Category Archives: Labels

Michel Chion, Dix-sept minutes. (MKCD032)

Oddly enough, Dix-sept minutes is almost exactly seventeen minutes long. And while it contains a lot of clock noises, including but by no means limited to ticking and chiming, those sounds are only part of a rich and complex tapestry that also includes acoustic instruments ...

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Lionel Marchetti, Train de nuit (Noord 3-683) (MKCD029)

The train is king of sounds; long live the king! But don’t expect a whole lot of train noises in this piece. This is a serious piece which happens to use train sounds as one of its sources, but only one. There are electronic sounds and people ...

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Jean-Francois Laporte, Mantra (MKCD028)

The first sound of Mantra is like that of a motor starting up (motor, not engine), which is only remarkable because nothing else like that ever happens again in the piece. It’s repeated several times in the first few seconds (sounding less and less like ...

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Maurizio Martusciello, Unsettled line (MKCD027)

Unsettled line starts out with some night sounds—cricket-like—which are joined by increasingly sharp, mechanical sounds and some truly luscious electronic grit. There are some pretty harsh sounds here, and some laughter, and some Tibetan singing bowl, and although there are a few drones now and ...

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eRikm, Frame (MKCD026)

On or about 1999, someone came up with the idea of handing over all the Cinéma pour l’oreille cds to date to Erik M (now known as eRikm) to do with what he would. Was it a good idea? Yes. Will you be able to recognize ...

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Lionel Marchetti, Le Grande Vallée (MKCD025)

I first heard Lionel Marchetti in the Ground Fault recording of Portrait d’un Glacier (Alpes 2173m). Le Grande Vallée could almost be called Portrait des feuilles sèches, as the sound of crunching through the autumn leaves strolls through the whole piece. Over the top of ...

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Les Kristoff K. Roll, Des travailleurs de la nuit, à l’amie des objets (MKCD024)

This piece could almost be taken as a test case of how inherently musical speaking voices are. I’m fairly certain that that’s not the main thing they set out to do in this piece, but it’s just as certain to me that that’s one of ...

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Bernhard Günter, impossible grey (MKCD023)

I’m tempted to say that this is the most col.... But no, I cannot. It is wildly beautiful, though. Dangerously low frequencies, that is if you’ve a good system and neighbors. Lovely bright hard sounds, too. You doubtless already like the scratchy sound at the ...

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Hervé Castellani, Deux Silences. (MKCD022)

In the first of these two silences, Castellani blends internal combustion engines and the squeaky wheels of a farm cart with low drones and vaguely organ-like sounds, along with both natural and harshly processed bird calls. Blends is perhaps a bit of a misnomer. While ...

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Dominique Petitgand,10 petites compositions familiales (MKCD021)

1 - Le prévu—low drone that comes and goes; held accordion chord; balalaika* strumming. Over them, a woman speaking. 2 - En partance—younger woman. Long pauses. Accordion thrumming and some high pitched (falsetto) singing (also female). Older woman talking, then even higher high pitched, as high as ...

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