Merge

Ken Ikeda is a musician and artist who has composed and recorded for David Lynch and for Moriko Mori, latterly as part of the Royal Academy's 'Apocalypse' exhibition in 2001. He featured as part of Sonic Boom, at the Hayward Gallery, London in 2000. He has released two albums for Touch. The first, tzuki [Moon] (Touch # T33.17, 2000), was strangely reminiscent of early Durrutti Column, hypnotic, dreamy and mystical. Here a darker side to his work unfolds; although retaining Buddhist notions of circles and cycles and other natural laws and influences, here he contemplates nature's shadowy side. The title, Merge, has as it's root 'to drown' or 'immerse' oneself, it's current usage with regard to convergence or (business) partnership not recorded until 1926 (OED). The double-edged nature of this recording is also reflected by it's entirely different aspect determined by whether one plays it at high or low volume. These notions are further reflected in Jon Wozencroft's photography - two small and uninhabited islands almost enveloped by the rising sea levels, juxtaposed with a view of New York's Upper East Side, taken from Central Park, skyscrapers swimming in the cloud cover...