Abruptly formed collages can sometimes have problems with explosive rebar into a buzz-saw like changes in volume levels from sample to sample, here the flow is almost perfect, the content is certainly strange but the volume levels are very smooth.
A flowing stream of music fragments
Are they only dreams? Are they not metempsychotic leakage? With so many cups so full-brim, there’s bound to be spillage but nothing is wasted. This is strange to listen to, it is tiny bits taken from all the old recordings in the world and arranged into some kind of song-like things that are always completely different. In fact, it might sound old and you have probably heard it all at some time, from movies and cartoons, radio shows and television, so it probably could sound familiar. Every track is exactly 2’00” (two minutes and zero seconds) in duration. I think that one could probably sort of dance to this, it is not intended as a soporific so no worries there, this is not sleep music, but what is it?
“When department stores dream…” Samuel Dzierzawa/Jan Jelinek, 2021
This is a flowing stream of music fragments, from almost familiar sources, the flow is never connected moment by moment, transitions flow nicely because the production values are very high. Abruptly formed collages can sometimes have problems with explosive rebar into a buzz-saw like changes in volume levels from sample to sample, here the flow is almost perfect, the content is certainly strange but the volume levels are very smooth.
What is it? Here is how I described it one Sunday evening not so long ago. Whirling distortions, now slow orchestral outtakes, suddenly a string section moaning, all very short while moving briskly along and maintaining a coherent message or intended expression, the chaos is loops of an illusion, this is easy listening overall, relaxing. That is track “A1” (2.00) I hear voices, I think loops of consumers speaking somewhere, and woodwinds with strings and rewinding tape noises, almost a clear and simple statement, so urgent in its delivery: “A2” (2.00). Undemanding loops of memories from further into the space age era of the 1960s, strange moaning chirps and winding, with occasional Mr. Kite inspired spillways: “A3” (2.00). Facile and trouble-free loops of horns and crowds, with revolving doors blending shouts and horns: “A4” (2.00). Unworried loops of a choir and flutes with accordions and soft shoe percussion: “A5” (2.00). Comfortable loops of coming out of a movie into a parade, then going back into the movie, repeated several times: “A6” (2.00).
Safe loops of suspense music from cartoons, strings erupt and vanish, echoes wander and never were there: “B1” (2.00). Undisturbed loops of easy dreamy cartoon collages, maybe a glockenspiel, pursued by martians, and sailboats careening back and forth: “B2” (2.00). Contented piano and ethereal voices, looped with shimmering strings and gliding sensations punctuated by sonic illusions of floating mattresses going into a tunnel: “B3” (2.00). Effortless cheerful organ music with the ethereal choir breezing through distant surf dance music clouds: “B4” (2.00). Straightforward loops of xylophones and clarinets that scurry and sparkle like iridescent fish darting in the dark: “B5” (2.00). Money for jam piano, horns, strings, water, and someone might be singing, now it is just kids playing around, warm springs spreading: “B6” (2.00). Tranquil loops of the best tender moments floating in darkness: “B7” (2.00).
From the liner notes:
The sparkly, computer driven, introspective landscapes of Vancouver producer and sound artist Jonathan Scherk have been steadily gaining traction within Canada’s thriving ambient underground scene over the last half decade.
Since releasing his debut tape of serenely oscillating synths and gentle syncopation under the moniker 80(sun) back in 2010, Scherk has been putting his textural, loop oriented style to practice through collaborations with a number of fellow B.C. musicians. His hypnotic sequencing found a home as part of the sample based electronic trio Plays:four, which opened for Oneohtrix Point Never and Pantha Du Prince in 2012. Scherk approaches his music as a consideration of the correspondence between technical process and aesthetics, where technique and interpretation are engaged in parallel. As plans to release a catalog of material firm up, Scherk brings his waves of percussive clicks, acousmatic euphoria and glitchy nostalgia to the festival.
From Wikipedia:
Plunderphonics is a music genre in which tracks are constructed by sampling recognizable musical works. The term was coined by composer John Oswald in 1985 in his essay “Plunderphonics, or Audio Piracy as a Compositional Prerogative” and eventually explicitly defined in the liner notes of his Grayfolded album. Plunderphonics can be considered a form of sound collage. Oswald has described it as a referential and self-conscious practice which interrogates notions of originality and identity.
Stealing bits of other tunes is good fun, making something new and original is destiny.
Toon! is available on Faitiche November 4, 2022.
