Tortusa, Joar Renolen & Jo David Meyer Lysne: Tokyo, November 2017
Dugnad rec

Promo text accompanying this seven-inch vinyl release refers to it as a “curiosity,” and the term is well-chosen. The release is credited to Tortusa (electronic producer John Derek Bishop from Stavanger), Oslo-based Joar Renolen (aka Foregound Set), and Norwegian guitarist Jo David Meyer Lysne, but from what I can gather it's the latter who's the performer whereas the others are identified on the sleeve as the respective composers of the sides' pieces (a better choice in this case might be remixer). Lysne's credited with prepared twelve-string guitar, but clarifying details as to what his partners did is otherwise absent. He's no stranger to collaboration, by the way, as releases with bassist Mats Eilertsen and the improvising collective Wendra Hill are part of his discography.

I can reliably report that the material originated from Lysne's concerts in Tokyo and Chiba in Japan, 2017 and that the so-called remixes “extract from and add to the original recordings in equal measure.” In these experimental explorations, conventional song structures are eschewed for a more abstract approach to sound design and texture. The dynamic interaction between artist and context is a central element, given how critical the relationship is between the two when live performance is involved. Each piece thereby physically documents the interface between performer, environment, and sound designer.

Side A presents Tortusa's “Jazz Spot Candy,” ten minutes of foreboding atmospherics, whistling tones, and low-pitched, cavernous rumblings. An ambient space is sculpted within which a variety of timbres emerges, some glassy and others blurry. When a minimal bass pulse surfaces amidst vaporous smears, the material takes on a rather Pole-like quality. Snippets of conversation briefly appear before the sound mass blossoms into a reverberant collage of rustlings and micro-detail. Renolen's “Udagawacho” perpetuates the abstract tone of the opener, if less forebodingly. An elongated drone glistens brightly as muffled chatter and sheets of instrument sounds glide across it. Like “Jazz Spot Candy,” “Udagawacho” is episodic, though transitions are smoothly effected. Field recordings also figure more prominently in Renolen's piece, though there's no shortage of other elements in play too. Of the two pieces, his is the warmer and sunnier.

November 2021