artist: AFFLUX
title: Bordeaux TNT
catalog number: and/all1
release year: 2006
format: CD
status: back in stock for a limited time
title: Bordeaux TNT
catalog number: and/all1
release year: 2006
format: CD
status: back in stock for a limited time
Long after the first two releases issued by Ground Fault and Edition Ellipsis,
and/OAR & Alluvial Recordings are pleased to present the final release in a trilogy
covering the sonic expeditions of the French location-specific electro-acoustic
trio Afflux (Eric La Casa, Jean-Luc Guionnet & Eric Cordier).
This release summarises what was initially a 6 hour performance / installation /
radio broadcast that occurred at the TNT cultural centre in Bordeaux, France.
The TNT centre is situated inside a former shoe manufacturing building. With
several hundred meters of cables, the exterior and interior of the building were
recorded using several different condenser and contact microphones, modified
and mixed in real time on a 32 channel mixing desk. Simultaneously, the live mix
was played into the concert hall / space using 8 channels for 8 loudspeakers.
While the improvisers were on the upper level, the audience was listening and
walking around on the lower level.
The final mix for the CD was edited by Eric La Casa.
* CORRECTION: The website address for Alluvial Recordings is incorrect on the
insert. The correct address is: www.alluvialrecordings.com
and/OAR & Alluvial Recordings are pleased to present the final release in a trilogy
covering the sonic expeditions of the French location-specific electro-acoustic
trio Afflux (Eric La Casa, Jean-Luc Guionnet & Eric Cordier).
This release summarises what was initially a 6 hour performance / installation /
radio broadcast that occurred at the TNT cultural centre in Bordeaux, France.
The TNT centre is situated inside a former shoe manufacturing building. With
several hundred meters of cables, the exterior and interior of the building were
recorded using several different condenser and contact microphones, modified
and mixed in real time on a 32 channel mixing desk. Simultaneously, the live mix
was played into the concert hall / space using 8 channels for 8 loudspeakers.
While the improvisers were on the upper level, the audience was listening and
walking around on the lower level.
The final mix for the CD was edited by Eric La Casa.
* CORRECTION: The website address for Alluvial Recordings is incorrect on the
insert. The correct address is: www.alluvialrecordings.com
REVIEWS
VITAL WEEKLY #521 WEEK 15 (MARCH 2006)
Your ear is an excellent microphone. Imagine to be in a crowded place, close
your eyes and listen. You will pay attention to detailed sounds around you,
simply because your mind allows you to ignore the surrounding sounds, those
you don't want to hear. Afflux does something like that, except that they use
real microphones and contact microphones in a location. TNT cultural centre
in Bordeaux is apparently a big building with a bar/restaurant, offices, concert
space and a top floor. Afflux attached many contact microphones to all of
these places and they were connected to a 32 channel mixer and the resultant
mix was played over eight speakers in the concert half. The whole concert
lasted six hours. Afflux is the collaboration of Eric Cordier, Jean-Luc Guionnet
and Eric La Casa, all three composers in their own right. From the six hours of
recordings, Eric La Casa edited this fifty one minute CD, with just one piece.
We hear sounds that we recognize, like people talking, the elevator, maybe the
coffee machine, but they all appear to be far away, or embedded in a strange
environment - maybe like we would hear this when we would inside such a big
environment ourselves, but now the ears don't select - the selection has been
made for us, by La Casa. Our ears are now focused on this CD, and not the rain
outside, or our own coffee machine. It makes this into quite a strange listening
affair, since we recognize the daily sounds that we would always recognize but
also all these other sounds. It makes this however not an uneasy affair, but
rather a fascinating one: what are these sounds, and where are they going to?
It's a highly captivating soundscape that is captured here. Not so much with a
'story' or a 'composition', but ambient music in the true meaning of the word:
music made of the ambience. Gorgeous music. (Frans de Waard)
Your ear is an excellent microphone. Imagine to be in a crowded place, close
your eyes and listen. You will pay attention to detailed sounds around you,
simply because your mind allows you to ignore the surrounding sounds, those
you don't want to hear. Afflux does something like that, except that they use
real microphones and contact microphones in a location. TNT cultural centre
in Bordeaux is apparently a big building with a bar/restaurant, offices, concert
space and a top floor. Afflux attached many contact microphones to all of
these places and they were connected to a 32 channel mixer and the resultant
mix was played over eight speakers in the concert half. The whole concert
lasted six hours. Afflux is the collaboration of Eric Cordier, Jean-Luc Guionnet
and Eric La Casa, all three composers in their own right. From the six hours of
recordings, Eric La Casa edited this fifty one minute CD, with just one piece.
