David Lee Myers’s “Terrenus” reviewed by Il Manifesto
@c + Visiophone’s “30×N — LRJ1” reviewed by Bad Alchemy
30xN — LRJ1 (C 242, DL) greift, wie auch schon „30xN — VRD1“ (C 235), Klangfäden auf, die @c + Visiophone bei ihrer audiovisuellen Performance „30xN“ gesponnen haben. Nun mit ‘LRJ1’ als von Mensch und Maschine, von Miguel Carvalhais & Pedro Tudela und einem Modular-System partnerschaftlich generiertem Track, der in seinem pochenden Tropfen, flattrigen Dröhnen, Surren, prickeligen Knistern und seiner stereophonen Räumlichkeit zur Vorlage wurde für Remixe. Zuerst ‘Wind Measure’ von Joana de Sá, die, mit Piano und Electronics, mit IKB bei Creative Sources zu hören war und mit Savina Yannatou oder allein mit „A Body As Listening“ bei Clean Feed. Ohne groß was am Ausgangsmaterial zu ändern, macht sie allein indem sie gemurmelte Sätze, the tone of her voice, hinzufügt, daraus eine Einladung, ihr Gärtchen zu genießen, wo sie den Wind misst. Dem folgt Jos Smolders mit ‘Sonnet’, als eine Art akustischer Kupferstich und unverhofft quasi in drei Strophen. Tickernd, wummernd, mit tackernder Oszillation, stanzender Rhythmik. Wieder tickernd, mit rhythmischem Dongdong und rauem Zerren. Und nochmal tickernd, brummend, mit heller Harmonik drüber. Und dazu einer zwitschernden Coda. [BA 131 rbd]
New release: Durán Vázquez + Kloob
Durán Vázquez and Kloob have known each other for over 25 years, sharing a strong interest in electronic music. In early 2023 they started collaborating towards developing a long-form work, for which the short story Novel of the White Powder by Arthur Machen became a strong inspiration. Machen’s story is a precursor of what we now know as science fiction, and it drew both to reflect on the symbolic power to express sorrow and terrible feelings, which led them to develop a music of fear, almost as a soundtrack for the story.
Machen’s story is part of a longer episodic novel titled The Three Impostors, but has often been published independently as a short story. In the text, “Vinum Sabbati” is an ingredient for witchcraft that changes people, at first through their personalities but ultimately, making the inner worm, “which lies sleeping within us all”, physically tangible.
Durán Vázquez uses electronic stuff ground through digital means with no procedural or generative algorithms. Metamorphoses of timbre and texture are achieved by manually handling legacy software. In live performances, he approaches sound matter in a semi-improvisational way, using synthesizers and prerecorded material to play around with dynamic range. He has, to this date, released four albums through Crónica.
Dani Kloob has been composing electronic music for 25 years, from underground electronic dance vibes to ambient atmospheric scapes. Since 2010, he is deeply involved in ambient and he has released with the labels Relaxed Machinery, Winter-Light, as well as ZeroK and Eighth Tower records from Unexplained Sounds.
Vinum Sabbati: In the Dawn of Science Fiction is now available as a limited-release CD, stream or download.
New release: @c + Visiophone’s “30×N — LRJ1”
We’re happy to announce @c + Visiophone’s 30×N — LRJ1, now available from Crónica.
30×N — LRJ1 is the second release in a series originating from 30×N, an audiovisual performance by @c + Visiophone.
Each release in this series includes fixed-media audio and audiovisual compositions created from the materials of one of the performance’s sections, both exploring and further expanding the original materials, bringing them into new contexts. The sonic materials are also delivered to other composers that contribute guest remixes.
The remixes in this release are Wind Measure, by Joana de Sá, and Sonnet by Jos Smolders.
Haarvöl’s “Horizons of Suspended Zones” reviewed by Blow Up
Emiter’s “Electromagnetism of the City” reviewed by Anxious
Natura i miasto… Jeśli zestawimy ze sobą te środowiska w kontekście tego, co słyszymy, naturalnie pojawić się może przeciwstawne porównanie – cisza i hałas. Gdyby jednak spróbować usłyszeć w miejskim zgiełku harmonię jego odgłosów? Dobrym punktem wyjścia będzie tu nowy album Emitera. Już sam jego tytuł zachęca do wgłębienia się w dźwięki otoczenia i spojrzenie na nie w zupełnie inny sposób.
Emiter, czyli Marcin Dymiter od lat eksploruje nieoczywiste dźwiękowe przestrzenie z kręgu szeroko rozumianej elektroniki, field recordingu i muzyki improwizowanej. Na swoim koncie ma również wiele instalacji dźwiękowych i słuchowisk. Tworzy również muzykę do filmów, spektakli teatralnych oraz wystaw. Z pewnością można go tym samym zaliczyć go do artystów zupełnie osobnych, których twórczość tak dalece wymyka się wszelkim definicjom. Jednak gdy pojawia się z czymś nowym, można być prawie pewnym, że będzie to twórczość tak samo oryginalna co zupełnie nieoczywista.
