Sound Reasons | Epiphany | VA | Released Feb 2014 |
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The third Sound Reasons Album which is a compilation called Epiphany featuring artists from the Sound Reasons label and the ones curated at the Sound Reasons Festival.The compilation also draws upon the vast array of practices that we at Sound Reasons have been involved with like sound art and music concrete, experimental electronic music involving analog and digital synthesis. Some of the artists on the album are Andy Guhl, Jasch, n0ngrata, edGeCut, Robert Millis, Salomé Voegelin, Petri Kuljuntausta, Gennady Lavrentiev, Cisfinitum and Grischa Lichtenberger to name a few of them
.Sound Reasons | Epiphany | 2014 | CD | SR003 |
Compiled by Ish S | Produced at Sound Reasons | Supported by Pro Helvetia New Delhi | Goethe-Institut Max Muller Bhavan, Delhi | Produced at Sound Reasons |
| Released on Friday 28 Feb @ Khoj International Artists’ Association, Khirki Ext | | Live performances | CD release |
Sound Reasons | Epiphany | VA |
2014 | SR003 |
Compiled by ISh S
Produced at Sound Reasons
The third Sound Reasons Album which is a compilation called ‘Epiphany’ features artists from the Sound Reasons record label and the ones curated at the Sound Reasons Festival. The compilation also draws upon the vast array of practices that we at Sound Reasons have been involved with like ‘sound art and music concrete’, experimental electronic music involving analog and digital synthesis. Some of the artists on the album are Andy Guhl, Jasch, n0ngrata, edGeCut, Robert Millis, Salomé Voegelin, Petri Kuljuntausta, Gennady Lavrentiev, Cisfinitum and Grischa Lichtenberger to name a few. You can read more about this compilation in the following:
Compiled by Ish S, this compilation has some of the most influential artists in the field of contemporary sound art and electronic music. Featured on the CD are 2 tracks from a live recording session which took place during the Sound Reasons Festival II in Delhi in November 2013. Here, Andy Guhl who is a pioneer of cracked and bent electronics, Jasch (Jan Schaner) and Ish S (edGeCut + diFfuSed beats) made three recording sessions together and two parts of these recording sessions called ‘vertex y,z’ and ‘point l,m’ are featured on this CD. These 2 tracks represent the spirit of free improvisation and creative flow driven equally driven by the process listening and observing as they are by the process of creation of these sounds itself. These recording sessions will be published in their entirety on Sound Reasons towards the end of 2014. The opening tune of the CD called ‘A’ composed by n0ngrata(Samar Grewal) + edGeCut (Ish S) was a collaboration especially shaped together for this compilation as it paints this ambient picture filled with mild glitches and pushes the envelop of harmony with a few interesting movements of fourths and sixths juxtaposed with some eventual dissonances. The compilation features a wide array of diverse artists like Gennady Lavrentiev and Cisfinitum (Eugeny Voronovsky ) who together hail from Moscow and their sound and creativity spans the contemporary and dark ambient. Lavrentiev’s track ‘rage in Jhaptaal’ is an interesting electro track set to an unusual 10 beat cycle and has a funny yet completely original nod to Frank Zappa and John Zorn. Cisfinitum’s work reflects an interesting dark ambient territory which evolves itself while it progresses into various interesting sonic states.
Salomé Voegelin who is a Swiss Writer and Sound Artist based in London and has written an outstanding book on contemporary Sound Art and Practice called ‘Listening to Noise and Silence’ has contributed a track called ‘exactly three minutes’ which is built around music concrete aesthetics. Here the focus is on the small and the slight – everyday material performed, recorded, and manipulated to become noticeable events that remain unimportant but attain a rhythm. These are moments that pass you by unless they are amplified and restaged in a composition: produced as unseen performances that almost fail to happen, that lack a performer and maybe even an audience and yet they sound.These sounds when have a the power to transform the listener and position him/her right into the centre of it, hence becoming very powerful sonically. The talented German artist Grischa Lichtenberger who has a highly individualistic attack and style lets his anachronistic interest in landscape reflect on his track called ‘Let c targ’ has a beautiful space . As one of the youngest artists to be featured on Raster-Noton he has already paved an interesting creative path and is constantly in a state of Flux via which he is directing and redirecting his approach constantly as this tune represents his new sound which he presented at the Sound Reasons festival. (http://soundreasons.in/videos). The background vocals on the track ‘let C targ’ derives its samples from a sufi concert recorded at Mehboobe Elahi (a famous sufi shrine in the heart of New Delhi). Fascinated by the repetitive, yet very narrative structure of the sufi’s music the track seeks to combine the futuristic impressions of a fragmented and disturbed reality with the vocal story telling of sufi music culture.
The collaboration between the Swiss Bass Clarinet player Hans Koch and Ish S from Delhi/ India has been built around abstract structures and experimental electronic synthesis. While being a study of generative rhythms it gives the listener a taste of the new EP which is under production by the Duo. One can also sample the virtuoso technique of Hans Koch on the reed on the track named ‘etude no 11′ as he efficiently demonstrates his circular breathing technique on he Bass Clarinet with eventual additions pulsating rhythmic variations as the track progresses. Robert Mills’ work “Gauhar” was put together using short, processed, and collaged samples from early acoustic 78rpm recordings, c. 1902-1920, especially recordings of Gauhar Jan, who is considered one of the first “gramophone celebrities” of India. edGeCut’s (Ish s) track ‘patterns in Fractals’ again has a lot of his trade mark glitch and compound rhythms which he is trying to explore for the last few years. The sharp contrast of electronica and melody which lends itself to dissonance through carefully manipulated patterns forms the basis for the rhythm and eventually moulding a structure for the perceived melody by the listener. Eisentanz’s work has some bold rhythm structures carefully contrasted with an evocatively clockwork industrial meter which is juxtaposed along with an array of ambient sounds. This track eventually transforms itself into another realm when choir voices appears towards the end of the track. da Saz’s track ‘Modular Geometry’ is composed using analog gear and it weaves together an interesting bouquet of floating ambient sounds and noises.
Finish Sound Artist’s Petri Kuljuntausta’s track ‘Aanien Jaljet’ takes us into the experimental territory of the ambient where the fine interplay of tension and sustain reigns supreme. Budhaditya Chattopadhyay picks up with the same intent of digital synthesis where his work intervenes into and redefines the ecologies of listening by making hidden sound elements audible to the ear, and in the process triggers the city-dweller’s imagination and awareness of an innate and pervasive sound-field present even in a presumably silent empty-space within the tangible environment of the city. Robin Meier’s tune which tracks Katia’s Dream is actually a binaural composition which uses an interesting mix of ambient samples and electronic synthesis to construct an aural dreamscape. In order to experience this track just like the intricate parts of the rest of the CD you have to listen to it on good Headphones to get the binaural effect. diFfuSed beats (Konrad Bayer + ISh S) track ‘A study of balance’ explores newer territories of sounds and rhythms while using a lot of ambient samples, with a playful exchange between music concrete and deconstructed elements of EDM. These elements are finally augmented together in their own unique way to shape the diFfuSed beats sound. Their debut album can be found at https://diffusedbeats.bandcamp.com. Masta Justy’s (Jatin Vidyarthi) tune ‘X’ is built on the drum and bass idiom and has an interesting mix of sonic activity to keep the keen ear involved through its unique array of ambient elements and sonic textures.
