Articles
2010 Artist Picks
Francesco Tristano
Albums
36
Access To Arasaka
Aeroplane Trio
Christian Albrechsten
Gilles Aubry
Andreas Bick
Wil Bolton
Caroline
Chaim
Scott Cortez
Dead Voices On Air
Margaret Dygas
F. Gerard Errante
Seren Ffordd
Field Rotation
Marcus Fischer
The Ghost of 29 Megacycles
Tania Gill
Gord Grdina Trio
Herion
Hummingbird
Ironomi
Yoshio Machida
Machinefabriek / Liondialer
Phil Manley
Matta
Mem1
me:mo
Miko
Momus
Moshimoss
Roger O'Donnell
orchestramaxfieldparrish
Cédric Peyronnet
Resoe
Danny Saul
Dirk Serries
Shedding
Clive Tanaka y su orquesta
Robert Scott Thompson
Two People In A Room
Undermathic
Wires Under Tension
Clive Wright
Compilations
Joachim Spieth Selected 6
Playing with Words
Reconstruction of Fives
20 Centuries Stony Sleep
EPs
Balmorhea
Clara Moto
d_rradio
Deepgroove
Kyle Bobby Dunn
Fear Falls Burning
Hammock
ptr1
Quiroga
Sawako
Sawako:
Brand New Fossil
Winds Measure Recordings
Sawako's Brand New Fossil (“fossils of radio signal and astro land,” that is) is one of the shortest singles I've heard in recent memory (about nine minutes total), but even so there's no denying its charm. To some degree that's due to its deluxe presentation, with its beautiful blue, seven-inch vinyl disc housed in an equally appealing two-colour letterpress sleeve. The single's two sides were recorded in different locales: side A was recorded with a handmade crystal radio in Brooklyn in February 2008, while the flip side comes from field recordings collected around Astroland, Coney Island in January 2009.
The material finds Sawako in full field-recording mode as she alchemizes the natural sounds of the urban environment into succinct meditations of evocative character. Much of it's pitched at a peaceful, low level, though “Season Off” does includes moments of clangor and high-pitched creak amidst the distant hum of traffic and industrial noise, and “Dot” does feature flickering radio fragments and static noise. In “Radio Stone,” on the other hand, a slow-motion, heaving swirl of glassy tones and muffled voices swirl is so becalmed it verges on celestial, and “Astro Land,” with its urban sounds submerged within a pool of dust and static, seems equally subdued. Despite its brevity, Brand New Fossil nevertheless provides a good impression of Sawako's skill as a sound-sculptor.
January 2011