UNMAP-Pressures

The genesis of UNMAP is the logical and fascinating consequence of Mariechen Danzs and Alex Stolzes collaborations. Mariechen Danz- born in Ireland- is a performance artist who tries to connect her works by using music and Alex Stolze a member of the Berlin-based indietronica band Bodi Bill- signed to the German DIY-label Sinnbus. Already earlier Danz did some works with BODI BILL, for example the feature Depart which you can find on their second album Next Time. At first they just highlighted Danzs performances with music,but after a while something greater emerged. The fusion between Danzs art and Stolzes music has been very special and they decided to form a band. They brought Matthias Geserick (bass) and Thomas Fietz(electronic drums) in and the quartet UNMAP emerged.

 Pressures is the name of their debut record- released a few days ago via Sinnbus.It's union of electropop,soul, r'n'b , triphop and electronica. Genre-borders are exeeded, contrasts created, song-structures prised. Like Danz said in an interview with artistxite.com : " UNMAP stands for de-territorializing“.You can't allocate their music to a genre-it's all and nothing. Also the lyrical texts try to break boundaries- the boundaries of speech, religion and mind. Hierarchies should be dissolved, conventions violated. It's a record about the dark sides of life-lost in time and lost in space. Danz perfectly applied voice is the leader trough the blurred and gloomy sound-structures- sometimes clinical, then full of emotions, one time feminine just to be a few seconds afterwards masculine.Pressures arise trough this antagonisms.

There is the pervasive opener Wire Rule-a song which won't drop out of your body for a long time. Followed by the single The Gold Route-featuring a delayed drum beat which swirls around Danz typical sprechgesang. When To Lead And When To Follow attaches all of the above named genres- electropop, triphop,electronica,soul and r’n’b. But it's probably Pressures last track -A B C (Hierarchy of the Alphabet)- which incarnates UNMAP's intentions best. Danz recites the alphabet from the beginning to the end in order to afterwards do it the other way around. In between these two fractions is an intermediate part where she sings "to speak another way“. 

That's just what UNMAP want to do- they want to be different, speak another way- the way of music and art. An aim which they definitely achieved with their extraordinary debut Pressures.

 originally published  on http://nbhap.com/music/reviews/record-reviews/unmap-pressures-album/

 (Miriam Wallbaum)