ANGUS CARLYLE – Some Memories Of Bamboo

Since Carlyle’s name was new to yours truly, I went for a Google search and the most satisfactory description was the following: “… Angus’ work explores the intersections between culture, technology and creativity. More specifically, he is interested in how our constructed ‘landscape’ modulates a sense of the relationship between human beings and the environment”. Not a truer word indeed, as this collection of location recordings testifies. Limiting the action to the small suburban district of Kami-Katsura in Kyoto, this man succeeded in presenting an artifact that is not comparable with the current overabundance of field recording-based releases – a dime a dozen lately – as in this case the sounds really tell a story of their own, perfectly portraying the difficulties revealed by each setting and the fickle temporariness of the situations he researched through. Carlyle is very precise, explaining in the enclosed booklet circumstances and utilized materials, adding his reflections about those moments.

That said, it is pretty pointless to merely list the acoustic pictures contained by Some Memories Of Bamboo: there are several that we come across quite regularly, a few less widespread than others and, at times, rather extraordinary. Seaming together natural and urban voices is not a difficult task these days, yet Carlyle accomplished a nice balance of clarity – namely an easy identification of the source – and elusiveness, either derived from a malfunctioning piece of equipment or caused by the long distance from which certain scenes were captured. The repetition of a computerized announcement on a bus appears almost as lyrical as a nocturnal bird; a restaurant’s muzak fragment is so softly restrained that, once framed in this particular milieu, it becomes plain lovely - like a whisper of summer wind.

Pure poetry is found in the record’s finishing episode, an old woman singing an ancient Japanese tune, then chatting amiably in broken English with the fellow soul who happened to record that moment. They talk, among other things, of the beauty of a well-visible moon in an afternoon’s blue sky. Reading in the liners that this frail lady was recovering from a heart attack is touching, her will to keep living and appreciate the sheer magnificence of the universe’s phenomena a teaching for many people who grieve over trivial matters and minor frustrations, unable to see the essence of what’s necessary right in front of them.

Gruenrekorder

GIANCARLO TONIUTTI – qwalsamtimutkwɁitalucʻik

A reclusive gentleman from a land of cold silences (Friuli, extreme North East of Italy), Giancarlo Toniutti has carved an individual niche amidst the obscurity of the really serious sonic experimentalists over many years of barely reported activity. The man is highly esteemed by those in the know, despite the relative scarcity of releases (besides other things, he's been a collaborator of Andrew Chalk and Jason Lescalleet). This CD, whose name is in Nuxálk language, is subtitled “and now he almost did make himself into hemlock needles, it is said”. Cryptic messages that find their acoustic expression in a kind of music that, in the originator’s words, “deals with the dynamics of perception itself as an element of a sharing experience”.

Originally intended as a sound-field for exhibitions by visual artist Luisa Tomasetig, this piece – which lasts a full hour – was created with an object that existed only for that purpose and today is no more: a “rattle-harp”. Basically, it’s a 145 x 85 drift metal plate, various meters of steel and metal wire with “tintinnabula” attached, plus “accidental” bone and wood. It was played with a “num”, namely the arco of a Mongolian instrument called “morin xuur”. Everything you just read testifies about the type of person Toniutti is: looking for the core essence of the matter and for the actual meaning of a gesture, certainly not content with the first plaything found around. Quite a difference with certain alleged experts of installations, not to mention those who buy expensive toys to pollute silence with records exclusively justified by the money used to release them.

The concrete upshot of the recordings (which were completed between 2001 and 2002) is a gorgeous work that has nothing to envy to the bona fide masters of the genre – say, a Jonathan Coleclough. The organic quality of the soundscape – essentially, a series of deeply resounding bowed drones with click-and-clatter protuberances in the background – requires total openness in its effectively overpowering low-frequency radiation. At the same time this music asks for repetitive reproduction, unafraid to reveal a raw magnetism to anyone able to identify a soul in the place where humongous rumble and ruthless growl rule.

Alluvial

JUAN PEDRO FABRA / JAN HÅFSTRÖM / CARL MICHAEL VON HAUSSWOLFF – Graf Spee

Despite the obligatory credit to Fabra and Håfström – active participants in the installations of which this music constitutes the sonic component – the sounds in Graf Spee were entirely generated by Carl Michael Von Hausswolff, a bona fide master of the subliminal action of frequencies on the brain. The sources are unspecified – sine waves, presumably – but the authority that these permanent wavering pitches establish on the listener’s will is inescapable and, ultimately, desirable, as one literally becomes addicted to this type of nerve-kneading feeling. For the umpteenth time, though, I wonder why we can’t have a chance of listening to this sort of material via CD. If these propagations were conceived for a walking space, the necessity of flipping a vinyl (also existing in a 50-copy “art” edition with a pictorial insert signed by the artists) tears the mesmerizing enchantment to pieces.

