Label: Critique of Everyday Life

限定150セット、当店大推薦の電子音楽レーベル!!現行の優れたミュージック・コンクレート作家を手掛ける、バルセロナ発Critique of Everyday Life!!レーベルの立ち上げ人であり、主に自然と人工に関する音作品の制作を行なっている電子音楽家William Selman。環境人類学をコンセプトに数種の音源を発表していますが、今回は数年掛けて完成させたというコラージュの手法を軸とした作品をリリース。"自身の故郷である太平洋岸北西部"、"コスタリカの中央部と西部"、2箇所の熱帯雨林フィールドレコーディングを緻密に組み合わせた構造が美しく、またその素材と対話する様に鳴らされるSerge及びBuchla 200の加工処理が激ヤバ。マスタリングはStephan Mathieuが担当。







The third release from William Selman on his Critique of Everyday Life label (co-curated with Chris Miller aka Gunnar Haslam, Emile Zener) departs from his previous approaches to making sound by collaging sounds thematically. Using a thematic tagging system to categorize the raw material on this album, Selman lets the sounds’ qualitative/imaginative characteristics guide the direction of each track by finding their associative partners. This associative method explores Selman’s fascination with sound’s mysterious ambiguity and the beauty of vague and surreal combinations.

Made over several years, the grounding materials are field recordings made in two types of rainforest: one temperate (his home region of the Pacific Northwest) and one tropical (the central and western regions of Costa Rica). These recordings capture sound material from tidal lagoons, saunas, volcanic springs, forest primates, insect swarms, street sweepers, shellfish farms, fermenting food, and caves. In dialogue with these recordings are tonal elements generated from Serge and Buchla 200 series systems, vibraphone, recordings of electromagnetic fields, and additional sounds and processing in Kyma and other digital tools.

On “Through Frozen Words,” melting ice meets boiling water and steam from a sauna evolving into interlocking rhythms. “Sanctioned Departures” sets up the sounds of rushing liquids against synthesized gong tones and sustained drones of their ringing tails. While on “Outside the Window,” a group of howler monkeys nesting near powerline towers vocalize against recordings of electromagnetic fields and Buchla frequency modulation.

“To sanction” can mean “allow” or its antonym “disallow.” It's a janus word—meaning it can mean its primary meaning or its opposite depending on the context. With the categorization system guiding some control of the compositional process combinations and transitions emerge that are both intuitive and non-intuitive. In other words, qualitatively-defined categories depart into uncategorizable combinations.

The shoreline isn’t clearly demarcated. Water overflows its banks and vessels. Sometimes the boundary of the forest and its opposite are impossible to define.