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Luc Ferrari, "Son Mémorisé"
Luc Ferrari’s death last year meant that the world had lost a creative genius. I was saddened both at the loss of the man and at the fact that no new music would come from his direction. Luckily, Sub Rosa are making available some of his later works as well as some older unreleased material.
Sub Rosa
Son Mémorisé includes an unreleased piece from his “Presque Rien” series of recordings. “Presque Rien #4: La Remontée du Village” is a processed and edited recording of a day split across two tracks. It is everyday life condensed into the space of around 16 minutes (and worked on for over nine years!). It doesn’t sound like all the recordings are crammed in, but instead sounds like Ferrari is walking through a bustling area of a town. It’s very natural sounding apart from the moments of heavily treated and chopped up recordings. It is a masterful piece of audio documentation where I can almost smell and feel the surroundings that I am hearing.
The middle section of the album is a recording of Ferrari’s visit to Algeria in the late seventies. “Promenade Symphonique dans un Paysage Musical…” is broken up into morning, afternoon and evening with different events occurring at each time of day. The market sounds are rich in texture but somewhat boring. The wedding is far more exciting, the music and sounds of joy rocked by what appears to be celebratory gunshots (which take my ears off when listening on headphones).
The final half hour of Son Mémorisé is a more recent piece entitled “Saliceburry Cocktail.” It is a collection of sounds recorded throughout the nineties and assembled into the piece found here in 2002. Ferrari writes in the sleevenotes about how he was hiding sounds he didn’t like with other sounds he didn’t like. I can hear what he means; there are a few queasy sounds (such as the creepy laughter on the second track of the piece). Unlike the previous pieces which although in places were slightly manipulated, “Saliceburry Cocktail” his heavily shaped by Ferrari. This is much more unnatural and chaotic. Parts of it are amazing sounding and parts of it are aggravating to listen to.
While Son Mémorisé isn’t consistently good, there are enough exceptional moments to justify its release. The parts I don’t like will most likely grow on me over the next few months, Ferrari isn’t someone that I can just pick up and instantly appreciate. Importantly, this is not a collection of pieces that are only getting thrown out into public view now that Ferrari is gone; it is a worthy addition to his canon.
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