Author: Christoph Albrecht
Bands in Berlin, 21-06-2003
www.b-i-b.de

From classical guitarsound to electro-industrialspheres

MICROTONNER are Paul Proll and Martin Baumann, two sympathetic guys from Austria. The roots of this 1997 founded band are not electronic industrial sounds, like on there latest work "The power of ignorance", they started very classical with bass, drums and guitar. The proportion of musicians and instruments which has to be played, included some problems which caused a search for solutions. As a long-term cooperation with other musicians failed, the boys had to change their tactics. By gradually electronic assembling they started to compensate the disadvantage of a two men business. The consequence was a massive change of sound, in a positive way. Because of this development and a lot of hard work, MICROTONNER became a live-able project. Apart from music, photography, video and graphic design, became more important for them. This had a very positive effect on the presentation of their musical work in the internet and on the self production of "The power of ignorance".

At the moment Paul Proll and Martin Baumann use the internet, where their work is available as download, at nearly 100% for propagation of their music. A positive side-effect of this kind of propagation is the fast feedback, which they use to test new material. The cd "The power of ignorance" is only available by direct order.

But what is behind the meaningful title "The power of ignorance". Firstly, it is a critical confrontation with the state of the world, especially with war and the person of the president in charge to whom they dedicated the song "George II". Particulary this title shows that MICROTONNER knows how to create moods and stimulate reflection with the help of slick language samples. In the song "not only one" MICROTONNER creates an apocalyptic atmosphere through the effective use of electronic instruments. And "red" which capivates the listener by industrial sounds, is definately one of my favourites.

MICROTONNER are highly recommended to fans of electronic and industrial sound. Finally a quotation from the MICROTONNER homepage I totally agree with: "Our mainly instrumental sound includes different drum machines mixed with classical drum set, synthesizers, samples and our guitars. Anyway just listen!".