Named after a combination of French words – the word sens (meaning direction) and the French adjective concrescence that the living legend Francois Bayle, who also coined the term “acousmatic” and inventor of “Acousmonium”, used to describe the concrete substance of sounds and its intrinsic impermanence and ruggedness -, this interesting release by Emmanuel Mieville keeps faith with its title as it sounds like an asymptotic approach to the core of musique concrete, as conceptualized by Pierre Schaeffer. While he focused on aural perception of specific environments and sonic “anamnesis” of different urban and wildlife locations on “Four Wanderings in Tropical Lands” that I introduced on this zine a couple of years ago, Emmanuel seems to develop the three sound structures of “Concret-Sens” by coalescing field recordings, other found sounds/objects, pre-recorded stuff and radio snippets without lessening listener’s chance to phase them in possible narrative buildups: the lack of uttermost objectification of sound material is particularly clear on the central structure, “Locus Sonus”, as the combination of field recordings with tapes and radio documentaries seem to evoke personal historical elements and educational memories of the composer, whose first learning steps as apprentice at Groupe de Recherches Musicales in the field of musique concrete got based on creative radio programs and live concerts and the boundaries between objectivity of sound objects and listener’s subjective translation seems to be also quite veiled on the initial “Cillages”, whose almost orchestral concoctions of recordings of neon lights and hums from electrical outlets manages to feed listener’s imagination as the development of the track could let you think about the testing of an unknown Tesla deep fryer. The final piece “Solis Ortus” is an admirable assay of manipulation of field recordings by means of granular synthesis, whose resulting particles crams the sonic sphere by degrees. Vito Camarretta
via Chain D.L.K.