Another hero of barely-existing music is the great Marc Behrens, whose Sleppet (CRÓNICA 046) began life in 2007 with a bunch of nature recordings made in Norway. Chris Watson, Steve Roden, Jana Winderen and other minimal-environmental geniuses were not far away from him at the time, and the record cover of this nature-worshipping release unfolds to reveal visual cut-ups of a silvery forest. So far, a few superficial skims by my dilatory lugs suggest that the familiar near-silent treatments of Behrens aren’t so much in evidence, but his editing scalpel is still as sharp as ever. These vivid recordings of seagulls, water, stones, sheep and glaciers have been spliced into carefully-planned linear sequences intended to reveal certain conceptual truths about nature. One thing folds into another, layering imaginary transparencies together to solve the enigmas of creation. Sleppet posits a severe and almost bleak view of wildlife, weather and the elements, a view so cold and unforgiving that you can almost imagine yourself wandering alone during the Mesozoic era when you spin this stark twig of a disk. Ed Pinsent
“Sleppet†reviewed by Monsieur Délire
A short album from electroacoustician Marc Behrens. Sleppet evolved from a field recording trip to Norway with other artists. The four-movement work was realized in June 2008 for broadcast on the German radio. It’s a relatively simple piece, but it’s powerful and evocative. Everything and the kitchen sink’s in there: nature’s elements (water, snow, stone), animal life (seagulls, cattle), and human activity (industries), presented as is and severely transformed. And it is in those transformations that Behrens’ artistry lies – the man’s sense of aural plasticity is commanding. Sleppet strays far from the microsonic regions often associated with his music. This work does not try to hide away in the shadows of your living room’s background noise, it unfolds in a grandiloquent way. Nice job.
via Monsieur Délire
“Home, Sweet Home†reviewed by Monsieur Délire
A free release from the superior Portuguese electroacoustic label Crónica (use the link below to download it). Home, Sweet Home shares seagulls with Sleppet. Duran Vazquez has put together a fine record of treated filed recordings. It doesn’t have the sophisticated aesthetics of Marc Behrens’ album, but it remains a strong work of ambiant electroacoustics with a hyperrealistic touch. It is set in an urban environment (a harbor city, but still), however Vazquez has found ways to temporize the urban beat and highlight the peace and quiet of certain locations.
via Monsieur Délire
Vote for Marc Behrens’s “Compilation Works 1996-2005â€
Marc Behrens’s “Compilation Works 1996-2005†has been nominated for the Qwartz 6 Music Award (in the “Anthologies†category). The public voting has already opened and will remain open until March 15. The awards will be announced in April 2, 2010 in Paris.
To vote for Marc Behrens, all you need to do is to send an email stating your vote for “Marc Behrens: Compilation Works 1996-2005†to anthology_6@qwartz.org.
You can check the list of nominations at Qwartz’s website and if you still haven’t, you can freely download Marc Behrens’s release from Crónica.
New CD release: “Passeports†by Mathias Delplanque
Crónica is very proud to release the new CD from Mathias Delplanque, “Passeports†in association with Bruit Clair.
“Passeports†is composed from various field-recordings realized in transport-related locations across France: train stations, harbors, parking lots and other areas of transit, weaved into dense ambient compositions. “Passeport 3 (Dieppe)” further includes recordings made in a call center in New Delhi, not a place of physical travel but, while operating mostly to Europe and the USA, nevertheless a place of transport. These recordings were the whole of the raw material used in the composition of this album, and were then themselves transported to Mathias’s home, where they were played back into the spaces of the various rooms, so that the mix between the broadcast sounds and domestic noises would itself be recorded to become the final version of the tracks, something that is particularly clear in “Passeport 7 (Nantes)”, the track that concludes the CD. “Passeports†is a work that questions the relations between space and music, between the sound and its space, between the music and its place.
Written & produced by Mathias Delplanque. Cover art by Steve Roden. Master and design by M. Carvalhais.
You can read the Press-release, order the CD directly from Crónica, or download through Boomkat or Zero Inch.
@c + Pierre Alexandre Tremblay live
Next Saturday, Pierre Alexandre Tremblay performs in a trio with @c (Pedro Tudela + Miguel Carvalhais).
Pierre Alexandre Tremblay (Montréal, 1975) is involved on a variety of projects, manipulating sound and playing bass guitar. He teaches composition and improvisation at the University of Huddersfield in England. He is a member of the ensembles ars circa musicæ and de type inconnu.
