Dan Powell’s “Four Walks at Old Chapel” reviewed by Vital Weekly

A few weeks ago I reviewed a CDR by Muster, a duo of James O’Sullivan and Dan Powell. Now the latter appears in a solo capacity. He’s also part of The Static Memories and Nil. I don’t think I heard his solo work before, so I had no idea what to expect. The recordings here were made at the old Chapel Farm, which is “an adventure in living, which aims to bring people close to the fundamentals of human existence: the creation of food and shelter” Powell visits the place since 2011 with his family and in 2018 he and his daughter collected objects and “gathered them together in a straw bale hut suspended over a stream in a wooded valley which the farm’s owners made available for us to use.
He recorded small performances with them, brushing, scraping and rubbing them to produce a wide range of intimate sounds.” All of this, combined with field recordings went into the computer back home and re-worked all of these into the four tracks that we find on this cassette. It is a most enjoyable release, of musique concrète proportions, but Powell created something quite playful. It is not about some strict rules of composition, nor does it rely too much on granular synthesis as his more serious peers would do. With Powell’s version we hear the field recordings as they were when committed to tape, we hear the cracking and rubbing upon objects, and we encounter small transformations of this, set in a more performance setting, which adds a delicate live electronics feeling to the music. It keeps everything with a beautiful vibrancy together. He overlays his original material with additional electronic material, feedback here, a big, fat drone there, or cut-up collage techniques using the good ol’ reel-to-reel machine, adds to the energy and variety of the music, and together with a powerful as well as colourful thirty minutes. (FdW)

via Vital Weekly

Francisco López & Miguel A. García’s “Ekkert Nafn” reviewed by African Paper

Francisco López und sein auch unter dem Namen Xedh bekannter Kollege Miguel A. García sind leidenschaftliche Versteckspieler, stets auf der Suche nach alltäglichen Geräuschen mit interessierter Kehrseite, oder nach dem Potenzial dessen, was man herkömmlichen akustischen und elektronischen Instrumenten entlocken kann. Versteckspieler sind sie deshalb, weil bei ihnen selten Klänge in wiedererkennbarer Form ihren Weg auf einen Track finden, sondern durch mehrere Stufen digitaler Unkenntlichmachung geschickt werden.

García hat zudem ein Faible für ganz ähnlich aufgeschnappte und verfremdete Wortbildungen, die er gern als mehrdeutige (oder nur scheinbar sinnhaltige) Titel verwendet. “Ekkert Nafn” klingt wie ein Personenname, ist allerdings die isländische Übersetzung von “No Name”, der Titel eines der beiden Stücke auf dem vorliegenden Album, auf dem beide Künstler das gleiche zusammen angesammelte Klangmaterial einer jeweils eigenen Chiffrierung unterzogen haben.

Auf López’ die erste Seite ausfüllendem Stück “No Name” kann man den Ursprung der verwendeten Sounds allenfalls gelegentlich erahnen, zumindest bei dem grillen- oder zikadenartigen Zirpen, das exponiert auf dunklem Fundament die gut halbstündige Komposition eröffnet. In mehreren Anläufen bricht klirrender, rumpelnder und manchmal auch tosender Lärm ins Setting ein, und wenn es nach dem größten Bruch plötzlich sehr ruhig wird, erscheinen einem die plastischen Sounds – hallunterlegtes Hauchen, geloopte Perkussion, stylische Elektrosunds etc. – noch klarer als zuvor. Arbeitet Lopez mit der Hervorhebung klanglicher Materialität, so ist García ein großer Wirkungsästet und setzt auf etwas, das auch in Lopez’ Beitrag im Kleinen steckt: Hypnotik und Spannung. Dasmag an dem Wind liegen, der eine ganze Zeitlang durch den Raum heult und fegt und schon dadurch eine endzeitliche Bedrohlichkeit evoziert. Aber das Resultat ist – nicht nur in der wie aufgeklebt wirkenden Melodie- und Beatansätzen – durchweg monotoner und so von einer trancehaften Qualität.

Ob beide auch Sounds aussortiert haben oder ob die Resultate nur durch die jeweilige Bearbeitung so unterschiedlich ausgefallen sind, muss Geheimnis bleiben. Dass man aber auch immer wieder Gemeinsames findet, schafft eine subtile Klammer, die aus der Kollaboration dann doch eine zusammenhängende Sachen macht. (A.Kaudaht)

via African Paper

New release: @c’s “GML Variations”

The new @c album, GML Variations is now available to download or stream. There are also still some copies available of the limited release CD in a gatefold sleeve, so get them while you can.

GML Variations started with a commission to compose a piece for the Robotic Gamelan of Casa da Música, in Porto, to be presented with other works in a public showing spanning several days. GML 123 was a generative system that controlled the actuators in the Robotic Gamelan while projecting several other sounds into the very resonant space of Casa da Música’s foyer. The piece was presented in January 2018 and shortly afterwards recorded in the same location. After receiving the recording, we found ourselves being drawn to it over and over and, as often happens to us, we started experimenting: revisiting the original composition, manipulating its recordings and creating new material, eventually developing the four variations and coda that complete this album.

During this process, we were unearthing echoes and memories of the first composition, transforming the original sounds to the limits of recognition, and finding structures that were already latent in, but were not expressed by, the initial piece. These pieces are therefore not six independent compositions but rather six different perspectives over a single work, six ways of listening to it.

In the course of this work, we developed a seventh piece, Jeden, Dwa, Osiem (dla Małgorzaty), published in the compilation Intermediale: Simulacra Soundscape 3. We also performed versions of the variations in a stream for Audiotalaia during the first lockdown of 2020, in a performance with André Rangel at Rivoli, Porto (in which we worked on for almost a year, and that we first had to postpone and ultimately cancel because of the pandemic), and in a concert at Passos Manuel, Porto (released as the GML Vars. Live single). GML Variations closes this cycle of work, at least until we find ourselves drawn to this material again.

Pedro Tudela and Miguel Carvalhais collaborate as @c since 2000, composing, performing, and creating sound installations. They have released and performed extensively, often collaborating with other artists and collectives in a practice marked by radical experimentalism with computational sound. In 2003 they established Crónica, a label dedicated to experimental music and sound art, that they have run since.

Tracklist:

  1. GML 123 (9:45)
  2. GML var. 1 (7:06)
  3. GML var. 2 (17:30)
  4. GML var. 3 (10:12)
  5. GML var. 4 (30:02)
  6. GML coda (4:59)

All pieces composed by Miguel Carvalhais and Pedro Tudela. GML 123 was commissioned in 2018 by José Alberto Gomes and Digitópia for the Robotic Gamelan of Casa da Música in Porto (developed by Rui Penha, José Luís Azevedo, and Miguel Ferraz). GML 123 was recorded by Tiago Ângelo in 2018 at Casa da Música. GML vars. 1–4 and GML coda were composed in 2019 and 2020.