitated a kaleidoscope, the colored particles wafting in the air like so much audiological confetti. Pointless to just pick specific tracks in any kind of summation, but tasters include the Jethro Tull-ish "flutes" dueting with plug-in snarl and sampled guitars ("Analogue Tender"), 70s blurp-funk pastiche ("Space Drift"), static whispers and Bernhard GŸnter-esque tone vignettes ("Silver Poem," "Black Gold"), and, of course, outright garbage-cans-down-the-stairs abandon ("Uneven Walk"). For the record, the duo surely give fellow splatterfesters Kid606, Venetian Snares, Aphex Twin, and about two-thirds of the Mego crew a run for their money, although belonging even peripherally to such a fraternity is probably dubious at best. Too chaotic, too abbreviated, too elongated—I'd suggest pruning shears next time out, and a tighter rein on the compositional muse (or simply a little less intimacy with the mouse).

Neural
This production, in an elegant and special edition made of ecologic cardboard with golden tints, is entitled 'Wag the Swing'. It's the latest work by the Ukrainian artists Dmytro Fedorenko (Kotra) and Kateryna Zavoloka, and follow the steps of their previous experiments, continuing the personal exploration that they started some years ago, made of several performances and workshops at the most renowned international electronic music festivals. Their improvisational attitude is unchanged, and they often bring the listener back to harsher and more contemporary sequences in the elaboration of their abstract melodies, between digital synthesis and more or less orthodox instruments (bass guitars and guitars, but also empty master matrices, turntables and various devices), minimizing the vocal research and focusing on interactions between sounds, skillfully juxtaposed in a cryptic alternation of the background..
(Aurelio Cianciotta)

indieville
I've reviewed Ukrainian experimental electronic acts Kotra and Zavoloka separately in the past, but Wag The Swing sees them together at last in the form of a 24-track collaboration album put out by Kvitnu, the label run by Kotra's Dmytro Fedorenko. This is quite a varied and eclectic affair as far as experimental glitch and electronic music goes, with just the right amount of tunefulness maintained to keep things from falling into noise territory. The album's combination of organic sounds (bass, voice, etc) combined with mechanical electronic manipulation makes for an interesting juxtaposition between the computer and the human. A track like opener "Out Of Nowhere" produces a warm, melodic sensitivity amidst the cutting edge of rhythmic static. Meanwhile, "Analogue Tender" is warped and jazzy, with a laminator-gone-wrong beat and musical noodlings hidden within. The whole thing is a little more lively and animated than many experimental offerings, which results in an energetic release that isn't overly abrasive. Only true enthusiasts of abstract and experimental electronic music need apply here, as twenty four tracks worth of this stuff might scare off less adventurous listeners. But if you know what you're getting into, Wag the Swing will prove to be yet another fine offering from the burgeoning Ukrainian electronic music scene.
(Matt Shimmer)

Luna Kafé
The Ukrainian alternative electronica scene seems vital, being a garden bearing many colourful, tasty and some strange fruits. Innovative sounds, from artistic angels, and with neat design and cover art wrapping. Wag the Swing! is a project by Kotra & Zavoloka. Wag The Swing! holds 24 tracks and is a long album, clocking in at almost 64 minutes. It's about samples, cut'n'paste, minimalism, avant electronica. The disc is interesting and exciting, but it's a very long listen. I suggest and recommend to check it out in portions, as I feel the whole disc is way too long. It's quite demanding and you need both patience and focus when listening. Some tracks are more melodic and organic than others. There are many a surreal, abstract, atonal moment. Among the tracks I like the better are the opening "Out of Nowhere", which makes me think of the band Xiu Xiu, the warmer sounding "Analogue Tender" and "Swing You, Swing Me", which is more on the 'amusing' side. I'll need some more time to dig into this one. Maybe you should be digging along as well.
(Håvard Oppøyen)

