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Ryoji Ikeda's "Matrix (for an anechoic room)" emits continually flowing tones which fade in slowly then ripple and waver. Daniel Menche contributes the low, crackling thrum of "Down", behind which ancient radio opera voices can barely be perceived. Apparently Chris Watson 's been making field recordings in Morocco ("Friday the 13th" features throaty male wails), North Ethiopa (where locals chant in "A Celebration", and another undisclosed locale). Other on-the-spot tapings occur with Aer's "As You Wander Round", which mixes a recorded speaking voice with locational sounds from England's Salisbury Cathedral, and then again with "Bread Upon the Water" from Le Bassin D'Arcachon in France.
More musical, in an electro-tribal vein, "Olga A1" by Thomas Brinkmann hums along with digital drumbeats.
With peppy beats and breathy female vocals, Locust's "Wrong" wouldn't seem out of place on the radio, though certainly stands out as strange here amongst its more-eccentric neighbors. Brassy grandeur streams from "Breaking Point", but after adding piano tones, Scala shifts into sheer musical chaos (with additional drums and electric guitars), from which emerges an energetic stream to be topped with ethereal female vocal strands.
Scratchy old recordings seem to be the base of Philip Jeck's miasmatic stew, "As My Shadow Passes..." (9:37); muted discord reigns in sepia tones of nostalgia and grit. Drastic cut-and-paste arrangements, strident bleeps and a weird gargling voice that sounds like a Muppet being strangled are only part of the serious oddness which is "KZSU 14 SEPT 99" by the conglomeration of People Like Us/The Jet Black Hair People/Wobbly. While those may be the craziest sounds, the Surrealist Title Award goes to Richard H. Kirk whose "Entering Valhalla without a laptop (but with an umbrella, a sewing machine and an operating table - dig it)" blends symphonic moods with grungily altered spoken word and eerily paranoic audio surroundings.
"Sun-Baked" from Biosphere quietly sizzles in a soft-though-hissy backdrop of wafting tones. In an interesting informational extrapolation,
Tobias Frere-Jones converts the highs and low temps of daily weather (of Milton, Massachusetts circa 1996) into audible data... growling/blipping electrons from "natural" data rival those of any microscopic sound sculptor. Working with hushed oscillations, Mika Vainio's "ilmaantuva" closes this collection with rising/falling blankets of electronic thrums
Additionally, sprinkled throughought are brief (as short as 0:12) snippets of sound and words, inlcuding wispy noise, ruminations on starvation in Calcutta, an old woman's voice and Russian Air Traffic Controllers.
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