Review

Philipp Otterbach

Correct Me If I Am Incorrectly You

Offen Music • 2023

Album of the Year 2023

The minimalism of »Correct Me If I Am Incorrectly You« is overwhelming even before the first note. The liner notes talk of »post-musical phantasmagoria«, throw around names that hardly anyone knows, and conclude by saying that this is deconstructed entertainment for hopeless romantics. All in four lines. Yes, exactly. But if you listen to the seven tracks on this album, you actually get all that from Philipp Otterbach. Somehow. Because on the surface, this record could easily be categorised as ambient and sound art. But there is more to it than that, in the empty spaces, ghostly effects and samples of »Aug 18, 95«, for example, where the rhythm marches on unperturbed while the rest of the piece indulges in an exorcism, before everything ends in the almost classical structures of a song with drums and bass. »Oct 01, 21« also works with its striking bass, but with the synthesizers and effects it hangs in the air and is barely tangible. Is this post-music? Does it transcend certain processes? Not really. Rather, Philipp Otterbach creates his own sonic universe on the album, which can only come from him in his very distinctive way. Minimalist, dark, sparkling. This sound needs much less theoretical superstructure—because all this can be heard much better than it can be expressed in words.