FrankenHöff (1998 - 2001)

During our years in ambibat, Eric and I would often get together to do some 4-track recordings as a duo. It was still improv but it leaned more towards the ambient than ambibat. As FrankenHöff – that's what we called ourselves – Eric and I played a few shows at ABC No-Rio and Spiral.

Here's one of our homemade recordings on Eric's 4-track...


[DOWNLOAD] FrankenHöff - Four Studies Of A Motion (2/28/98)
01- Motion_1
02- Motion_2
03- Motion_3
04- Motion_4

In 2000, Eric and I decided to take FrankenHöff into the studio. For the recording we recruited Chris Altenhoff (ambibat bassist) – his last name has "hoff" in it so it's all good. As a trio we recorded a few hours of improvisations on the sci-fi tip.

As I was listening back to the tapes during the next few weeks a story began to take shape in my head. I figured if we took a passage here, a section there, add some found sound and record some extra layers...piece them together and it could play like a soundtrack to a lost sci-fi film. Well, this process became very labor intensive and it cost some dough in studio hours. This, plus the arrival of Earl Pickens, lead to Eric quitting both ambibat and FrankenHöff. At least that's my take on it.

In the end, FrankenHöff Battle To Save The World And The Girl, Too! is a pretty cool recording. I think Eric would agree...


[DOWNLOAD] FrankenHöff - Battle To Save The World And The Girl, Too! (2000)
01- I
02- II
03- III
04- IV


When I was making Bellmore: The Unscene, I asked Joe Kollar to help out with the graphics. He did, of course, and I'm very grateful. In the package of art and images I gave him there was some illustrations I used for the back of the FrankenHöff CD. Joe took it upon himself to animate them, so I put it to some music from the album...



FRANKENHÖFF
Frank Fusco - guitar, turntable/tape deck/radio, electronics
Eric Hoffman - synthesizer, drums, electronics
Chris Altenhoff - bass, arp odyssey, electronics