The first solo release by Morten Riis since 2009 presents his newest endeavours into the broken worn-out world of cassette tapes and modified tape players. Lad enhver lyd minde os om [Let every sound reminds us of] wreathes around our conceptions regarding a sense of togetherness, perishability, the inherent sensuousness of objects and potential poetic statements coupled with humans’ belief that through language and representation we can control everything around us. The album is composed on homemade synthesisers and modified 4-track cassette recorders, thus creating a music-technological poetic that underlines the specificity of media and the human-object participatory democracy that creates what we normally conceptualise as an artistic expression. It is a slow process in which several melodic elements are layered to create an expression in which the individual voices vanish in myriads of noise and textures. Behind the often-chaotic roaring sea of tape mediation, melodic structures emerge, like sunken forgotten memories in our minds.
The full-length cassette release is accompanied by Lad den samme lyd minde os om [Let the same sound reminds us of], 25 loop unique cassette tapes handcrafted by Morten Riis and containing the original source material for the compositions.
Øyvind Brandtsegg søler på kjøkkenet. Han tar mjøl, krydder og en del andre kjøkkenprodukter, drysser dem utover en glassplate og setter på strøm. Slikt blir det bråk av.
Brandtsegg er professor i musikkteknologi ved NTNU og en nestor i den punkete DIY-glade musikk-avantgarden i Trondheim. Han spiller på «instrumentet» sitt med å bikke fatet i ulike retninger og putte kabelkledde fingre i blandingen. Alt dette påvirker vibrasjonene og feedbacken, som sendes inn i Brandtseggs selvlagde lydmixmastere. «Ingen adaptive filtre», forsikrer han i presseskrivet, uten at jeg er helt sikker på hva det betyr. Det minner litt om «ingen kunstige tilsetningsstoffer». Det er sikkert andre ting jeg har misforstått også. Men jeg lytter.
Og det jeg hører er hylende atmosfæriske lydflater som endrer seg seigt og gradvis etter hvert som kanel og bakepulver blandes. Lydene han lager er nesten taktile, og oser av en slags fysisk energi.
Stykkene har ganske enkle forløp. Det er sjelden vi hører flere lydstrømmer samtidig, med unntak av et av sporene hvor det blandes inn tale og tekst (som for øvrig blir et litt rart stilbrudd). Formmessig er de dessuten ganske løse. Dette er kanskje den minst stringente av platene i Ballade klassisk denne gangen.
Men Brandtsegg har en dansende eleganse. Alt bråket høres levende og poetisk ut. Ola Nordal
«Persistent Disequilibrium» is a new sound art project of Norwegian experimental composer-scholar-educator Øyvind Brandtsegg. Brandtsegg devised a set of new musical instruments where finger-mounted piezo contact pickups are used with transducers on vibrating plate-like objects (metals, plastics, wood, ceramics, concrete, glass, bioplastics and even human bones in a living body) to explore intimate resonances by touch. The performer’s finger acts as a filter in the feedback circuit, and variations in performative gestures (pressure, angle, touching with the nail or the flesh) bring out different potential resonances of the objects.
These instruments create a chain reaction of deep, low-frequency feedback loops when the sonic vibrations pass through the plate-like objects and allow Brandtsegg to investigate these vibrations. The basic feedback mechanism was kept simple and often Brandtsegg’s voice was added into the feedback loop to create further diversions of textural resonances. This sound-making process offers a new method of embodied sound production and allows close performative control over the expressive nuances of the performative environment.
Brandtsegg recorded a set of seven haunting and quite unsettling drones at the NTNU Music Tech in Trondheim, where he is a professor of music technology. He was assisted by the «external ear» of Maja S.K. Ratkje, and discovered weird and detailed sonic universes within the vibrating chain of feedback, some are even suggesting friendly rhythmic alien transmissions and twisted yet subtle melodic veins, and the last one «Moebius Guessthetics» offers a deep and peaceful meditative mode.
