Label: Hypnos/Soundscape Format: DVD
Somnium is one of those recordings which serves to illustrate the possibilities of DVD as a medium far beyond the mere shovelling of films, trailers and “interactive” biographical details onto a soon-to-be replaced medium. Remember how Big Black ironically referred to CD as The Rich Man’s 8-Track Tape? Well, even though DVD may be the fastest growing new medium ever – whatever that means; just wait another year and there’ll be another one along like DVD-Audio (for which Somnium would be ideal) and DataDisks to join the CompactFlash, MiniDisc, CD-RW etc. etc. – it’s always a bonus when someone comes along and chooses to push the envelope. The Residents did the business with Icky Flix and its entertainingly innovative interface and layered soundtracks, but Robert Rich has had a go at reproducing his Sleep Concert compositions onto a disc which can accommodate the ultra-long recordings, more or less comfortably.
The idea behind the Sleep Concerts is to play music and sounds to a sleeping audience, to work on the semi-conscious border between slumber and waking. These performances last all night, and Somnium is similarly directed towards listening while sleeping. At seven hours long, the piece has necessarily been split into three sections, purely for technical reasons in that DVD can only hold so much audio data without compression, and the middle two hours have been slightly compressed to fit. There are no moving images, and the bare minimum of controls on the menu screen allow selection of “play” and a few notes.
Listening to Somnium while awake can be a strangely immersive experience; seven hours is a long time to have a single continuous flow of sound plying, and the DVD defaults to looping too. Oh, and the lack of video signal, omitted to save space, also means there’s no fast forward, rewind or pause available either, so to find out how the piece ends takes a marathon listening session – or an alarm clock. Concentration on such a long work is neither feasible nor probably intended, and soon the sounds of waves, water and electric fish (really) merge with ambient electronics, sub bass and sundry chimes and pedal steel, drifting from the foreground to background and into envelopment. The key term is naturally Ambient, with a capital “A”, but Somnium is not intended to promote restful or soothing sleep (though it can) in the manner of innumerable New Age CDs and their “stunning interpretations of Mozart and the sounds of nature in harmony” taglines. There are no pictures of dolphins.
However, once the piece becomes a part of the background of everyday life, it soon fits in to the soundscape of the listening environment. Turning up the volume substantially has the effect of bringing the detailed parts of the languid composition into sharp relief; once again, that term immersion makes absolute sense, and headphones provide an even more involving sense of otherworldly coasting. Put the disc on while sleeping, and despite the possibility that all those water sounds will promote numerous nocturnal awakenings (though – what’s the effect on young children with bedwetting tendencies?), the results are intriguing. Dreams are definitely affected, though in what way exactly time has yet to tell. The strangest effect is one of reducing the depth of sleep – put on any sound or other source of stimulation while asleep and the tendency is towards perception, if only as part of a defence mechanism. This is not to say that there are threatening noises in Somnium, but the sensation of half-waking into an unexpected section of washing waves, very slowly-evolving electronic tones, creaking landscape sounds or equally tectonic bass sussurus is both disconcerting and quite gently stimulating from time to time. The slow rise to a dawn chorus, especially if it chimes with the real sounds of birds awakening, is especially pleasant to hear distantly from the subconscious periphery.
Time is the key to enjoying Somnium; there may well be few occasions for playing the whole disc through while fully awake, but it’s a recommended experience all the same. Nocturnal or otherwise sleeping through it is possibly more difficult unless there happens to be a DVD player by the bed, but is certainly a different way of getting a good night’s rest. Personally, there’s going to be a lot more nights camping out on the sofa to get the full breadth of Somnium.
-Antron S. Meister-
