There are a few problems when it comes to evaluating recordings of electro-acoustic improv. First, the eternal problem with documents of all genres of improv is that it's just a static moment in a continuous evolving creative medium, which best experienced in a live setting. Second, how does one derive more enjoyment from the amalgamation of one set of sounds then from others? Other questions arise of the presence/ lack of ego of the performers, as well as their machismo/restraint. Now that I've posed these questions in text, forget about them; for you�ll become too cognitively busy to actually experience the sounds.

P.O.W.E.R.'s label, tour de bras, hail from Rimouski, Quebec, and seeing that they are in part by financed by the Council of the Arts and Letters of Quebec (that's my pigeon French translation), I will make the brash assumption that the band is also from that province, and more likely from Quebec's Maritimes, not that geographical location is important.

P.O.W.E.R. would seem to be an acronym of sorts, one which would seem unfortunately overtly masculine in this genre of music (the lineup reveals this not to be the case), but that would be misleading. According to their notes it appears that the power in question is the synergetic combinations of the individuals to the whole sound. To me, this sound at times reminds me the old AMM trio, in their busier moments attacked by the feral ferocity some of Osaka's noiseniks of the 90's. There are lambastes of articulated pure noise, but these are offset by more delicate moments. They have nice aesthetic of dynamicism, often lacking in many noise/improv groups, but as good as it is, I can't shake the feeling that it doesn't rise to the status of a document I'll revisit. But maybe that's not the point, and maybe I should just experience them live.