Universe

Kuf create emotion-laden dialogues across layers of time and dimensions of sound. Voices recorded in private are chopped up and brought out center-stage to sing with beats hammered out right here and now. Glowing synths push forward. Basslines rise to grab the melodic role of a track while a vowel is truncated and locked into a grid, driving the rhythm. Voices move within the frame of a sample, performed by hands pushing keys, guided by the ear, immersed in a trio session's deep flow... A vortex of quirky hands, responsive ears and glowing circuits. Since Thomas A. Edison first recorded the human voice in 1877, the recording arts have changed music forever. Musicians have explored the endless possibilities of bouncing their input onto layers of tape, off the walls of an echo chamber or the circuitry of electronic helpers - technology that modulates, spatializes, shifts, divides, or multiplies the work of human hands and mouths. An era of sampling offered a cubistic analysis of the recorded past and DJs took dancers onto intricately fractured time travels. This is the historic foundation that Kuf keep probing. Just like the sampler and the DJ before them, they found new ways to re-allocate where machine and man stand when making music together. Most importantly, they turn the resulting friction into sparkling bursts of energy. Universe digs deeper into the android vocal chords. The album offers sweeping melodies, different beats, and persistent bass. Immerse in the intimacy of the voices, probably recorded in trains, backstage areas, and at late night private parties during Berlin Lichtenberg warehouse rehearsals. By striking the keys, Kuf squeeze out and serve up all the soul accumulated in those savory phonetic shreds. Wood striking metal, thick bass strings moving air, oscillators humming eagerly. Physical and electrical, alive and stunningly beautiful - after a year well spent in smoky clubs, on festival stages and in extensive nocturnal sessions, Kuf deliver chapter two of their unfolding saga.