REVIEWS reviews...... sounds...... pictures...... words...... links...... info from The Wire Issue 168 ­ February 1998 in brief / outer limits column   The Apiary Descent THE FOUNDRY FOU03 CD eM Djinn THE FOUNDRY FOU01 CD The first two releases proper from the new California label, The Foundry, showcasing the collective forces of, um, M. Bentley, who monikers as both eM and The Apiary as well as performing most of the tracks on a compilation called Eclectronica (an unusual exploration of Ambient Classical ­ Grieg, Schubert and New Age melodies as played on a wheezing sombre-toned cinema organ). Djinn is the most promising, drawing on Panasonic and Ryoji Ikeda to explore the nature of electromagnetic sound. Tracks have descriptions such as "This world is haunted, as am I. Feedback signal, static charges" ­ and that's pretty much what you get: live processing of radio, TV and computer signals, clean irreducible hums and scribbles of noise and heartbeat pulses, but with occassional added woodwind synths and Ambient surrounds for that haunted feel. This is really between two worlds ­ a Manichean struggle between the New Age and the experimental, with electromagnetism taking the place of whale noises. Descent is more explicitly Norse and mystical. The accompaniment to an installation, it explores repeating thematic materials: a melodic bass series, lonely piping, sparse synthesizer notes with added spectral effects. For me, all this priestliness in the shadows draws a cloying caul over the sparks of possibility in the music. Matt ffytche