Paradigm Discs
These recordings make up part of the Kymatik archive and were recorded nearly 20 years ago, yet are timeless and unfold at our leisure.
The sounds captured herein are both mysterious and arcane, the odd rumble of found vocals twisted and torn open on side one are interspersed amongst the insidious creak and gentle murmur of things both organic and not. The rhythmic bounce of a spring hidden in the backdrop as metal discs circle and falter, dipping and droning. We can see an abandoned factory, but one which has been reclaimed, nature taking control once again, though it is not just nature that finds a home here. The earth is taking hold and here and there in scattered anterooms the power is still on and spirits play gently with the leftover machinery.
It is difficult to communicate, but Kymatik use the facilities as a means of expression, the sounds laboured and distant. Meanwhile grass grows and the slow, almost imperceptible progress of nature continues unabated. In an ancillary building we are slowly drawn to the hypnotic, insistent cacophony; the whirr of a projector, the pulse of something greater drawing us nearer, the sounds ebbing and flowing in and out of our consciousness and slightly in and out of sync, causing disorientation and a looseness of mind; a turgid groan, a vibrant rattle consuming and drifting, until there is nothing.A gentle and soporific field recording of birds and trickling water act as an idyllic segue to the darker journey of side two.
The ambience is slightly edgier here. The plunging of something into water brings to mind some of Etant Donnés‘ work, but is less structured and has a faint eerie wail occupying the backdrop as wind and water appear restless. It feels grey, overcast, brooding, ominous. The somnolent mood is suddenly upset and we are wading into the water, far out to sea with laboured steps, the drone of submerged material, distant explosions, the grip of fear and the silence of survival, that morbid silence filled with something.Now on board, the jostle of movement, sporadic clanks and the blip of radar. The whirl and hum of sonar take over, translating the depths, peaks and troughs, wreckage and nature, efflorescence and phosphorescence, mystery and darkness. Dragged into an outburst of voices, rudely drawn again into the here and now, the hubbub, the rhythm of life, a welcome interjection? I am not so sure; better to set off again, to who knows where.
This is where it took me; allow it to take you.
-Mr Olivetti-