Before email, file sharing, and social media transformed how musicians connected, the international cassette underground functioned as its own creative ecosystem. Artists found one another through independent publications such as Option and Sound Choice, cassette labels, mail art, and handwritten correspondence. A review accompanied by a mailing address was often enough to spark an enduring artistic relationship.
It was through this network that Belgian composer Dirk Serries, then recording as Vidna Obmana, and American composer Phillip B. Klingler, recording as PBK, first came into contact. Their earliest documented correspondence dates from 1988, when Dirk invited PBK to contribute three compositions to the cassette compilation The Ambient Wax Ritual. That invitation quickly evolved into a collaboration, resulting in two full-length works, Monument of Empty Colours and Depression and Ideal. Originally released on cassette in 1989, these recordings explored slowly evolving drones, looping harmonic structures, and immersive sonic environments whose dense, monolithic presence and deliberate pacing anticipated what would later become recognized as the dark ambient aesthetic. Reissued several times over the ensuing decades, the albums continue to be regarded as important early works whose artistic value extends well beyond their historical significance.
Although their artistic paths diverged over the following decades, both composers continued to develop highly individual musical languages while remaining committed to exploration and experimentation. More than three decades after their last collaboration, they reunited to create amplitude split. Rather than revisiting the sound of their earlier recordings, both artists allowed their independently evolved musical vocabularies to meet on entirely new ground.
From its opening moments, amplitude split draws the listener into a dense, continually shifting structure of sound. Resonant guitar, abstract electronics, drones, and transformed sonic textures merge into an electroacoustic environment in which individual sources gradually lose their identity, becoming part of an ever-changing sonic fabric. The music resists narrative and imagery, directing the listener instead toward the internal life of sound itself. Crackling electrical textures emerge, dissolve, and reappear in new forms, while subtle shifts in resonance and spatial depth continually reshape the listening experience. At times the music feels almost claustrophobic in its density, yet its fascination lies precisely in this relentless process of transformation. Rather than relying on melody or conventional song structures, the compositions reward sustained listening, revealing new relationships as they continually evolve.
When Dirk Serries and PBK first exchanged recordings, every new composition crossed the Atlantic by post, carried on cassette tapes accompanied by handwritten letters. Today those same sounds can be exchanged in seconds, yet the quiet faith that somewhere, on the other side of the Atlantic another artist was listening remains at the heart of their collaboration. Amplitude Split is the latest chapter in that enduring dialogue.
This release is a professionally made lathe cut LP, limited to 25 hand numbered copies. Each copy comes with exclusive artwork by Martina Verhoeven, housed in a resealable deluxe polypro highly transparent sleeve. The release is enriched with a textured artisan paper insert with embossed stamp, a label card and sticker. Lathe cut pressing by My Studio, France. (PLEASE NOTE: THE PHYSICAL RELEASE IS SOLD OUT)
All guitars and outboard effects performed and recorded at the French music room by Dirk Serries. All electronics, synthesizers recorded at PBK Home Studio, Chicago, IL. Mixed by PBK. Mastered by Dirk Serries. Exclusive artwork by Martina Verhoeven.