«Persistent Disequilibrium» offers an enigmatic and immersive listening experience. Eyal Hareuveni
Having seen various videos of Gintas K’s improvisations, involving a keyboard and a dusty old Lenovo ThinkPad running some custom software, it’s apparent that his approach to composition is nothing if not unusual, and it’s matched by the results.
His Crónica debut, Lengvai / 60 x one minute audio colours of 2kHz sound was sixteen years ago, and his return to the label is a very different offering, although as has been a common factor throughout his career, Lėti – Lithuanian for slow – consists of comparatively short pieces – and here, the majority are four minutes long or less. Less is more, and what’s more, Gintas K invariably manages to pack more into a couple of minutes than many artists do in half an hour. Here, we have a set of eleven short pieces ‘created from recording and improvising in studio followed by extensive mixing and editing using software.’ There’s no more detail than that: some artists accompany their releases with essays explaining the creative process and the algorithms of the software and so on, but Gintas K simply leaves the music for the listener to engage with and to ponder.
Where Lėti is something of a departure is in the emphasis on the editing and mixing of the material and the fact that, as the title suggests, the arrangements are a little more sedate. The signature crackles and pops, chines and static are all present and correct, but there’s a sense of deliberation as we’re led through ethereal planes of delicate chimes and tinkling tones that resonate and hang in the air, drifting in open expanses, with time and space to reverberate and slowly decay. With this more measured feel, melodies become more apparent, with simple motifs, repeated, giving ‘Hallucination’ a sense of structure and, I suppose you might actually say ‘tune’.
It isn’t that Gintas’ works lack tunefulness as such, but that any tune is surrounded by froth and extranea, and so much is going on it’s often hard to miss. Listening to Lėti is a fairly calm, even soothing experience, at least for the most part, conjuring a mood of reflection, of contemplation. The album’s longest piece, the seven-minute ‘Various’ brings a dense wave of sound that surges and swells slowly like a turning tide. There’s almost a stately grandeur to it, but then, there’s a rattling kind of a buzz that’s something of a distraction, and a glitch that nags away and seems to accelerate. These little headfucks are quintessential Gintas K, and Lėtiisn’t all soft and sweet: ‘Savage’ brings thick, fuzzing distortion and discomfort.
The flurries of sound, the babble of bubbling bleeps and bloops that are his standard fare are slowed to sparse, irregular drips in a cave on ‘Variation’, and the application of reverb is impressively nuanced, to the point that the reverbs almost become music in their own right. ‘Atmosphere’ and ‘Ambient’ are appropriately titled, while ‘Nice Pomp’ would comfortably serve as a soundtrack to a slow-motion film of a moon landing or somesuch, and again none of the pieces are without depth or detail, as the layers and slivers of sound that intersect create so much more than mere surface.
Lėti is a genuinely pleasant and pleasurable listening experience, but is most certainly isn’t straightforward or simple in what it delivers. There are many sonic nuggets to unearth, and so many tones and textures along the way, that what is, superficially ‘less’ is, in actual fact, a whole lot more. Christopher Nosnibor
Der litauische Klang-, Performance- und Konzeptkünstler Gintas Kraptavičius alias Gintas K bringt dieser Tage ein neues Tape heraus. “Lėti”, das im Litauischen “langsam” bedeutet, enthält elf Miniaturen, gebaut aus filigranen Sounddetails unterschiedlichster Herkunft, die einer ebensolchen Vielfalt an Bearbeitungsstufen unterzogen wurden und in ihrer finalen Gestalt einer großen Wunderkammer gleichen, in der man bei jedem neuen Besuch imemr wieder neue Stilreferenzen und einiges mehr entdecken kann.
Gintas K ist seit der ersten Hälfte der 80er aktiv, zunächst als Teil des Post-Industrial-Duos Modus, ab Mitte der 90er dann mit seinen soundorientierten Soloarbeiten. Vom Label heißt es: “He became known for his sound actions, theatrical performances and conceptual art in the manner of Fluxus and now works in digital experimental and electroacoustic music, film music, and sound installations. His compositions are based on granular synthesis, live electronic, hard digital computer music, and small melodies”. “Lėti” erscheint auf CD und als Download bei Crónica.
