Fossil Hunting Collective is musician and sound artist Jamie Jones, from Guelph in Canada who has been active under this artist name since 2019. He has previously released music on labels such as Ambientologist, ROHS, Polar Seas and Rusted Tone Recordings across this project name and as (ph)authers (alongside Hymns57) and Still Harbours (with Brad Deschamps). Followers of our discography may also recall 2020’s contribution to our Home Diaries series, entitled ‘Aperture’. 

‘Cyanotype’ was made primarily, via the beautiful surprises thrown out of various guitar pedals along with re-amped loops played back through old cassette recorders. Whilst virtual plugins are also used throughout the process, Jones places an emphasis on the physical too, with his small body acoustic guitar strung with nylons, a Jazzmaster guitar, a baritone ukulele and reel to reel tape. The sound is a heady blend of melancholy, nostalgic and life-affirming movements, using droning texture, tape decay and loosely performed instrumentation to tell dreamy stories.

The theme for this album was born out of the emotions that Jones pours into his music, as he contemplates the day-to-day struggles of his daughter Hunter, who has been Type 1 Diabetic for the last two years of their life. This autoimmune disease can be life-threatening if not managed correctly and around 95% of Jones’ headspace is occupied with worry, as follows strict procedures to count carbohydrates, weigh out food and monitor blood sugar metrics to ensure that his daughter does not become hypoglycaemic, which could lead to a coma. Controlling this disease is a full-time job and one which Jones carries the weight of at all times. The worry, care and withered energy levels mean that these emotions surface their way into the music, when he sits down in his studio late at night.

The album is a homage to what Hunter must go through each day of their life, living with Type 1 Diabetes.  No child or parent should have to go through this. No child should need to understand how it all works, but they are forced to wonder ‘why me’.  On top of the weight of the emotional trauma, there is a physical trauma that comes with being injected with devices and life-saving medication numerous times a day, until a cure can be found. Jones and his family are keen to remind themselves when they can, that the disease does not define the being, and they still celebrate all the positive splendour life can offer. These tracks are an emotional journey of the day-to-day; there is the good and the bad, days of hope and wonder, days of melancholy and sadness.  Above all, they are not alone in this fight, and they all work together as a unit, protecting their family bond fiercely, like bees.

At an age of around 18 months, Hunter adopted the nickname ‘B’, after being so enthralled with their bee costume for Halloween that they continued to wear on many occasions afterwards. The track titles for this album are all influenced by bee related terminology but also, in some cases there are double meanings, such as ‘Apiary’ (meaning home), ‘Castes’ (members of the family) ‘Mellitus Propolis’ combines Mellitus (Latin for sweet)) used in describing Diabetes Mellitus and Propolis (the resin that bees use to hold hives together).

The album package makes use of the artist’s wife Richelle Forsey, who is a visual artist. Richelle often employs a process using the energy of the sun (ultra violet) to expose a camera-less image on paper coated with iron salts. This is called a cyanotype and the paper undergoes a chemical reaction which fixes the image, thus creating an imprinted monochrome ‘blueprint’.

Cyanotype

wlr121 Fossil Hunting Collective - Cyanotypes

@noemibuchi - Matter
Cat #: OUS041
Release date: November 25, 2022
Distributed by Kudos: https://kudosdistribution.co.uk
Label Bandcamp: https://ousooo.bandcamp.com

"Music gives us the illusion that time is not time, but space. It is then that the music transforms from process to object, which I find a very interesting thought; a materialisation of the sound process. Sound is matter." - Noémi Büchi

Noémi Büchi’s debut album ‘Matter’ captures the tension between growth and decay, consonance and dissonance, mirroring Büchi’s own catharsis through music. Her most personal material to date, ‘Matter’ is an opus of refined, sculpted beauty, one that aims to blur the distinction between ephemerality and physicality. Inspired by late romantic classical music and early 20th century contemporary music, ‘Matter’ is driven by the compositional methodologies of Igor Stravinsky, Alexander Skrjabin, Gustav Mahler and György Ligeti to modern sound forms, adapting and expanding upon their ideas in an awe-inspiring exploration of cutting-edge potency and tactility.

