Seven artists reckon with isolation and subsistence in Dragon’s Eye Recordings’ latest release, titled 'Touch'. Organized by Tomoko Hojo, the album collects six sound pieces by various artists who grapple with the restriction of physical contact through sound. Our ability to touch is a means of survival, an essential and intimate way of living and communing with others. So when it is taken away for the same reason we possess it—for the sake of staying safe—how can it be replaced? What can stand in? 

The pandemic claimed so much; and for a time, touch fell victim. In the album 'Touch', Alexandra Spense, KMRU, Viv Corringham, Myriam Van Imschoot and Federico Protto, Tomoko Hojo, and Melissa Pons prod at means of non-tactile touching. They explore spaces where touch is only a memory, a recording, something missing to find replacements. In assembling this six-piece collection, artist Tomoko Hojo recalls Yoko Ono’s 1964 event which invited attendees to “watch the sky and touch”. Over the course of 'Touch,' the listener is an attendee, witnessing sonic reconstructions of haptic happenings. In each of the album’s pieces, sound grazes unseen surfaces and traces invisible shapes with an absent finger.  

In “Communion”, Alexandra Spense recalls a space where tactility transformed into something more, an instance that dissolved the borders of the physical body to blend spirit with its surroundings. KMRU’s “its not a tangency” relies on repetition to feel the boundaries of its container. Almost like echolocation, the listener relies on distant children’s voices and the monotony of soft drones to situate oneself in an imagined space.  

“Imagine myself walking with you” engages with the physical intimacy created not through touch, but rather physical presence—the nearness of two bodies, the potentiality of tactility, the imprint conversations can leave long after they end. Viv Corringham digitally recreates her process of walking and talking with strangers, instead connecting with a friend online. In “Human Measures”, Myriam Van Imschoot and Federico Protto create an instrument which mimics what touch might sound like by simultaneously breathing into a circulatory system of tubes, wrapped into something like the symbol for infinity.   

In “fall asleep”, Tomoko Hojo conjures whispers, chants, and rings bells to touch the air.  From these sound waves of voice and instrument and element, intentional and drawn out, their dispersal can be felt. It’s when the waves enter the ear that we can hear them. But Hojo asks what happens to other waves that run into other parts of the body, unalive or unhearing.  

The absence of other bodies, the ultimate vehicles of touch, brought Melissa Pons inward with her piece “Three”. Through airy field recordings, scattered static, and gently howling drones, it’s as if Pons watches her emotions float off of her body like the minuscule flakes of skin that comprise dust.  

Each of these six pieces ask to expand outside of sound, to take physical shape, make gestures and wander. In their own unique ways, the artists of 'Touch' attempt to transmute sound into tactility, and they come as close as they can. Collectively, the sound pieces exist within the container of the compilation—an abstract notion that places collections of noise alongside one another. And so what is a compilation if not individual tracks rubbing up against one another, meshing, touching?

Touch

KMRU - Its not a tangency

Field Recordings - Sound of Black Sea Odesa

notal1 606

Dawn Dance

Format: CD
Pre-order: 12th July 2024
Release date: 19st July 2024

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In a small fishing village located on a remote island, there was an elderly man who loved to stroll along the beach at sunset, leaving his footprints on the golden sand as he contemplated the infinite sea.

One evening, as he walked along the shore, he came across a young boy sitting on a rock, lost in his thoughts.

"What are you doing here all alone?" he asked kindly.

The boy looked up, surprised to be interrupted. "I'm just trying to understand the meaning of life," he replied weakly.

The elderly man smiled and sat down beside him. "The meaning of life is like this ocean we see before us," he said, gesturing towards the vastness of the sea. "Majestic and mysterious. We may not always understand it, but we must accept its flow."

The boy nodded, but still seemed perplexed.

"Look at the waves," the elderly man continued. "They're like the events of life. Some are high and tumultuous, others are gentle and serene. But in the end, they all crash upon the shore, leaving only smooth and uniform sand."

The boy watched the ocean attentively, reflecting on the old fisherman's words.

"Life is made up of moments that leave their mark," he said. "But just like footprints in the sand, they will eventually be erased by the tide of time. No matter how hard we try to leave our mark, in the end, everything will fade away."

The boy felt relieved of an invisible burden as he listened to the wise words of the elderly man. Perhaps there was no need to search for the meaning of life so anxiously. Perhaps all he needed was to learn to accept the flow of time and enjoy the present moment.

That night, as the tide silently rose on the beach, the elderly man and the boy sat together on the rock, watching the sea shimmer in the moonlight. And in that moment, in the quiet of the island, they found the inner peace they had been seeking.

"Inspired by Alessandro Baricco's book 'Oceano Mare' (1993)."

Sound source material: Berlioz Symphonie Fantastique / Felix Mendelssohn, Piano Concerto No 2.

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previews. Lamasz, come le onde - il mare cancella, di notte | ROHS!

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Dance with Me

Double Pendulum

ultimate

grow ft. nueen

Track 4 from @nueen - Form [APPX:03]

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Form

digis & lathe cuts

Nueen - V444V [APPX:03]

Dragon’s Eye Recordings is a digital imprint based in Los Angeles and curated by artist and composer Yann Novak. Emphasizing the elevation of marginalized voices in experimental music, our catalog represents a range of sounds, processes, identities, and practices. Since 2005, we’ve published over 100 works of sound art and experimental music with a focus on ambient, field recording, drone, electroacoustic, and acousmatic music. As an independent label, we work to build community for our artists and listeners searching for somewhere to belong.

KMRU - Its not a tangency

Dragons Eye Recordings