This is my second review of the works of Gintas K, a fascinating and innovative sound artist, born in Lithuania in 1969 and a person who has generated considerable interest. As with the previous album I reviewed, this electronic music work needs a good sound system or headphones and a nice quiet environment to truly be appreciated. The title of this release, Lėti, is Lithuanian for ‘Slow’ and comprises eleven short tracks.
The first track, Bells, consists of different pitched bells and a rather strange crackly background. It starts off relaxed, and grows in intensity before fading away to silence. The middle section is rather joyous in effect.
The second track, Hallucination, starts in a slightly fragmentary fashion, but a pattern soon emerges that is present throughout the whole track, the sounds around it changes as does the pattern itself, but it is always recognisable and I tend to focus on that more than the sounds around it. The pattern is shortened towards the end of the track, but sometimes the memory fills in the rest. This quite a fascinating movement. It does portray what the title suggests it might.
Track 3, Various, starts almost organ-like and swells and pulses and grows increasingly louder. Eventually it becomes more complex as other sounds cut across and some are absorbed into this pedal note. A slow melodic figure grows around this pedal note. About half way through, the intensity of the pedal note becomes less and the music relaxes and becomes quieter, apart from the rather spiky interjections. This reminds me of some of the very early electronic music I heard in my youth and is the longest work on this disc. Towards the end of the track the music is much less dense and it fades away to a single point of sound.
Variation seems to revolve around the pedal note in the previous track and there are various short abrupt tones that suggest that the pedal is there, without it generally being so. Maybe this is just my imagination, but I believe this music leaves it wide open for you to feel or imagine what you will. Every time I listen, I hear new things and my perspective changes.
Atmosphere, is announced by a couple of guitar notes, and then a dense field is built up around that, sometimes two note patterns, sounds that are a little like whale song, again with a pedal being maintained, although this does change in pitch slightly as the work progresses. This track is certainly atmospheric, perhaps also being a statement of the atmosphere that envelopes and nourishes us all.
Savage begins with a core distorted sound that becomes the pedal around which other sounds move. This grows in intensity as the movement progresses, and in the middle grows rather menacingly and the activity generally becomes more intense. This starts subsiding towards the end and the movement ends quite abruptly.
Guitar is a short track of recorded and filtered guitar sounds that have other sounds added around them. The internal resonance of the guitar is also either captured or simulated, and the three-note guitar figure that repeats throughout the movement is the unifying factor.
Nice Pomp is interesting and varied with bell sounds and organ, and is quite melodic and relaxing. Even though the overall pulse is slow, the work is busy with many different sounds and effects that create a rich tapestry without overwhelming. In the middle, excitement bubbles over and the music becomes quite exultant before becoming calmer. Just when you think it has stopped, it bubbles up again and then rapidly subsides.
Query begins with a fairly rapid rhythmic pulse over a pedal and other sounds start growing around it, including some bell effects, some of which sound like an alarm bell. This grows in intensity and then subsides but the whisper of a pedal, maintained in the bell, remains as the music disappears into silence leaving the idea of the query behind.
Track 10 is entitled Ambient. This music grows from nothing and a chord emerges, again with a pedal note underneath. On this CD, the pedal note seems to be a frequently used device. In this movement it comes and goes but there is always one present in one or another register. There is a bubbly background and the music is quiet and reflective.
The final track, Bonus Sound, grows like a swarm of bumble bees that create the pedal around the note A. The sounds around it that grow in the middle suggest a melody, but every time I listen, the melody seems to slightly change with my awareness.
