Introduction to Sound Creations: Kinetic Speakers and Sonic Commons (Spring 2017)
4.320/1
Best known as one half of the innovative German electronic duo Mouse on Mars, Jan St. Werner also pursued a solo career as Lithops and under his own name. He began releasing music as Lithops in the mid-’90s (around the time of his collaboration with Markus Popp as Microstoria), issuing several singles and two full-lengths, Umi Unit and Didot, by the end of the decade. Despite St. Werner’s work with Mouse on Mars and the duo’s spinoff project with the Fall’s Mark E. Smith, Von Südenfed, Lithops’ output continued at a steady pace in the 2000s, including albums like Scrypt and the two-part release Mound Magnet as well as compilations such as Queries and Ye Viols! During the 2000s, St. Werner also acted as the artistic director for Amsterdam’s Institute for Electronic Music STEIM. In 2013, St. Werner released Blaze Colour Burn, the first of a series of experimental releases called Fiepblatter Catalogue, on Thrill Jockey. The second volume, Transcendental Animal Numbers, which used extreme dynamic and frequency shifts to approximate the random-yet-organic quality of field recordings, appeared in 2014. In 2015, St. Werner collaborated with members of Earth, Oval and Bo Ningen on Miscontinuum Album, which had already been performed as an opera and radio play in the four years prior to its release. Werner wrote music for ensembles and orchestras, composed pieces for German public radio, and produced installations for art galleries and museums. His new album “Felder” will be out in Thrill Jockey on April 1st 2016.