The first part is the most “minimalist”, if you forgive the expression. An incessant throb that mutates according to the volume level and the position you’re in (needless to say: no headphones) is interspersed by an indeterminate “something” that I couldn’t manage to decipher, a fragment of a church choir maybe, or just an electronic invention (in that case, all the more flabbergasting for this reviewer) appearing in a mist and emitting a short enigmatic figuration, a question mark of sorts in a brainwashed gaze. The oscillations perceived when playing this segment loud are extraordinary, almost hurting the rear of the head in selected circumstances. At moderate levels, the effect is not too far from Eliane Radigue’s mind-numbing processes. Please consider the latter a mere reference: Von Hausswolff is Von Hausswolff.

Side two is even more mysterious, if possible. A concise hypnotic section is repeated for 12 times, giving a “rhythm” to our attention which is called out, sustained and abandoned in a minute and a half or so, only to be coaxed back by the exact replica of the previous track, until conclusion. The snippet per se is another fulfilling coalition of pulsating tremors, felt in the body and vibrating through the cranium rather than “heard”. Its plausibility is confirmed by the physical acceptance of it as a natural phenomenon acknowledged on a primary manifestation. After a while, we hope that it never stops, as if suddenly threatened of being deprived of an essential element for survival.

Presto!?

IAN HOLLOWAY / DARREN TATE – The Earth In Play

Two long-time collaborators reunite to satiate our appetite for unsophisticated depth once more, managing to draw out heart-warming consequences in the 35 minutes of The Earth In Play. In spite of the fact that marine recordings were utilized and that images of water adorn the sleeve, the CD is not drenched in liquid sonorities, actually perceptible only in the first of the two nameless tracks, a five-minute prologue of sorts with Tate complementing the aquatic echoes with the strained oscillation of the processed sounds of an accordion – or squeezebox, as he calls it. Perhaps a souvenir left by his erstwhile neighbour, the late Kathleen Vance, heard playing that instrument on a couple of earlier releases by Yorkshire’s purest artist.

Holloway’s classic bottomless sound is at the forefront in the longest track, obviously the album’s nucleus. It’s a simple yet profound piece, initially orbiting around subterranean whispers (presumably obtained by slowing down the pitches emitted by a wooden flute) that go away and reappear, either reciprocated or balanced by a meagre piano, additional – and slightly dissonant - droning constituents (Tate is also credited with guitar) and infrequent percussive touches: a single hit, a reverberating clang, small gestures that nevertheless weigh a lot in the music’s economy. The effect, as I listen in a torrid July afternoon characterized by the boundless mantra of cicadas and the occasional faraway tolling of the local bell tower, is just wonderful. The positive thoughts and the best intentions we used to have - forgotten for years now - return for a short while, giving the mere illusion of new existential openings as a present.

Quiet World / Fungal

CELER - Dwell In Possibility

There are many titles but no actual subdivisions in the music comprised by the two sides of this LP, whose tracks were recorded by Will and Dani Long at home in 2008. As always, the sounds were obtained via a painstaking work of degeneration and reconfiguration of the timbres coming from normal instruments and machines. However, this time the final result is special as we abandon precincts characterized by worn-out terminologies and genres, approaching instead a condition which is nearer to a singular kind of extrasensory fog than “new ambient”, or whatever name you may want to stick on it.

A slight differentiation exists between the parts. In the first, human remnants seem to be still present: unrecognizably altered voices (perhaps a handful of singers, somewhere), or just traces of someone’s activity appear and perplex, attributing an additional degree of uncertainty to an indescribable combination of factors. Everything revolves around a constant instability of nebulously stifled clusters – occasionally following a synchronization of sorts, elsewhere amassing one over another in indefinite fashion – that get suddenly cut at one point, leaving us quite flummoxed.

The other face of the coin is represented by the relative steadiness informing part of the second side, also defined by the type of vibrational/irrational power (mainly originating from a creatively skilled equalization) which only certain adjacent frequencies can elicit. Sudden increases in the thickness of the sound’s inherent rumble are capable of annihilating the shimmering textures that some of these recordings are endowed with. Ultimately, this mix of situations brings the whole to the same state of sonic ambiguity perceived previously, the amplified influence of the lowest possible susurrus literally clutching the nape of the neck at elevated levels of playback.

In both cases the outcome is impressive, causing a temporary postponement of alternative actions, and the few pops due to the vinyl are not detrimental to a compelling involvement. Dwell In Possibility indisputably belongs among Celer’s paramount releases and its reissue in digital format would be very useful for this writer’s personal needs of infinite-repeat abstraction.

Blackest Rainbow