#qixia

Chen Ling - 我不是戏神

Qi Xia - 十日终焉

齐天龙

Chris Lynn

Qixia

digital release (flax/mp3)

Impulsive Habitat IH127

2017

How do people breathe in Qixia? If I open my mouth to yawn in Qixia, how much sound do I inhale? Straight away we’re dropped into the spongy humidity of “Nanjing Railway Station at Night”. Echoes, engines, exhaust fans, and even the familiar squeal of brakes get ensnared in a great gray fog, carried away as quickly as it came by the barbarian clod of an oncoming train. The train, too, seems more like a mirage—it is practically upon us, and then is merely a shimmering hiss. These shifts in activity and density (active/headyàimposingàsparse/faintàtonalàetc) keep me engaged but apart. Either I’m departing or this station is. Or both. People can be transient, just like spaces. But can people be transient spaces? In a way, Qixia feels more concerned with what it is to be passed through than what it is to be somewhere. I hear a “Soft Shower”—where? On what? It seems to be coming from inside my head; or when I hear my partner grind her teeth in her sleep; like it’s raining inside a very small room. Everything is translucent and permeable, but no more recognizable. Even the birds seem artificial; their songs erupting like pedestrian traffic signals. Thousands of insects get caught in eddies of distant, powerful weather. Or is it the hum of the city? Cicadas or power lines? Lynn’s work obfuscates the artificial and the organic. It’s an effect that is at once nerve-wracking and incredibly familiar. I do feel with absolute certainty that Lynn has really listened to these places. Even the tracks that initially feel like simple illustrations turn out to be incredibly detailed. The richness of sound in “Empty Boat on Xuanwu Lake,” as it bobs and gulps in the waves, is totally hypnotic. In someone else’s hands it might simply be charming or pastoral. Even the fucking rain is interesting. The final track, recorded in Qixia Temple, moves toward and away from us like a wick of flame, but the percussion seems as fixed as the sun, and always right there.