Reviews:

(Dead Formats) Seeded Plain & Hal Rammel is a collaboration that also really exceeds in abstract minimalism. The instruments listed here are: Homemade instruments and amplified palette. I wish I could have seen this being recorded so I could really get a grasp on what exactly is going on her. Bed Springs, metal trays, lengths of rope, broken guitars, plastic drums? I have no idea what exactly is going on but it sounds awesome. This is an excellent example of electroacoustic music or maybe musique concrete. Simple screen printed reclaimed record covers with xeroxed inserts. I seriously feel like I could destroy Sunday's NYT crossword after having heard this. - Demian Johnston

(Monk Mink Pink Punk) Seeded Plane is one of the many sound projects of Bryan Day, here playing homemade instruments with Jay Kreimer and Chicago's famous amplified palette inventor Hal Rammel. Rammel was one of few noise musicians I saw when I lived in Chicago way back when (1992?). The three musicians conjure a racket of plinks and scrapes, like a bad day in a xylophone factory. Maybe a thumb piano factory on a good day. Regardless, it is an intense rumble of noises divorced any instrument. It's a rolling sea of noises. One side of an LP is not enough Hal Rammel, it's almost insulting, but the quartet of multi-instrumentalists (D)(B)(H) makes a nice second side and I can't fault them for anything. Saxophone, trumpet, and drums are folded in with tapes, metal (objects), strangely-played guitar. It's a free and exciting music, the players know how to leave space for the others. - Josh Ronsen

(Foxy Digitalis) (D)(B)(H) and Seeded Plain split sides on this LP of improvised music. Both groups demonstrate multiple modes of listening and performing through unique instrumentation and performance. (D)(B)(H) plays live on Bloomington Indiana’s WFHB community radio employing Marty Belcher on saxophones, Justin Clifford Rhody on trumpet, tapes, guitar, harmonica and cymbals, Kray Korvella performs metal objects, tapes, guitar and radio and Daniel Wick rounds out the ensemble on percussion. Seeded Plain is Brian Day and Jay Kreimer on homemade instruments joined on this recording by Hal Rammel and his amplified palette. The side long improvisation from (D)(B)(H) – “Bad for Business” – illustrates improvisation predicated on listening and emulation as much as it highlights ingenuity and performance. The instrumentation blends together as much as it stands on its own, at times the saxophones and guitars are intertwined in sustain so that it’s hard to discern feedback from howl. Yet there are moments of certainty wherein each instrument executes its known characteristics. The pace of the piece revolves around the transference of ideas between players, which come and go, entertained and forgotten at a leisurely rate. This is not to say the piece is without intensity, while silence and restraint are employed by all performers so are noise and abandon. There is an overall quality to this recording of finding or creating a language. There is as much frustration in the performance as there is elation. The balance between these two elements makes for an engaging listen. Seeded Plain and Hal Rammel utilizes modified everyday objects as their instruments. Brian Day and Jay Kreimer use a collection of disparate materials ranging from tape measures to golf balls, however much of their instruments are built from raw materials such as metal rods, wood and various strings and springs. Both Day and Kreimer amplify their instruments and use some form of processing. Day opts for pedals while Kreimer uses a laptop. Hal Rammel’s electrified palette is a painter’s palette which he has attached tines to the edges making it similar to an Mbira which he can pluck or bow. There is a distinct richness in the tones which are culled from these creations which without their modifications would be unheard. The sounds range from lush bell-like sounds and singing bowls to grading scraping and attack heavy percussion. Many of the sounds could well be electronically generated due to the use of amplification, however the clarity and density of the sounds reinforces their acoustic origin. Seeded Plain and Hal Rammel perform with a more “all over” aesthetic as compared to the minimal moments of (D)(B)(H) – both sides engage the listener in an active listening situation that finds each play of the LP revealing new intricacies. - John Collins McCormick

(Still Single) Two Midwestern outfits get active. (D)(B)(H) side = Euro free improvisation, the type with a saxophone spastically/gingerly blurting while three guys clatter metal and percussive objects in restless fashion. Takes a whole side to resolve... Seeded Plain team up with Hal... Rammel on their side for some even more abstract, noisome improvisation on homemade instruments and amplified palette... unpredictable, as the listener can neither see nor determine the makeup of the tools at play here – part windchime, part cheese slicer? Who had six thumbs and fingers that are all cut up and mutilated? THESE GUYS. Adventurous listening, particularly the latter, in a homemade looking sleeve. One has to wonder if the economic nightmare of Europe circa now is putting a damper on guys like these, and their ability to make a living through their art; after all, this is where such music seemed to thrive for decades on end. Then again, is that even a concern for such groups? The ivy-covered walls of academia and the rebellion that brews within each individual trapped inside informs the scrappy, unsettling sounds found here. - Doug Mosurock

(Dead Angel) Enigmatic stuff from Seeded Plain (and pal Hal Rammel) and another artist even more cryptic and obscure. The (D)(B)(H) side is entitled "Bad For Business" and consists of four improv musicians -- Justin Rhody (trumpet, tapes, guitar, harmonica, cymbals), Kray Korbella (metal objects, tapes, guitar, radio), Marty Belcher (saxophones, metal), and Daniel Wick (percussion) -- making odd squiggly noises in the name of art during a session recorded on WFHB community radio in Bloomington, IN during the summer of 2010. Like most free improv records, if you aren't already down with the concept, it will sound like nothing more than a lot of random bleating and squeaking, but there's plenty to appreciate here in the tones and eccentric sounds they generate, and unlike a lot of improv bands, they leave plenty of space in their sound. There's a lot going on, sometimes even many things at once, but it rarely grows so overwhelming that you can't pick out the individual instruments, and much of the time those separate instruments are left to weave around each other rather than together, creating a sound that's persistent without being exceptionally busy. The four tracks from the flip side feature Seeded Plain (Bryan Day and Jay Kreimer) using homemade instruments and Hal Rammel using an amplified palette to create an exotic array of percussive noises and peculiar sounds. Their approach is brighter and busier, but still very much in the skronk vein; there's no readily discernible attempt at structure happening here, just a dizzying avalanche of weird sounds and tones circling around each other, like alien ships looking for a place to land. The album comes with an insert featuring liner notes and artwork, housed in a repurposed thrift-store record jacket broken apart, turned inside-out, and repainted on the cover. You can't get much more DIY than this, doom childe. - RKF

(Monsieur Délire) A split LP. A Side: the quartet (D)(B)(H) in a side-long free improvisation involving real instruments (trumpet, sax), found objects, metal, and percussives. Rich, changing, stimulating music - fine work. B Side: four tracks of a collaboration between Hal Rammel (and his amplified palette) and Seeded Plain (Jay Kreimer, Bryan Day, and their homemade instruments): delicate dialogues between fragile and puzzling sounds. Recycled LP sleeve. A fine release and a good pairing. - François Couture