Free Time/Dead Time by Left Hand Cuts off the Right
The first full length LP for Robbie Judkins’ experimental sound project searches for creativity within the shadows of the daily grind
The first full length LP for Robbie Judkins’ Left Hand Cuts off the Right finds a deserving home on the always engaging Brachliegen Tapes.
Across seven movements, Judkins’ sonic thesis Free Time/Dead Time embraces a minimalist approach and places a sputtering spotlight on the troubled search for creativity within the shadows of the daily grind.
Although the album may seem to initially suggest tonally that it has a mechanical composite DNA, its collage of improvised and composed soundscapes flow with organic flair. Drone – in sound, symbol and status – is at the heart of Free Time/Dead Time, but these dense reverberations are ably supported by a blend of nervy experimental electronics and musique concrète textures.
An exploration of the uneasy intersection of labour and leisure, these soundscapes function as a social commentary on the push-pull force of the work/life balance.
These opposing forces in Free Time/Dead Time symbolically seek a pathway either through, over, or under dank and claustrophobic voids, spore-infested break rooms and industrial labyrinths – all possibly haunted by the spectres of social stasis and the slow tick-tock of the clock.
In Free Time/Dead Time, junk is currency and noise is energy. The hum, hiss and drones of machinery are all eternally in earshot, while dripping pipes and deep tones surround. Sometimes rhythms engage like prickled blood; a hammer bouncing the spine. Other times, they swirl and moan, rattle and grind.
In these subterranean passageways the Minotaur has become the machine. Theseus is now a mere echo of the beast. There’s a strong sense of slow decay at every turn, as our breath is strangled by encroaching electric fog and enclosing damp walls, in search for a moment of fresh air.
When melody appears during ‘Free Time’ it seems to attract shards of flying corroded metal, like a magnet. But despite this, it fails to be drowned out by the din, although it grows heavier and lower in pitch, like raindrops dripping into a broken bucket.
Glimpses of hope do appear briefly; often through grubby planes of glass – possible windows of time, of opportunity; or a mirror to reflect the fractured self. A glittering zither escapes from these interior caverns during ‘That Window’ and offers a possible sighting of far off stars while rain begins to fall.
‘Dead Time’ brings us to a conclusion by a cold drone flooding the soul. We could be in an empty room, caught in dead time; one where anxiety always reverberates our internal and external surroundings. Growing metallic squeaks and rattles begin to incite an action to the hive mind; to be employed overrules the necessity to enjoy.
The message of the dominant hegemony here appears to be: to stock take rather than take stock. Judkins’ tapestry of sonic terrain highlights the fragility in the balance of work and play, but this project shows that if you strive to find the light when surrounded by darkness, great art will always come to the surface.
Free Time/Dead Time by Left Hand Cuts off the Right is available to pre-order from Brachliegen Tapes on limited edition 12" vinyl LP and download. The album will be released on 14 April 2023.
