NAKED TRUTH MAGAZINE
Issue Number 10
BORUT KRZISNIK-Currents of Time

Borut Krzisnik hails from Zagreb in the former Yugoslavia and is the founder of the group Data Direct that unite Slovene, Italian and Yugoslav musicians. This CD "Currents Of Time" is Borut Krzisnik's first, originally released in 1991 but re-released in 1998 by Tone Casualties and features 14 tracks of "avant garde rock" or "cool jazz". Borut Krzisnik's music has been used in a lot of theatre and dance performance videos and other projects and he also has contributed pieces to Laibach and Borghesia. The tracks on this CD are entirely insturmental and would I imagine make suitable background music for visual performances. But if you are used to song structures and constructed tunes then this may not be quite what you are looking for. File under eclectic and avant garde and buy something else if your favorite band is The Sisters of Mercy!

 

SONIC BOOM WEB SITE
BORUT KRZISNIK-Currents of Time

Former Laibach live contributor Borut Krzisnik compiles the eclectic collection of music aptly titled "Currents Of Time". Musically, the album leaps across years of classical gypsy music, eastern European folk, and modern electronic rock in a mere hour's worth of recording time. This album is true Industrial music at its best. The release uses every conceivable musical non-sequitor at least once, alongside clanging metal, bird samples, ukeleles. You don't just listen to this album. you experience several hundred years worth of musical tradition colliding into one large melting pot.

 

D.L.K. The Hell Key Magazine
Issue #6, February 1999
BORUT KRZISNIK-Currents of Time
Review by Marc Urselli-Scharer

Slovenian musician Krzisnik is a member of Wax Trax artist Borghesia and a touring guitarist for Mute artist Laibach. The album has been originally released by Recommended Records UK and has now been re-issued by Tone Casualties. The fourteen pieces on this strange CURRENTS OF TIME offer you a polychromatic, poly-rhythmic and manifold nowave/improv music performed with an insturmental set focusing on Krzisnik's own insturment, guitar (noisy, heavily distorted, in feedback, clean, detuned, abused or whatever else it may be), without forgetting the usual nowave crazy horns, jazzy drums, funny and fanciful bass lines and of course lots of samples and noises! Pure experimental/no-wave musick in the vein of Italians Plume E. Sangue or American Post Prandials but with a less epileptic and less cacophonic approach. Also there are three absolute crazy compositions by Mario Marlot. In some of the songs you may even recognize the Slovenian roots of the artist through tunes and sounds unmistakably bound to Eastern cultures.

 

DAMN! MAGAZINE
Number 16, March 1999
BORUT KRZISNIK-Currents of Time
Review by Jester

Former laibach live contributor Borut Krzisnik compiles this eclectic collection of music aptly titled Currents of Time. Musically, the album leaps across years of classical gypsy music, eastern European folk, & modern electronic rock in a mere hours worth of recording time. This album is true Industrial music at its best. The release uses every conceivable musical non-sequitor at least once, alongside clanging metal, bird samples, ukeleles. You don't just listen to this album, you experience several hundred years worth of musical tradition colliding into one large melting pot.

 

DIGITAL INTERSECT MAGAZINE
Number 3, December 1998
BORUT KRZISNIK-Currents of Time

Tone Casualties has re-released Borut Krzisnik's 1991 debut solo album Currents of Time, originally issued by the Reccomended Records and Point East labels in England.Borut Krzisnik is a founding member of the Slovenian band Data Direct and has played guitar for Laibach and Borghesia. He has also composed music for numerous theatrical plays and art videos.

The avant-garde guitarist and composer expertly combines elements of jazz, classical, and rock to create the perfect musical free for all. Guitar, both acoustic and electric, is Krzisnik's insturment of choice but he makes effective use of other insturments organic and electronic, percussion, wind insturments, keyboards and piano. Guest contributors include saxophonist Mario Marlot, pianist Hugo Sekoranja, Bassist's Nino De Gleria and Anton Kovac. The most remarkable thing about Krzisnik's music is his ability to incorporate so many different kinds of music into his recordings. The first track on Currents of Time is very acoustical, but shades of classic metal ala Black Sabbath and Dream Theater can be heard on "The Play of The Puppets". On "Break To Build (Build To Break)" Krzisnik experiments with a mix of orchestrated classical music and sound collage.

Borut Krzisnik plays with the skill and depth of a classically trained guitarist, but he's mastered jazz, folk, and rock styles as well. His greatest strength however, lies in his avant-garde compositions. Currents of Time is an ingenius musical creation, as relevant now as it was eight years ago when it was recorded.