This CD is not something that everyone would appreciate, but again there are rich rewards for those that do. The Gintas K works I’ve heard impress me because they are free from gimmicks or pretentiousness and are honest. There seems to be a unifying factor and sense of purpose that leads you gently but purposely, but does not thrust itself upon you. I did enjoy this journey. Geoff Pearce
We’re proud to release Gintas K’s new album, Lėti, 16 years after Gintas’s first release in Crónica, the now classic Lengvai / 60 x one minute audio colours of 2kHz sound and after several other encounters in compilations, collaborations, and four albums. Lėti, Lithuanian for slow, is a set of 11 short pieces created from recording and improvising in studio followed by extensive mixing and editing using software. Further details on Gintas K’s creative process are as usual scarce, but Lėti can be seen as expressing his affectionate side, and as fitting in a corpus of albums with similar emotional undertones, with 2016’s Low (Opa Loka), 2013’s Slow (Baskaru) and 2009’s Lovely Banalities (Crónica).
Gintas K is a Lithuanian sound artist and composer active since 1994. He became known for his sound actions, theatrical performances and conceptual art in the manner of Fluxus and now works in digital experimental and electroacoustic music, film music, and sound installations. His compositions are based on granular synthesis, live electronic, hard digital computer music, and small melodies.
Lėti is now available as a limited-release CD, download or stream!
Matilde Meireles is a recordist, sound artist, and researcher who makes use of field recordings to compose site-oriented projects. Her projects often have a multi-sensorial approach to ‘site’ which draws from her studies and experience in areas such as field-recording, site-specific visual arts and design.
Her latest album is an in-depth study of potato in culture.
In her own words:
“The potato has travelled a long way from its native lands in South America. The starchy tuber, brought to Europe by the Spanish in the late 1600s, slowly settled to become a key ingredient in most European countries’ traditional diet. As with many other vegetables, plants, and spices from elsewhere, we forgot the origins of the potato. We made them our own because food is an inherent expression of social identity. It tells stories, and evokes nostalgia, belonging, and wellbeing. Yet, the food system of the current times is desperately unsustainable. Like the potato, many other fruits, vegetables, plants, and animals travel far and wide daily, blurring territories, and playing an accidental part in the immeasurable impact of the politics of food production. The potato is an incredibly resilient element whose history traverses time and location, and its historical traces have very different socio-political nuances in the places I call home: Portugal, Ireland, and now England. It also grows seasonally in our garden and is a tasty tuber part of a rich sonic ecosystem. This seemed like a good starting point for a new project.”
The field recordings and the processing show a close touch with the whole structure of growth as well as culinary aspect of it. An interesting study of how every day life staple has so many references and a range of small mysteries that we, as listeners have to go through to understand aspects of our lives, that seem obvious.
Mad Disc est le projet solo du musicien japonais Takamichi Murata, batteur et percussionniste. Impliqué dans plusieurs groupes, dont le sien, il a collaboré avec de nombreux improvisateurs et compositeurs. Dans Material Compositions, il joue non seulement de la batterie et des percussions diverses, mais fait intervenir l’électronique et les synthétiseurs pour retravailler le son.
Material Composition 1 commence par le timbre limpide d’une clochette “rin”, instrument rituel bouddhiste, qui donne tout de suite à la pièce sa belle solennité. Des sonorités électroniques accompagnent la clochette, formant des motifs obsédants. Peu à peu se développe un univers sonore tout à fait étrange, fascinant, dans lequel les sons synthétiques, les percussions métalliques prennent comme une vie autonome. Une lente pulsation anime la première longue pièce, de plus de vingt minutes. Material 1 est un curieux mélange entre musique expérimentale post-industrielle et musique rituelle un peu folle, la clochette rin utilisée très intensivement pour créer un fond d’harmoniques cristallines foisonnantes. D’autres percussions dépaysent davantage, nous entraînant d’abord vers une atmosphère doucement extatique, mais la fin est un long crescendo d’une puissance trouble ponctué par quelques frappes percussives méditatives. Takamichi Murata réussit une œuvre d’une rare beauté ! Material 2, plus expérimental, a la brutalité de certains apologues zen, entre free jazz et métal, constamment en ébullition, batterie déchaînée et rugissements synthétiques : quel contraste avec le morceau précédent ! Je suis moins enthousiaste, mais impressionné par ces neuf minutes magmatiques.
