Digital Sensorium

Parc Pierre Paulus à Saint-Gilles, des poussins viennent de naître, et une oie souffle.

Pierre Paulus park in Saint-Gilles, the chicks are born, and a goose is nearby.

Haunting field recording of Kenyan folk music from 1950, inspired by country singer Jimmy Rodgers (Chemirocha)

There’s a song drifting around the backwaters of the internet called “Chemirocha.”

It’s a scratchy field recording made in Kenya, in 1950, of a little village girl singing with her friends. Someone in the background strums a sort of makeshift lyre called a chepkong. The entire recording is only 90 seconds long, but it has an arresting, unearthly beauty. It’s the sort of thing that once lived only on freeform radio stations at the left of the dial, or on worn-out mix tapes passed between obsessive collectors. Now it’s on YouTube and Soundcloud.

Anyone can hear the song’s appeal. But there’s something that turns simple fans of chemirocha into fanatics—enthusiasts and evangelists who bring up the song at dinner parties or cocktail hours; who use it to enliven a weary work happy hour or impress a date with their acumen. And that is its backstory.

Alexandra Khitrova raspberry dragon cherry dragon grape dragon cloudberry dragon

Geoffrey Todd Smith Haunted Home Recordings 2016 Enamel and gouache on panel 30"x 24"

Marolles, 1000 Bruxelles, Belgique.

Shadow Mount

Prahia de Curral Velho, Boa Vista, Cap-Vert.

STADSRUIS - CITYSOUNDS #01 Den Haag

STADSRUIS - CITYSOUNDS is a collection of sounds, edited and mixed to give you an impression of parts of, or spaces in a city. 

In this episode you are listening to locations and spaces in Den Haag (The Hague), the Netherlands. 

The part of Den Haag you will listen to is under major construction. A new entertainment area will be built, and the old theaters (only 30-something years old) are being demolished as I write this. Former ministeries are being replaced with new ones, recreating the centre of a city in a decade or two. It is great work, urban planning. 

All this demolition, construction and renovation is going on in a very busy area. One thing I remember about the recordings I made was that I had to lower the gain of my recorders quite often, something that I only have to do in a storm, or other situations with high wind speeds. Noise is a constant backdrop to the great views Den Haag has to offer. 

The recording session was a joint effort of Michel Campfens and me. Michel is a professional photographer, and his pictures of some of the recorded locations are featured here. You can find Michel’s work at: http://www.michelcampfensphotography.com

Recorded locations, in order of appearance:

Den Haag Centraal, busses, cars and streetcars (Start to 1:00)

Hall Den Haag Centraal Railway Station, passsengers, announcements, trains and streetcars (0:50-8:40)

Prins Bernhardviaduct, pneumatic drill and passing cars, looped (1:00-2:50)

Intersection Utrechtsebaan/Juliana van Stolberglaan, passing bus, cars, motorcycles (1:20-2:40)

Escalator (1) Streetcar Station Ternoot (3:05-3:15)

Tramviaduct near Royal Library, cars and streetcars (3:15-6:20)

Partikel Tramviaduct Turfmarkt, granular synthesis of streetcars passing through a tunnel, own composition (3:30-8:10)

Synthesizer track, own composition (4:15-6:10)

Schedeldoekshaven, demolition crew working with aluminium siding (4:30-5:40)

Escalator (2) Streetcar Station Ternoot, original and edited sound, simultaneously, looped (7:10-8:50)

Dr. Anton Philipszaal (demolition started, October 2015), air vent (7:55-8:30)

Parking Garage Schedeldoekshaven, exiting car (8:30-9:10)

Some of the sounds cannot be reproduced, because the buildings no longer exist.

The locations can be found here:

Place Stéphanie, Bruxelles, Belgique / Manifestation pro-Erdogan Demonstration.

Manifestation pro Erdogan à l'occasion de la venue du président turc. La Place Stéphanie est remplie de drapeaux turcs, la sono diffuse des chansons dédiées à Erdogan.

Demonstration pro Erdogan for the visit of Turkish President. Place Stephanie is filled with Turkish flags, the sound system broadcasts songs dedicated to Erdogan.

(mrutssamoht)

31 décembre 2015 à Rio de Janeiro, tôt le matin, des coqs, des criquets, des chiens dans la colline de Santa Teresa.

I’m home from being away with a late night memento in tow.