 

FAQT Magazine Vol. 3 Number 1
BORUT KRZISNIK-Currents of Time
Haiku Review

joining the circus
manic eclecticism
some Zappa learnings

 

The Fritz Magazine, Vol. 4 Number 3
Borut Krzisnik, "Currents of Time"
Review by Melissa Cain

If you're at all familiar with the gothic band Laibach, or you just happen to have a penchant for cutting-edge experimental European music, then you may have heard of Borut Krzisnik since, after all, Borut is a name that tends to stick in your head. A skilled guitarist and pianist, Borut can normally be found lending his substantial musical talent to the gothic industrial band Laibach and composing music for his own numerous side projects. He also is the leader of Data Direct, an eclectic European band which dabbles in electronica. This time out, Borut is without Data Direct or Laibach, appearing instead in a project that is all his own. Now, via the Tone Casualties record label, Borut has released an album that is surprising and exciting and runs the gamut of experimental music.

Along with several other musicians, Borut Krzisnik creates a fanciful world full of both music and intruguing noise. Each piece on this solo offering is unique and imaginative. It seems as though each one was painstakingly pieced together from as many different samplings as possible, and then these sounds were sewn together and made coherent via familiar musical insturments. The musicians skillful musical talent with piano or guitar provide a common thread which carries through almost every piece and helps to string the sounds into viable music as opposed to senseless noise.

Ah, and what a world Borut has created! Like something out of a half-lit, shadowy twilight zone comes "Currents of Time". If you're not careful, the music on this album can creep up on you, ensnare you, and basically transport you into a realm which is altogether a bit too surreal. At least, it is if you're listening to it in the wee hours of the night , but this albums still a little scary even if you've got it playing during afternoon tea.

Still, though, Borut does some amazing stuff. He and his fellows play around with everything and seem inclined to attempt to create music out of anything. My personal favorite was Borut's combination of a classical violin and cello, flowing and twisting about, with each note singing in the air, occasionally interrupted by a ringing telephone and a trinkling keyboard. Also included in this six minute long piece, called "Break To Build (Build To Break)" is a lurid harpsicord and some really demented carnival music. The latter conjured up twisted images of dimly lit, snarling carousel horses breathing acrid smoke (yes I took that as an indication that I probably should not listen to this stuff at such an early hour.) Perhaps, though, that is the best thing about htis kind of music; it definitely appeals to more than one of the five senses. I liked sitting back, closing my eyes and absorbing it, trying to come up with visual images to match the sounds which were assaulting my brain.

So, fourteen tracks later, my head is still throbbing from the onslaught of sounds, samples, noise and music. It was fascinating to hear the juxtaposition of sound and melody with various random chaotic bits thrown in for sheer fun. I liked the fact that the tinkling toy piano and heavy bass and thudding guitar were prevalent throughout the album. It was a good way to tie the entire thing together, I think. In his first solo endeavor, Borut has given us some of experimental music at its best. Even if "Currents of Time" gets rather weird and creepy in places, it's definitely an interesting offering. The world it creates, although twisted and convoluted in places, is kind of fun to wander through. And anyway, even if you don't like the music, it is always good to take a step away from familiar music and take a peek at what's going on in the less mainstream corners of the music industry.

 

Atlanta Press, Nov. 27-Dec.3 1998
BORUT KRZISNIK-Currents of Time
Review by Mitchell Foy

Given his work with groups like Borghesia and Laibach, one might mistake a record by Borut Krzinik to be rife with endlessly throbbing beats, a few crunchy samples and the occasional sub-European grunts. But check the label. This isn't Metropolis or Nettwerk, it's the grand Tone Casualties, so boring industrial cliches are nowhere to be found. Instead, what we have is something that appears horribly indecisive on the surface. The action changes directions constantly for the first 13 minutes, giving the sensation of a lack of direction, if not outright schizophrenia. In fact, after the first few listens I was convinced this was just a bunch of different ideas tossed in a blender. But repeated listens are required for this one. Music that comes from so many different directions takes a different approach to assimilate. Once there things start to make sense and suddenly other music doesn't quite sound the same. The world around is a strange place and reality is exposed as this subjective transitionary state of continual flux. Life doesn't seem so dull and beyond control. Ideas take on a life of their own and mental boundaries fall away like skin from a snake. Then the disc ends, the boss calls to tell you to be in an hour early on Monday for a meeting, and BAM! you're back in the "real world". There is a distinct importance to wizards like Krzisnik, in the hands of whom technology is the sword and wisdom is the wand. The listeners mind, then, becomes the ceremonial terrain.

 

Outburn Magazine
BORUT KRZISNIK-Currents of Time
Review by Steven Teref

Currents of Time (originally released in 1991 by Reccomended Records) by Borut Krzinik (ex-Borghesia and Laibach) is a carnivalistic jazz that is beyond categorization. It dips in and out of moods and styles, mixing Krzinik's intricate guitar playing with crazy samples. Jumpy moments a lonesome metronome ticks; Metallica-esque riffs chug; a sample of Janet Jackson's Rhythm Nation sounds; a lone saxophone drones ; dirgy metal drives on. This is for people with short attention spans. You may not be able to follow it, but you won't be bored.