La suite de l’album donne à entendre trois remixes, respectivement par trois collaborateurs du compositeur, Toru Kasai, Koutaro Fukui et Ryoko Ono. Toru Kasai réutilise la clochette “rin”, propose une version ambiante à l’onirisme grandiose, avec de lentes volutes veloutées dans lesquelles circulent des nuages électroniques et des drones : séduisant, et impeccable ! Koutaro Fukui revient aux percussions, et surtout aux sons sales, troubles, pour une version techno MAGISTRALE, à frémir, les amis ! J’en suis à regretter la relative brièveté du morceau, d’une splendeur apocalyptique, d’une densité noire fulgurante. Quant à Ryoko Ono, il nous propose une version rock-punk-free jazz survoltée, tout en frappes frénétiques de la batterie, avec une clochette “rin” hallucinée, d’énormes vagues ramassées de sons électroniques, dans la lignée de Material 2. Une vraie folie sonore, chuintante de crissements, de mille traits acérés échappés d’une boule en fusion.
Un disque pour les oreilles solides, c’est évident, mais les amateurs de musique hypnotique, mystérieuse, d’une densité acérée, seront ravis. Décapant et revigorant, avec une palette étonnante de paysages sonores, splendidement travaillés !
Persistent Disequilibrium is based on a set of new musical instruments where finger mounted piezo pickups are used with transducers on vibrating plate-like objects to explore resonances by touch. This creates a feedback loop where sonic vibrations pass through the material to be investigated and are not transmitted through the air. The direct contact let us come very close to the vibrating objects, and the low frequency rumble inherent in the objects is teased out and amplified in the feedback loop, creating haunting resonances and deep vibrating spaces. Various vibrating materials have been explored, such as metals, plastics, wood, ceramics, concrete, glass, bioplastics, even human bones in a living body. Closed loops of the audio feedback circuit resonate by amplifying background noise, singing on frequencies determined by the vibrational modes of the objects the sound is passing through. Contact microphones are attached to bones in the performer’s hand, enabling an embodied and direct interaction with the feedback loop. Including the body parts of the performer in the feedback circuit creates a new method of embodied sound production and allows an intimate performative control over the expressive nuances of the performative environment instigated by closely spaced vibrationalmodes of the instrument. The performer’s finger acts as a filter in the feedback circuit, and variations in performative gestures (pressure, angle, touching with the nail or the flesh) can thus selectively bring out different potential resonances of the object.
A feedback network is a chaotic system with resonances as attractors. The high sensitivity to initial conditions makes it very responsive in performance. Brandtsegg has worked on various kinds of maps of the pitch space of these instruments, uncovering the resonant topography of the vibrating objects. Even though such maps will rarely indicate anything absolute about the space, they will often give relational cues for the performer, aiding in the “where do we go from here?” conundrum of unstable situations. For the basic feedback mechanism, very simple audio processing was used with just compression and equalization and no adaptive filters. On some of the tracks, this was extended with live convolution and ring modulation techniques, blending the performer’s voice into the feedback loop and thus creating further diversions of textural resonances.
Øyvind Brandtsegg is a composer and performer working in the fields of computer improvisation and sound installations. He has a deep interest in developing new audio processing methods for artistic purposes, and he has contributed novel extensions to both granular synthesis and convolution techniques. Brandtsegg has participated on more than 25 music albums in a variety of genres. Since 2010 he is a professor of music technology at NTNU, Trondheim, Norway.
Performed and composed by Øyvind Brandtsegg.
Recorded at NTNU Music Tech, Fjordgata, Trondheim by Øyvind Brandtsegg.
Mixed by Øyvind Brandtsegg.
External ear: Maja S.K. Ratkje.
Mastered by Miguel Carvalhais at Crónica.
Cover photo by Jeremy Welsh, taken at an exhibition developed at Surnadal Billag by the group Pixels.Frames.Beats.Drones (Jeremy Welsh, Apichaya Wanthiang, Øyvind Brandtsegg, Tijs Ham, Trond Lossius).
