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Lawrence English, "Ghost Towns"
Room 40
While the debate over what is or isn't 'real music' is tired, there arestill releases now and again that call that nagging question to mind,just as a reminder of the very far extremes of music that exist beyondeven the peripheral vision of most CD-buying folks, and this iscertainly one of them. For roughly 18 minutes, English treats us towhat could be a foley recording session for a major motion picture ifsome of the sounds weren't layered and overlapped through time. There'slittle emotional or psychological reward for making it through those 18minutes, and the theme of "Ghost Towns" isn't explored in anysignificant way that stuck with me, but the disc works like a trainingguide for careful listening. While some of the mixing techniques are abit obvious (a humming sound slowly pans from stereo right to left;distant sounds slowly fade in while closer sounds pop into the mix),most of the time the sound isn't drawing attention to its manipulation,and that's a good thing. In a very traditional Music Concrete sense,this work is about the sounds themselves in space; sound as an objectto be perceived. To that end, the record can be enjoyed vastlydifferently in different settings where gongs, distant trains, torturedpianos and chewing potato chips aren't usually familiar. The onlytraditionally musical timbres included are a gong and some mutedpercussion at the beginning and a piano that is being banged on andplucked at ferociously towards the end of the piece. The bookendinstruments hold together a string of recordings from amplifiedroom-tone to all of the scraping and crackling sounds that these kindsof records generally include to keep listeners guessing. I can imagineLawrence English performing this piece on a stage full of seeminglyrandom objects and tape machines with loops of field recordings. I cansee him scurrying back and forth between the pile of leaves, the birdcage, and the broken crash cymbal as a well-dressed art crowd looks onand wonders "is this really music?" The wonderful point of music likethis is, however, that none of it matters in the end. The sounds areobjects, you are free to browse them at your leisure. There will besome you find quite pleasant and others that are objectionable, whilestill others may leave no impression at all, and if you have anycomments please leave them with the curator.
While the debate over what is or isn't 'real music' is tired, there arestill releases now and again that call that nagging question to mind,just as a reminder of the very far extremes of music that exist beyondeven the peripheral vision of most CD-buying folks, and this iscertainly one of them. For roughly 18 minutes, English treats us towhat could be a foley recording session for a major motion picture ifsome of the sounds weren't layered and overlapped through time. There'slittle emotional or psychological reward for making it through those 18minutes, and the theme of "Ghost Towns" isn't explored in anysignificant way that stuck with me, but the disc works like a trainingguide for careful listening. While some of the mixing techniques are abit obvious (a humming sound slowly pans from stereo right to left;distant sounds slowly fade in while closer sounds pop into the mix),most of the time the sound isn't drawing attention to its manipulation,and that's a good thing. In a very traditional Music Concrete sense,this work is about the sounds themselves in space; sound as an objectto be perceived. To that end, the record can be enjoyed vastlydifferently in different settings where gongs, distant trains, torturedpianos and chewing potato chips aren't usually familiar. The onlytraditionally musical timbres included are a gong and some mutedpercussion at the beginning and a piano that is being banged on andplucked at ferociously towards the end of the piece. The bookendinstruments hold together a string of recordings from amplifiedroom-tone to all of the scraping and crackling sounds that these kindsof records generally include to keep listeners guessing. I can imagineLawrence English performing this piece on a stage full of seeminglyrandom objects and tape machines with loops of field recordings. I cansee him scurrying back and forth between the pile of leaves, the birdcage, and the broken crash cymbal as a well-dressed art crowd looks onand wonders "is this really music?" The wonderful point of music likethis is, however, that none of it matters in the end. The sounds areobjects, you are free to browse them at your leisure. There will besome you find quite pleasant and others that are objectionable, whilestill others may leave no impression at all, and if you have anycomments please leave them with the curator.
