Akos Garai - Barges & Flows (3Leaves, 2011)
It is dawn by the Danube. The river is flowing quietly. There are only a few moored ships, and many empty docks.
No movement? No sounds? It is quite the opposite. From close-up, you can hear the docks and their vessels sing their own rusty songs incessantly. I find a place and set up my recording equipment.
The purpose of these unprocessed field recordings is to introduce the harbor sounds along the riverbank of the Danube. Some areas are filled with people and ships on a daily basis, while others are only visited occasionally or never at all.
I collected these field recordings in the autumn of 2010 in Budapest, Hungary.
Akos Garai
visit Akos Garai & 3Leaves
audio excerpts & buy
Mathieu Ruhlmann & Banks Bailey - Anaadiih (3Leaves, 2011)
Within each location, there is profound history. From their first collaborative album, artists Mathieu Ruhlmann and Banks Bailey have created an album that is not only a record of detailed documentation and imagination, but a depiction of a time and place, which also represents an idea, and maybe more importantly, a future. Details have been so meticulously collected and arranged accordingly, that momentarily, everything is illusory, yet retaining completion, and full realism.
Inspired by a Native American Navajo writing, natural material remains one of most important contributions to Ruhlmann and Baileys' work. As is present in both of their musical histories, the heart of the recordings are captured and documented from these
collections of nature and real objects, a truth instead of any other means. The title of the album, 'Anáádiih', is the Navajo word which describes the phase of the moon disappearing. Any moment of these recordings could be mistaken as a complete, straight recording from a desert hilltop, a crackling fire in the center, with a world of action and life surrounding in every direction, pouring life and spirit into each moment.
Yet, even with its incredible realism and depicted respect of true documentation by these two sound collectors, there is a voice that comes through, which surpasses even the recorded vision. These pieces of music not only document realism, but they are abound in enigmatic imagery. Insects buzzing, horses whimpering, overhead thunderstorms, and coyotes howling. There is movement, there is work. Little can it been seen in nature of development, or of time passing, except in long term. Yet, from this work, it can be understood of one of the most important aspects of nature: the results from the capability of our imagination; seeing and hearing those things that are otherwise invisible, or overlooked, and what we find inside.
3Leaves
visit Mathieu Ruhlmann & 3Leaves
audio excerpts & buy
