“The Waste Land” reviewed by A Closer Listen


As we wrap up our five-day field trip, we travel into unfamiliar territories ~ mysterious lands marked by strange and unsettling sounds. Your guides for these journeys: Luci Forcucci, Yannick Dauby & Hitoshi Kojo and smallhaus.

Luca Forcucci was given an unusual challenge for his journey into The Waste Land ~ to compose a film score based on an unidentified six minute field recording. He rose to the challenge by splicing, repeating, expanding and layering his source material until it became wholly his own. This title piece is now truly its own entity. But the album’s B side is even more stunning. “My Extra Personal Space” is a complex soundscape that travels back and forth between the streets of Paris and the Normandy coast, allowing for bizarre juxtapositions ~ helicopters and church bells, kicked bottles against streaming water. And then there are the birds. Usually when one encounters birds in field recordings, one experiences them as a joy ~ not so here. These birds seem to have flown directly from a Hitchcock movie. Throughout the mix, they emerge and retreat, watching from the trees and planning their next move. A dog is not enough to frighten them away. For one brief moment, the lapping of waves implies safety, but then the birds return en masse. In this wasteland, no one is safe. Richard Allen

via A Closer Listen