This recording was made in response to a prompt from La Meme Young as part of the LMY Patrons Monthly Project #1, and was also submitted as part of the Presque Tout project. 

Montreal (QC) - April 7, 2021, 3:54pm
Alleys are a defining feature of urban life in Montreal, and during the pandemic I've become especially sensitive to the gradual changes that take place in the alley behind my apartment building, which I watch from my balcony. Last summer, I noticed a Palestinian woman would often stop to pluck a few grape leaves from the vine growing on a neighbor's fence. The activities of the local squirrels and cats became daily entertainment. But the most dominant sound, at least when the weather is nice, is the boombox of the old man who lives across the alley. Forget about the groundhog; once this guy appears, winter is over. And once he stops wearing his shirt, you know it's summer. It was about 15 °C the day of this recording, almost 10 degrees higher than average, so I cracked open the window and made this recording. The man across the alley always plays awesome music, so I’m glad I captured some of that vibe, which also attests to the diversity of this neighborhood, which was built in the 1950s and has always had one of the highest percentages of foreign-born population anywhere in Canada. 

The first thing I hear is common bird song, probably sparrows.  The steady hum of automobiles on a nearby highway ebbs and flows on the edge of perception. A lighter flicks, and the door clicks shut. The clinks and clacs of kitchen sounds are faintly audible. Suddenly a radio is turned on, a hypnotic bassline and hand drum rhythm vamping while some sort of Middle Eastern horn solos energetically. The engine of a plane overhead is loud enough to be clearly heard; we’re right in the flight path of the airport. The song continues on for a while before changing, as vocals enter in a language I can’t recognize. Greek maybe, but the melismatic singing sounds more Arabic or Turkish. More kitchen noises become apparent, perhaps the clearing of plates. As the ninth minute is ending, a large automobile passes on the far side of the street. The bird song begins to increase in density, almost as if responding to the horn and vocalist which have increased in tempo. Some loud seagulls become audible towards the end of the recording, first screeching in the distance but coming closer, almost right overhead.  The gull reappears after a while, maybe it is circling, no longer shrieking but still crying out in almost regular intervals, moving further away. The birds pick up again. The door opens, and the recording fades out.

Montreal alleyway on the first nice afternoon of spring

The Underground City

http://www.montrealsoundmap.com/

Notes from Underground

I moved on 1 April, and so I took the opportunity to rework my set up.  Throughout the month, I would try different set up, recording straight to tape.  I didn't think about it at all, just recorded until the tape side was full.  I had ten sides (5 tapes in all).  On 30 April I produced this track by mixing, dubbing, and effecting the various tapes I'd recorded throughout the month. 

3 tape decks, mc-303, mic and objects, flute, melodica, organ, guitar, memory man, chorus, fuzz, echo, looper, etc

As usual, headphones recommended

Freedom & Command

This composition was made as part of the Disquiet project. The German word “rauschen” means a murmur, a rumble, a whisper, any continuous kind of noise. The American artist Robert Rauschenberg, student of John Cage, winner of the Venice Biennale's Golden Lion in 1964 (infamously due to CIA meddling making him an unwitting Cold War pawn), and famous for his collage-based brand of painting.  

For "il rumore della spiaggia" I grabbed recordings from my archive, all recorded in the Italian village of Pisciotta (SA). These include the sound of the sea on rocks, bugs in the surrounding hillsides, electrical hums and drones, and cars and scooters in the distance.  I mixed them, entirely unprocessed, with just editing, panning, and fades. 

More on this 398th weekly Disquiet Junto project — Rauschen Bern / The Assignment: Make music by making a collage of noises — at:

https://disquiet.com/0398/

This week’s project is the first of three being done in collaboration with Musikfestival Bern, which runs in Switzerland from September 11 – 15, 2019. More details at:

https://www.musikfestivalbern.ch/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

https://disquiet.com/junto/

Subscribe to project announcements here:

http://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co:

https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0398-rauschen-bern/

il rumore della spiaggia [disquiet0398]

From January through March 2019, I rented a room in an apartment on the Corso Vittorio Emanuele in Napoli, in the south of Italy.  I'd seen using the iMPC app, so I downloaded it and gave it a try, recording sounds around my temporary home. Coins, light switches, a latch on the desk, blowing in a wine bottle, and so on. I mostly forgot about the app, as I was traveling until July and then spent much of the last year moving and teaching and writing and finishing up other projects. When I read the instructions for this week's Disquiet Junto, I figured I would share that kit.

More on this 433rd weekly Disquiet Junto project, Disquiet Junto Project 0433: Kit Bits — The Assignment: Create a kit’s worth of percussion samples — at:

https://disquiet.com/0433/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

https://disquiet.com/junto/

Subscribe to project announcements here:

http://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co:

https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0433-kit-bits/

Tno Disquiet Casa Kit 16

Tno Disquiet Casa Kit 15

Tno Disquiet Casa Kit 14

Tno Disquiet Casa Kit 13

Tno Disquiet Casa Kit 12

Tno Disquiet Casa Kit 11

Tno Disquiet Casa Kit 10

Tno Disquiet Casa Kit 09

Tno Disquiet Casa Kit 08

Tno Disquiet Casa Kit 07

Tno Disquiet Casa Kit 06

Tno Disquiet Casa Kit 05

Tno Disquiet Casa Kit 04

Tno Disquiet Casa Kit 03

Tno Disquiet Casa Kit 02

Tno Disquiet Casa Kit 01

writer enjoying ordering sounds

www.soundpropositions.com



lo-fi ambient electronic, limited only to the cheap gear and equipment i have, and free recording software.

co-founder and writer for A CLOSER LISTEN (www.acloserlisten.com)

co-runs lost children net label (www.lostchildrennetlabel.com)

co-founder of the now defunct the silent ballet.

inspiration: robin guthrie, tim hecker, black to comm, fennesz, vladislav delay, stars of the lid, jon hassell, giuseppe ielasi, hue, harshcore, nicola ratti, ezekiel honig, jonh cage, kluster, machinefabriek, klaus schulze, MB,  moritz von oswald, steve roden

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