Did you ever get bored at school? If so, did you ever take your hopefully bendy ruler, stretch it a few inches over the edge of your desk, hold it tightly, let go with anticipation and listen with delight to the brittle sound of the vibrations? Then you’ll love »Rhetoric Islands«. Giuseppe Ielasi had fun with this back in 2011 when he created these ten untitled pieces as a commission for the Parisian sound art festival L’Audible. Now, 13 years later, they appear in all their plastic splendour on Jan Jelinek’s Faitiche. And why not? Music of this kind doesn’t age quickly, and it’s as likely to pass on short-lived fashions as the sonic events it triggers in your eardrums when enjoyed through headphones. This is impressively demonstrated on track three, where scraping noises of various frequencies collide with a discreet drone mixed in the background and held for a long time. Track four thrives on the contrast between silence and the motorised needles that pierce it. Track six, on the other hand, sounds like a mixture of footwork and bass music for the white cube, while the seven once again features hard-edged elasticity. What’s left when you look at this record dispassionately? Not much context. But an unorthodox listening experience that shines even in its dry moments.
blackbody_radiation
Ultar-Materials
Faitiche