quantised entanglement – 9013DL (2025), Inclusion Principle (Discus Music)
quantised entanglement is the latest in a series of EPs being released this year by Martin Archer and Hervé Perez to celebrate twenty years of them making music together as the duo Inclusion Principle. Both reed players, they diversify variously into electronics, field recordings, shakuhachi and recorders among other things. As a title, it’s a great metaphor for the work of a duo: two particles that, however far apart they might be, share the same fate. It’s a pretty weird idea, too and, as we’ll see, weirdness has a part to play in what’s happening here. As any fan of Archer and Perez will know, they have perfected the knack of making music that sounds new every time while, at the same time, sounding unmistakably like IP. And I like, too, the way they create that sound by, as well as generating elements of their own, combining elements from the vernacular of different genres (for example, IDM, retro sax gestures) in startlingly original ways. As I’ve remarked before, I’m guessing this is the origin of the name: if a sound sounds as if it might be useful, it’s included on principle.
In the notes which accompany the EP, we’re told to expect music here that’s ‘beat driven’ and from the very outset, it is. The start of ‘fire dance’ put me in mind of the world of Chris and Cosey, but almost immediately, the birdsong (electronically generated or field recording?) kicked in, reminding me where I was. It’s a track, too, with a decidedly psychedelic feel to it, the kind of music that might almost suit a sitar. The next track – the first interlude – creates a mood of compelling weirdness, which is at the same time lush and exotic. In this case, the weirdness had me thinking of the stories of Robert Aickman, an impression reinforced by the title of the next track, ‘twisted mansion’ (one Aikman’s best weird stories, The Inner Room, involves a strange dolls’ house ). In the second interlude, against an electronic background, music for shakuhachi and recorder dialogues with the (compressed? reversed?) sounds of a harpsichord-like keyboard. The final track, ‘core wave’, is a six-minute meditation on a G major chord. This could leave us standing around but, in the hands of Archer and Perez, the effect is anything but static. Of all the tracks, this one reminded me most of their first release in this series, the call of a crumbling world: a wave of sound carrying with it sax melodies, fleeting morse glossolalia, birdsong… There’s even a harmonica in there somewhere.
It’s good to know that, in a world where the arts are too often reduced to entertainment, there are outfits like IP working hard to create the real thing and finding new ways to do it. And it’s worth checking out the Discus site for the previous releases in the series. There are several yet to come, too: it would be great to be able to fast forward (so long as one can rewind!) in order to get an overview of them all.
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Dominic Rivron
LINKS
quantised entanglement: https://discusmusic.bandcamp.com/album/quantised-entanglement-9013dl-2025
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