released May 25, 2007

RECENZJE / REVIEWS (fragmenty / excerpts):

„Awangardowe opowieści na stalowe instrumenty perkusyjne: konwencjonalne oraz zbudowane a także przedmioty. Muzyka oparta na nierytmicznym rytmie. Wibrująca metalowa przestrzeń, skłębione płaszczyzny echa i konsekwencji uderzenia, statyczna energia zagadkowego rytualnego napięcia, oczekiwanie i zatrzymanie, magiczne sygnały i ostrzeżenia.”
Henryk Palczewski, Informator „ARS”2

„100% Recycled Sound Installation – głosi napis na pieczęci wewnątrz okładki. Muzyka z recyklingu? Ba, ze śmietnika i ze złomowiska. Dzwonki z gwoździ, gongi z patelni i pokryw od pralek, kanistry, metalowe beczki, a nawet felgi i resory. Instrumentarium z odzysku. Przypominać może o prorokach industrialu z Einstürzende Neubauten i Test Department na czele. HATI idzie jednak własną ścieżką, która wiedzie wprost do korzeni. Miast na hałas, stawiają na sublimację tych źródłowych dźwięków. Z jednej strony przypominają o wynalazczej inwencji instrumentalistów z Afryki i Karaibów, a z drugiej przywołują subtelne dociekania awangardy minimal music. Mieszając plemienny rytuał z natchnioną medytacją, realizują te wyzwania znakomicie.” Rafał Księżyk, MACHINA nr 19 (październik 2007)

"Album Works for Scrap Metal należy do najbardziej udanych zarówno pod względem konceptualnym, jak i brzmieniowym płyt dekady; nagrany wyłącznie przy użyciu instrumentów domowej roboty wykonanych z surowców wtórnych: gongów z pralek, łańcuchów z wieczek od zniczy, kanistrów, gwoździ, felg, resorów i tym podobnych."
Tomasz Gregorczyk: magazyn.o.pl/2011/podsumowanie-pierwszej-dekady-w-muzyce-w-xxi-wieku/3/

”Polish metal music (in the most literary sense of the word) musicians HATI have already released a bunch of CDRs and toured quite a bit, including various concerts with Z'EV. On 'Works for Scrap Metal' they do not necessarily present one or more pieces of music, but the results of a sound installation of some kind. These metallic constructions are played by hand or by mechanical objects. Only in the long 'Barrels III' we get the idea that things are played manually. In the other pieces things sound a bit more mechanical (perhaps I am entirely wrong here). The music is less based on electronic, if any at all, and the lack of reverb to create those artificial overtones is also not really present, which makes this into quite an enjoyable CD of atmospheric metal percussion music. Not with the similar
power of some of the early z'evwork, but more on a meditative level, which works quite nice.”
Frans de Waard, Vital Weekly, number 579

“Works For Scrap Metal, the sixth and so far longest release from Polish gong-and-dronemongers Hati, is a compilation of pieces recorded live in Hati’s studio during 2005 and 2006, and it was issued in May 2007 on Hati’s own Eter label. At the time these recordings were made, Hati were still a duo comprising Rafal Iwanski and Dariusz Wojtas, although they are currently performing as a trio, with the addition of Rafal Kolacki. According to Hati’s press release, the album is an integral element of their 100% Recycled Sound Installation project, which has been presented in various gallery settings in Poland. All the instruments used for it were fabricated from scrap metal, and in a way, Works For Scrap Metal is one step beyond even the aesthetic austerity of the early Hati release, 2003’s Music For Metal Idiophones, which utilised exclusively metal percussion instruments, but didn’t insist on their scrap-metal origins.
Eight tracks extend over 63 minutes, with each track simply named after the instrument used on it. ‘Springs’ opens the work with a tinkling cascade of delicate tintinnabulations (and there’s a word that doesn’t get out often enough these days!). ‘Barrels I’ follows, slower and deeper, more sonorous, a solemn and meditative piece with distinctive and deliberately placed strikes. ‘Shakers’ is busier and more chaotic, a clattering, whirring conversation between assorted rattling devices. ‘Chaingong’ is sonically diverse, with both high- and low-pitched gong beats overlaid with a brighter clattering, which, judging from the title, is generated in some way involving chains. ‘Barrels II’ is both faster and louder than ‘Barrels I’, taking a continuous rolling beat and gradually building to a noisy, immersive crescendo – it really feels as if you’re inside an oil-drum being played on this one! ‘Lidgong’ eases the pace, with a slow, restful track much more like ‘Barrels I’. ‘Coverchains’ reprises the cacophonous, multilayered confusion of ‘Shakers’, sounding a lot like a herd of goats with bells around their necks being driven to market. The final track ‘Barrels III’, at 28 minutes easily the longest piece on Works For Scrap Metal, is a distant, oceanic, rumbling drone of continuous rolling beats, with individual beats hard to distinguish from each other, something like a massively extended roll played on a kettle drum. The sheer scale and severe minimalism of this piece are impressive in the same way that the colour field paintings of New York painters like Barnett Newman are impressive – it’s easy to lose yourself in the work, ego is annihilated as the waves of sound wash over the listener. It would really be something special to see this performed live.
So overall, how does Works For Scrap Metal rate within Hati’s discography? Well, whilst Hati are a consistently interesting project and one of my favourites within the broad field of ritualistic ambient, I must admit to a preference for the releases like Genius Loci and Zero Coma Zero, which combine wind instruments of various kinds with the metal percussion, as opposed to releases like this one and Music For Metal Idiophones, which focus exclusively on metal percussion. With the mixed releases, there’s more variety and interplay, whereas the percussion-only releases do tend towards monotony in my opinion – although, as I said previously, ‘Barrels III’ is just so incredibly long and overwhelming that it manages to break on through the monotony barrier into a timeless nirvana-like state. I almost wish this track had been released all by itself.
Works For Scrap Metal is a limited edition of 500 copies, and its packaging is rather special. A hand-numbered, stamped cardboard envelope with stark monochrome artwork unfolds to reveal a 24-page booklet of informative texts in both Polish and English, as well as the CD itself. And yes, it ‘s all on recycled paper.”
Simon Collins