Viktor Timofeev returns to Lo Bit Landscapes with “Palace of Peace and Reconciliation”, a set of odes to digital alienation. The suite of tracks form a meditative soundtrack to an ancient eon and a crumbling artifact of the electronic era where laments unto the bitrate gods bend and swirl over estranged networks, fusing forms that feel both mystical and computer-rendered at the same time.
Conceived, recorded, and pressed to a unique vinyl/CD gatefold format in 2016 as the follow-up to his debut GIVE_HEALTH999, this release was delayed due to the unceremonious and unexpected shutdown of 79 Lorimer, the Brooklyn home of the Lo Bit Landscapes label (you can read more about the situation at Vice here). Finally seeing the light of day in 2021, the record actually follows Timofeev’s more recent set of recordings collected on “Exocursion”, released on Futura Resistenza earlier in 2021. The fact that the audio contained herein has been dug out of the wreckage and resurrected feels supremely poignant, given the way this music will make you feel.
The album’s searing guitars are at times reminiscent of his critically acclaimed (Resident Advisor, Aquarius Record of the Week) work on NIHITI’s sonic World War II epic “for ostland”, but here the structures are looser, the forms more misshapen, and the fidelity more abstract – more in line with the digital stutters of Timofeev’s work with Wire cover stars Quantum Natives as Zolitude or NYC outsider house champion Bryce Hackford (DFA).
FACTS
1. Science is real.
2. Map is not the territory.
3. Lenin was a mushroom.
QUESTIONS
1. What is the biggest inspiration for your music?
General curiosity and hunger for expression.
2. How and when did you get into making music?
How and when did you get into making music?
I played music growing up, mostly balalaika and guitar. Years later I started jamming with friends and it turned into a metal band, which didn’t go very far. I kept messing around with string instruments and wanted to see if I could make my own compositions so that I didn’t have to deal with any kind of group dynamics.
3. What are 5 of your favourite albums of all time?
Very hard to narrow these things down so maybe I will just say these are the albums that I have been coming back to in the last few months.
Nico – Marble Index
Klaus Schulze – Timewind
Coil – Remote Viewer
Pauline Anna Strom – Trans Millenia Consort
The Russian Doomer playlists 1-19 on youtube (from justmyfavstrangemusic)
4. What do you associate with Berlin?
Unfortunately, I left Berlin on a bad note due to some health problems, so I now associate it with chronic illness. Beyond that I would like to keep the early days of Tempelhof airport in my memory, when it was still a kind of strange, empty, and vast space.
5. What’s your favourite place in your town?
I live in Brooklyn and my favorite place is Blue Park, a local skate spot. What makes it so fun is that there’s always a vibrant scene happening. Handball courts full of yelling and chanting, volleyball courts, kids’ rollerblading, Bad Bunny blasting, and of course the skating. There’s a lot of fun objects to skate and the community there is warm and diverse.
6. If there was no music in the world, what would you do instead?
Drawing and painting.
7. What was the last record/music you bought?
The back catalogue of Ingus Baušķenieks, who was part of the Latvian group Dzeltenie Pastnieki.
8. Who would you most like to collaborate with?
Existence Without Authority.
9. What was your best gig (as performer or spectator)?
Swans at Berghain.
10. How important is technology to your creative process?
I actively try to keep things as simple and off-screen as possible, but I don’t always succeed.
11. Do you have siblings and how do they feel about your career/art?
I have a younger brother who is interested in what I do. I think he likes my visual work more than my music but I’m not really sure.
Photo © Viktor Timofeev