Nie inaczej jest w przypadku tego wydawnictwa. Choć dźwięki miasta często mają swoje industrialne pochodzenie, na tym krążku brzmią one wręcz organicznie i niezwykle naturalnie. Łącząc się i przenikając raz po raz tworzą wspólnie dźwiękowy kolaż, na bazie którego dostajemy bardzo zgrabne, transowe kompozycje. Choć zatytułowane są one dość sugestywnie np. Hundreds, Thousands of Devices, czy Harmonies of Noise to paradoksalnie brzmią one wręcz kojąco i bardzo harmonijnie. Nieco surowiej robi się choćby w utworze Dusts and Fluids, gdzie na tle lodowatego minimal techno powtarzana jest fraza – „Nadciąga atomowa burza…”. Takie smaczki nadają całości ciekawego kontrastu. Całości, która zawiera w sobie pełen koloryt otaczającej nas miejskiej rzeczywistości, dokumentując ją przy tym w bardzo wyrafinowany sposób oraz zamykając ją w muzycznej formie. Wojciech Żurek
via Anxious
New release: Emiter’s “Electromagnetism of the City”
We’re very happy to present the new album by Emiter, Electromagnetism of the City. This album is composed from the broad range of noises that surround us in contemporary urban life, on the impulses, discharges, and harmonies of the city. Emiter explores feedbacks, noises, densities, and how streets are like a circuit board where houses are chips and other buildings akin to resistors. The city is then seen as an integrated circuit, as a score for the discharge of electrophonics.
Emiter is a project of Marcin Dymiter, who works in the field of electronic music, field recording and improvised music, creating sound installations, radio plays, film music, theatre performances, exhibitions and public spaces.
Electromagnetism of the City is now available as a limited-release CD, stream or download from Crónica and Crónica’s bandcamp page.
Marc Behrens’s “Clould” reviewed by The Sound Projector
We’re still reeling from Mut Att Narc Imm which we noted in 2019, continuing in our way to typecast this player as severe and extreme in his very distinct approach to minimalism, but it’s more likely we’re still enduring self-induced nightmares and sleepless nights from that image of a red claw. In fact this fellow has a wide range of milieu in which he operates, including installations, performance, theatre, fine art and photography, and not just making records. It’s also important to note that text and image are arguably equally valuable weapons in his Stanley FatMax bag. Matter of fact even the title of Clould is an ingenious compacted piece of textual wordplay, splicing together the “clouds” so familiar to both weathermen and airline pilots, and the verb “could” – strongly implying something our own human potential for doing something.
Having suggested early on that we, as human beings, believe in supernatural beings who live in the clouds and influence us (citation needed), Behrens returns to matter-of-fact realist mode by presenting us with five segments of sound art that have their origins in airports and airplanes. That’s right, field recordings taken from these environments – and I seem to recall that recordings made inside a jet airliner were once quite common among avant-garde sound artists, as they flew from one highly-paid gig to another, but Behrens intends something quite different. For one thing, he’s reprocessing voice recordings (radio announcements?) on these tapes, and grinding them down into atomistic fragments, thereby making some further conceptual and artistic points – he likes the idea that ghosts can appear out of these digital artefacts, that he’s somehow deconstructing language, and even that he’s realigning things on the principles of Buddhist mysticism in some fashion. By this means he circles back to his original proposition about the gods who live in the clouds.
While this thought-equation certainly works on a cerebral level, not all the music here succeeds in manifesting the ideas very strongly, not even when we get to the lengthy climax of the ‘5th Movement’, where the voices truly start to emerge. The nuances of tone variation here are handled with tremendous skill, but the over-familiar digital crunching and time-stretching techniques used on the voice parts are a bit naff, and tend to distract from the plan. I’m not asking for an Erich Von Daniken moment, but surely the voices of the Gods ought to be more convincing, more profound, more articulate than this? Ed Pinsent
Haarvöl’s “Horizons of Suspended Zones” reviewed by Music Map
Haarvöl è il nome di un progetto musicale portoghese fondato da Fernando José Pereira, João Faria e Rui Manuel Vieira.
Pensata e sviluppata come esplorazione delle proprietà del suono, e finalizzata alla definizione di ambienti sonori cinematografici e immaginativi, la proposta del trio trova un suo nuovo manifesto in “Horizons of Suspended Zones”, album pubblicato dalla label portoghese Crónica quest’estate.
Il disco si ispira ad alcun scritti di Hakim Bey, filosofo statunitense che, alla fine degli anni Novanta, parlava del virtuale come un’altra strada possibile per l’espansione del capitalismo, introducendo il concetto di “temporary autonomous zones” per parlare di spazi, fisici o simbolici, in cui le persone possono sottrarsi al controllo sociale e politico dominante, esplorando forme libere di comunità, creatività e relazioni.
Gli Haarvöl dichiarano il proprio intento di creare delle “zone sospese”, sulla scia di queste elucubrazioni, che siano il contrario degli eccessi che la tecnologia offre e consente oggi: suoni nudi, semplici, che si presentino esattamente per quello che sono.
Senza alcun tipo di post-produzione, gli Haarvöl costruiscono un disco contrassegnato da tre elementi fondamentali: ripetizione, silenzio e durata.
Sospeso tra pulsioni ambient, una composizione minimale e un forte afflato sperimentale, l’ascolto di “Horizons of Suspended Zones” è contemplazione, scoperta e riscoperta del silenzio e attenzione per i dettagli.
Il nuovo lavoro firmato Haarvöl, destinato a una nicchia per quanto pregno di significato, conferma l’ottimo stato di salute di una band autentica e pressoché unica nel suo genere. (Piergiuseppe Lippolis)
via Music Map
David Lee Myers’s “Terrenus” reviewed by Blow Up