Büchi structures the electronic works that constitute ‘Matter’ in movements, stratifying myriad instrumental parts like the constituent sections of an orchestra. During her work on the album, Büchi engaged in extensive research, obsessively studying specific chords and progressions, and searching for transcendent intonations with resonant properties; complexions of sound with the ability to connect with the listener’s body. Transforming our inner worlds into zones of suspension and levitation, Büchi exposes the listener to intoxicating slipstreams of sound. Prominent voices ascend, tectonic disturbances threaten the foundations, perception and sensation becomes subject to elemental countercurrents and inversions. ‘Matter’ illustrates the fraught pursuit of momentary equilibrium, and makes the fragility of euphoria tangible.

CREDITS:
Written and produced by Noémi Büchi
Mixed and Mastered by Manuel Oberholzer VFBM
Photography by Jean-Marc Avila
Photography / 3D reworked by Mirko Eremita Encor Studio
Graphic design by Alfio Mazzei

BIO:
Composer & sound artist Noémi Büchi creates electronic, symphonic maximalism. Her music is defined by delicate electronic-orchestral forms and textural rhythms. She strives for a combination of harmonic and dissonant sonorities, to evoke both intellectual and emotional euphoria. Büchi has appeared on the Light of Other Days and Visible Dinner labels, and is now an affiliate of -OUS, releasing ‘Hyle’ her debut EP on the label in spring 2022. As well as her solo output, Noémi Büchi is currently working with Feldermelder on their collaborative project Musique Infinie. Their debut album will also be released via -OUS in the near future.

Buy on Bandcamp

Noémi Büchi - Matter - 3 -  Causes Of Forgetfulness

Demo track for our Substratum sound library for Pigments and Analog lab,

What The_Scanner

L'ampleur du souffle (2020)

To breathe, is to activate a certain space. Short breaths, deep breaths, dying breaths or sensual ones - they evoke variety of features and peculiarities that the breath embodies. Breath is also a precondition of voice, and further, of a spoken word. Paving the path for every physiological and philosophical activity, breath is essential to all we do and all that we are. 
Auditory situations in this piece are fluidly changing from one to another in a constant fluctuation and transfiguration of the musical material. Acoustic spaces inside of which the music is being situated, give room for the sounds to appear, to change and disappear, develop and transform, and inside of these spaces, the ear can swift freely from one sound object to another in a spatial and non-linear listening experience.

Commissioned for the Tingles & Clicks project by the Musikprotokoll 2020 and supported by the program "Creative Europe" of the European Union and SHAPE platform.

The work was presented in ambisonics, binaural and stereo formats. It was composed for an interactive environment, and the sections (structure, duration) were open. This is one of its renderings (structure and format-wise), made for the presentation at Radio Belgrade in 2020.

Presented at Musikprotokoll, Graz, at Radio Belgrade 3, CYNETART festival and Ö1 radio (Zeit-Ton radio show).

L'ampleur du souffle

A journey from airy ephemeral tones and textures that ultimately settles back to earth in a nostalgic theme centering around the instrument that originally launched my interest in music. 

Intro developed from initial experiments with the Xoac digital frequency shifter. Later ethereal tones emerge from sequencing a series of chords on the E370 at audio rate, creating a complex blur of tonally related pitches.

Cloud scene photo shot at Hudson View Apartments in Beacon NY and treated with Paint Shop Pro with apologies to Rene Magritte.

Coming Home

Tracklist

01. Andrew Heath - Waldeinsamkeit
02. Observatories - The Resistance Of
03. Paperbark - Creek of Intrigue
04. Tomoyoshi Date - Hikari
05. Ghost and Tape -  Reyes
06. Lullatone -  Rainy Season Again
07. The Humble Bee - Manual With Foot Pedal
08. Innesti - Around this Space
09. KMRU - Other Times

313. Sleepy Sunday Podcast (Elm Records)

Continuing to experiment with delay buffers, and layering the results into a collage of sorts.

sketch 3.13.2023

2023-05-28

NLS - 2023 - 05 - 28  Birdsong

Original Track :
https://soundcloud.com/applicant/open-sky

Applicant - Open Sky (Senglar Rmx)

Lie Run Enjoy

meditative rocking back and forth feel to this track

What The_Scanner

Seed Audio