Metica
Maxisingeln 'To Kill the Tiny Groovy Cat' som föregick 'Wag the Swing' lämnade med sina hjärtskärande elektroniska attacker mycket att önska, och kanske är det mina förutfattade meningar som gjorde att mitt första intryck av nya plattan var övervägande positivt.
Med basgitarr, gamla skivspelare och elektroniska apparater samt en stor dos fantasi och skaparglädje gör de båda ukrainska projekten Kotra och Zavoloka med 'Wag the Swing' en skarp vänstersväng in på mer lättillgängliga territorier. Att få fram vrickade och huvudlösa ljud är inte svårt. Att få resultatet att låta lyssningsbart utan att det extremt skruvade går förlorat är desto knepigare. Kotra och Zavoloka har dock funnit sig tillrätta och behöver inte längre maxa skiten ur sina maskiner för att locka uppmärksamheten till sig.
Med stor trovärdighet balanserar de mellan rytmisk struktur och arrangemang som gränsar till kaos utan att kliva över linjen. Ljuden är både mustiga och barnsligt enkla. Små anspråkslösa loopar toppas ibland av trevande elektroniska melodier som känns typiska för fröken Zavoloka. Den för Kotra karaktäristiska basgitarren är framträdande på spår som 'Moonlight in Mirror', 'Cream Skimmer' och naturligtvis även 'Bass Serenade'. På 'Analogue Tender' blir det nästan lika jazzigt som på Biospheres fantastiska 'Dropsonde' och tro det eller ej, nästan lika bra. Låten är utan överdrift ett av de bättre elektroniska styckena jag hört på ett tag.
Jazzigt blir det även på andra ställen, inte minst på svängiga 'Swing you, Swing me' medan de välgjorda looparna dominerar på 'Breath of Sky'. 'A Taste of Live Life' är vidare ett exempel som visar Kotra och Zavolokas hårdare och mer noise-betonade sida.
På en platta i stil med 'Wag the Swing' finns det tveklöst en poäng med att göra korta låtar. Intensiviteten är hög och man hade antagligen tröttnat om längden på spåren närmat sig tiominutersstrecket. Tjugofyra spår med en speltid på en dryg timme känns dock på tok för mycket. Färre och aningen längre låtar samt en skiva förkortad med åtminstone tio minuter hade varit att föredra. Men, 'Wag the Swing' är trots detta en jämn och på samma gång spretig platta som sjuder av liv. Utan att förlora den improviserade känslan har Kotra och Zavolokas gjort en skiva som ger dem sina hedervärda rykten tillbaka.
(Martin Engström)

EtherREAL
Kotra et Zavoloka sont deux artistes que l'on connaissait pour leurs sorties sur le label ukrainien Nexsound . Afin de multiplier la sortie de productions locales, Kotra (Dmytro Fedorenko) a décidé de créer son propre label qui voit ici sa première sortie. Déjà fidèle à Nexsound, un label éclectique d'une qualité régulière, c'est assez serein que l'on aborde cette première sortie, mais curieux du mélange qui pouvait naître de la fusion entre ces deux artistes. Kotra est plutôt orienté sur l'électronique bruitiste, tandis que l'on a déjà parlé ici de Zavoloka et de son électro-pop à la fois déviante et touchante.
Étonnamment, c'est une guitare lancinante qui débute l'album sur Out of Nowhere . Sortie de nul part effectivement, elle subit divers traitements afin d'être dédoublée et syncopée. Rythmique sourde et grésillante, mélodie cristalline, on est en pleine electronica mélodique, sophistiquée, tordue, pleine de charme. C'est après que les choses se compliquent. En effet le reste de l'album est assez représentatif de la complexité qui pouvait naître du mélange de ces deux artistes. Kotra semble avoir mis de côté sa composante bruitiste, et se retrouve à la basse, instrument omniprésent sur cet album. Zavoloka quant à elle ne garde que l'aspect déviant de son électro-pop. On navigue alors en pleine abstraction, avec force collages, samples syncopés jusqu'à l'overdose, abstractions synthétiques, minimalisme ludique et naïf ( Swing You, Swing Me ), crissements, sifflements.
Composé de 24 pistes, l'album est plus à voir comme une compilation de vignettes expérimentales dont l'abstraction extrême n'en réservera l'écoute qu'aux plus aguerris au genre. A la rigueur, on peut retrouver ici, poussé à l'extrême, la construction des morceaux de Zavoloka qui semble partir un peu dans tous les sens en intégrant suffisamment d'éléments connus et/ou accrocheurs (une mélodie, une séquence rythmique) pour garder l'attention de l'auditeur. Ceux qui écouteront Wag The Swing dans son intégralité seront les adeptes de musique contemporaine électro-acoustique, de free jazz ( Moonlight in Mirror reste très électronique mais construit dans un style très free rappelant une séance d'impro acoustique), ou plus simplement de curiosités musicales.
Parfois, nos deux expérimentateurs semblent faire une pause en produisant presque un tube puisque après le titre d'ouverture, on trouve les nappes imprévisibles et les guitares ludiques de Analogue Tender , et le très beau Moments of Springroove à la mélodie de guitare répétitive et hésitante sur une rythmique sourde et grésillante.
En guise de signature, la voix de Zavoloka et une texture bruitiste de Kotra sur Wag The Puppy. Wag the Swing est un album difficile. Difficile à appréhender, difficile d'écoute, inclassable et même difficilement recommandable aux fans de Kotra ou Zavoloka. Avec cet album les deux artistes ont essayé de créer quelque chose d'autre, et cet album devra trouver son propre public.
(Fabrice Allard)