{"id":11519,"date":"2024-10-07T15:53:13","date_gmt":"2024-10-07T14:53:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.cronicaelectronica.org\/?p=11519"},"modified":"2024-10-07T15:53:13","modified_gmt":"2024-10-07T14:53:13","slug":"marla-hlady-christof-migones-swan-song-reviewed-by-the-sound-projector","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.cronicaelectronica.org\/?p=11519","title":{"rendered":"Marla Hlady & Christof Migone\u2019s\u00a0\u201cSwan Song\u201d reviewed by The Sound Projector"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Spirits Drifting<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here\u2019s two discs of very enjoyable drone music produced by various processes\u2026Swan Song<\/em> (CR\u00d3NICA<\/a>196-2023) was realised by Marla Hlady<\/strong> and Christof Migone<\/strong>, and they did it during a three-month residency in Glenfiddich.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From what I can make out, it\u2019s a clever bit of \u201crepurposing\u201d of old equipment from the Glenfidich still, specifically the copper \u201cswan necks\u201d which are essential to the character of each still, and the taste of the whiskey. According to one online source, \u201cthe shape of the swan neck can give the vapours a smooth ride or act as a baffle, leading heavier elements to condense against the copper surface and drop back down into the pot, leaving the lighter elements in the vapour to carry over the top.\u201d When our two European friends arrived in 2019, it so happened that two old stills were being replaced by new ones, and they seized their chance as the crane lowered the copper tubes to the ground. The swan necks became part of a \u201ckinetic sound sculpture\u201d. The musicians used them to amplify sound recordings they made \u2013 field recordings captured around the distillery, all methodically listed here, all of them important stages in the production of whiskey (even including the spring water from Robbie Dhu), thus telling the whole story from start to finish, in sound. This results in the quite sublime soaring drones \u2013 three very long ones \u2013 on the first disc, while the second disc presents eight shorter pieces referring obliquely to pumps, processes, and mash\u2026this second disc, although heavily abstracted, is perhaps the more process-heavy of the two, and not as successful as achieving the sublimation of the three long pieces. Part of that success is down to the choir \u2013 not a choir of professional musicians, but workers and staff at the distillery in Dufftown, who were required not to sing in a mass but simply produce two short voice recordings, high and low. Hlady and Migone then arranged the recordings according to a system \u2013 some sort of mathematical calculation based on how long the staff had been in the job in relation to the age of the plant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The project, and the record, align with a certain trend I\u2019ve been detecting in experimental music for a few years now \u2013 it\u2019s to do with the decline of built infrastructure, the collapse of certain industries that can\u2019t compete in the modern world, or just general observations on 21st-century decay and entropy. The last time I mused on this trend was\u00a0here<\/a>. There was also Iain Chambers and\u00a0The Eccentric Press<\/em>\u00a0record<\/a>. Many of these projects find ways to capture, or generate, sound from buildings or machinery, and reprocess it into something new. In the case of\u00a0Swan Song<\/em>, this time it\u2019s not a pessimistic take, since the distillery in question continues to thrive and do business; the \u201cSwan\u201d part is of course a reference to the copper swan necks, not to the dying gasps of a neglected industry. And as already noted, I like the comprehensive way that their holistic understanding of the process, and their research, has been used to structure this particular piece. From 2nd March 2023. Ed Pinsent<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

via The Sound Projector<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Spirits Drifting Here\u2019s two discs of very enjoyable drone music produced by various processes\u2026Swan Song (CR\u00d3NICA196-2023) was realised by Marla Hlady and Christof Migone, and they did it during a three-month residency in Glenfiddich. From what I can make out, it\u2019s a clever bit of \u201crepurposing\u201d of old equipment from the Glenfidich still, specifically the copper \u201cswan necks\u201d which … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Marla Hlady & Christof Migone\u2019s\u00a0\u201cSwan Song\u201d reviewed by The Sound Projector”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[569,566,565],"class_list":["post-11519","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-569","tag-christof-migone","tag-marla-hlady","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.cronicaelectronica.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11519","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.cronicaelectronica.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.cronicaelectronica.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.cronicaelectronica.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.cronicaelectronica.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11519"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/blog.cronicaelectronica.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11519\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11520,"href":"http:\/\/blog.cronicaelectronica.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11519\/revisions\/11520"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.cronicaelectronica.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11519"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.cronicaelectronica.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11519"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.cronicaelectronica.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11519"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}