He launched his first acousmatic album on Empreintes DIGITALes in 2006, ars circa musicæ debut album in 2007, and in 2008 the seventh of [iks], the contemporary jazz ensemble he directed for eleven years. In 2009 he published La rage, a 50-minute suite for free-jazz drummer and electronics. He also worked on pop music projects in studio as producer and bass guitar, and is interested in video music and in DSP.
In 2010 @c celebrate the tenth year of the ongoing collaboration between Tudela and Carvalhais, a project that has never shied from joining forces with other musicians or artists. The performance with Pierre Alexandre Tremblay will be the perfect way to start the year, as it will also mark the release of @c’s new CD in the Baskaru label, “Music For Empty Spacesâ€.
Philip Jeck & Janek Schaefer’s “Desert Island Discsâ€
New @c release in Baskaru
We are very happy to announce the new release from Pedro Tudela and Miguel Carvalhais’s project @c in the excellent Baskaru label, “Music For Empty Spacesâ€.
“Erotikon†reviewed by Etherreal
Il y a tout juste un mois on vous parlait d’une collaboration entre le Portugais The Beautiful Schizophonic et le Japonais Yui Onodera publiée chez Basses Fréquences. Comme promis, nous revenons ici sur le dernier album du romantique Jorge Mantas qui nous propose ici 11 pièces qui sont ses propres interprétations de la chanson d’amour. Ça tombe bien, puisque si l’album est sorti en juillet dernier, nous le chroniquons à l’approche de la St Valentin…
Bien sûr, rien à voir ici avec des chansons puisque le Portugais est plutôt le spécialiste des nappes, drones et autres douceurs expérimentales. Si à l’écoute de Erotikon on a parfois peur que The Beautiful Schizophonic bascule de l’ambient au new age, il vient régulièrement nous rappeler que son approche reste basée sur le hasard et les accidents. Ainsi on est tout de suite happé par le son incroyable de Furla, enveloppé entre les drones graves et les nappes flottantes pour une tonalité générale qui reste sombre mais qui tend à s’éclaircir alors que le temps passe. Aysha au contraire nous apparaitra nettement moins inspiré, et passé les fines textures granuleuses de l’introduction ce sont des nappes classiques qui se superposent et se répètent à l’infini.
Au fil des morceaux, le son s’éclaircit et on pensera à Radiance, son album avec Yui Onodera à l’écoute de Bambilány, retrouvant la lumière et des gazouillis d’oiseaux qui composeront l’intégralité de Musgo. Le son extrêmement traité tend à nous faire oublier l’origine même de ces compositions et en particulier la voix de Christina Vantzou qui apparait régulièrement sur ce début d’album. Jorge Mantas nous surprend également avec la durée de ses pièces, de 2 à 14mn, élargissant son champ d’expérimentation sur les formats courts, optant pour un son bouillonnant et plus rugueux (Blumarine), mêlant field recordings et ondes radio (Musgo), ou opérant des variations sur une boucle de piano avec Nocturnosque.
La deuxième moitié de l’album s’avère plus homogène avec 5 pièces qui jouent sur la longueur tout en adoptant des sonorités d’origines variées. Un ton sombre et cinématographique sur le magnifique Aliénor d’Aquitaine, puis une boucle granuleuse qui s’avère être un enregistrement datant de 1860 de Au clair de la lune, peut-être le tout premier enregistrement existant d’une voix humaine, adouci par le magnifique piano de Yui Onodera. Les nappes sont ensuite produites par une guitare, un peu à la manière de Sylvain Chauveau sur Orlнk, une conversation téléphonique semble avoir été captée sur Fornarina nous rappelant les premiers travaux de Scanner, avant de terminer avec les 14mn de Pollen et ses nappes lancinantes et lumineuses, et de nous engloutir dans les remous aquatiques qui clôturent l’album.
Amateurs d’ambient, drones, rêveries éthérées, cet album est fait pour vous. On en profite pour signaler que le label Cronica produit son propre podcast avec très régulièrement des pièces inédites des artistes du label. The Beautiful Schizophonic y est largement représenté. Fabrice Allard
via Etherreal
Mathias Delplanque live
February 13 in Nantes: Mathias Delplanque + Jean-Luc Thomas at Château des Ducs de Bretagne, Festival Brèches.