We hear sounds that we recognize, like people talking, the elevator, maybe the
coffee machine, but they all appear to be far away, or embedded in a strange
environment - maybe like we would hear this when we would inside such a big
environment ourselves, but now the ears don't select - the selection has been
made for us, by La Casa. Our ears are now focused on this CD, and not the rain
outside, or our own coffee machine. It makes this into quite a strange listening
affair, since we recognize the daily sounds that we would always recognize but
also all these other sounds. It makes this however not an uneasy affair, but
rather a fascinating one: what are these sounds, and where are they going to?
It's a highly captivating soundscape that is captured here. Not so much with a
'story' or a 'composition', but ambient music in the true meaning of the word:
music made of the ambience. Gorgeous music. (Frans de Waard)
PARIS TRANSATLANTIC (JULY 2006)
The ability of a CD to satisfactorily recreate the experience of walking through
a sound installation is limited, to say the least, yet labels like Dale Lloyd's
and/OAR and Alluvial keep going against the odds, releasing important
documents that more often than not approach "masterpiece" status in this
particular area. In this instance, Eric Cordier, Jean-Luc Guionnet and Eric La
Casa recorded a live performance at La Manufacture des Chaussures in
Bordeaux, six hours of sounds specifically conceived to be used in the inner
zones of Bordeaux's TNT Cultural Centre. The artists decided to mix
prerecorded sounds together with those of the urban surroundings, extending
cables throughout the Centre, installing condenser and contact microphones
and channelling everything to a mixing desk manned in real time by La Casa,
who modified and filtered the incoming results. The mix was played in TNT's
concert hall by eight speakers, the three men working on the first floor of the
building while people walked and listened on the ground floor. But none of
this theoretical babble will prepare you for the uncertain weather of Bordeaux
TNT, a 51-minute piece where the manipulation is almost undetectable, all
sounds maintaining their basic attributes even in the most unpredictable
moments. Screaming children and barking dogs are engulfed in a nocturnal
dimness amalgamating the noise of traffic and the scary silence of a blind
alley. The pulsing complex structure of vibrations (Guionnet is credited with
"long string recording devices") had me thinking of Paul Panhuysen flying a
miniature plane sitting on a café terrasse. Every once in a while a passing car
roars louder, yet everything is organically linked in an obscure but perfectly
functional mechanism of sonic circulation, a perfect example of how such
projects should be realized. Above all, Afflux succeed in reminding us of the
beauty of long-distance urban/industrial murmur, inviting us to leave our
mental windows open, to change the air a little bit. (Massimo Ricci)
The ability of a CD to satisfactorily recreate the experience of walking through
a sound installation is limited, to say the least, yet labels like Dale Lloyd's
and/OAR and Alluvial keep going against the odds, releasing important
documents that more often than not approach "masterpiece" status in this
particular area. In this instance, Eric Cordier, Jean-Luc Guionnet and Eric La
Casa recorded a live performance at La Manufacture des Chaussures in
Bordeaux, six hours of sounds specifically conceived to be used in the inner
zones of Bordeaux's TNT Cultural Centre. The artists decided to mix
prerecorded sounds together with those of the urban surroundings, extending
cables throughout the Centre, installing condenser and contact microphones
and channelling everything to a mixing desk manned in real time by La Casa,
who modified and filtered the incoming results. The mix was played in TNT's
concert hall by eight speakers, the three men working on the first floor of the
building while people walked and listened on the ground floor. But none of
this theoretical babble will prepare you for the uncertain weather of Bordeaux
TNT, a 51-minute piece where the manipulation is almost undetectable, all
sounds maintaining their basic attributes even in the most unpredictable
moments. Screaming children and barking dogs are engulfed in a nocturnal
dimness amalgamating the noise of traffic and the scary silence of a blind
alley. The pulsing complex structure of vibrations (Guionnet is credited with
"long string recording devices") had me thinking of Paul Panhuysen flying a
miniature plane sitting on a café terrasse. Every once in a while a passing car
roars louder, yet everything is organically linked in an obscure but perfectly
functional mechanism of sonic circulation, a perfect example of how such
projects should be realized. Above all, Afflux succeed in reminding us of the
beauty of long-distance urban/industrial murmur, inviting us to leave our
mental windows open, to change the air a little bit. (Massimo Ricci)
TOUCHING EXTREMES (MAY 2006)
The TNT cultural centre in Bordeaux was filled by "several hundred meters of
cables" by Eric Cordier, Jean-Luc Guionnet and Eric La Casa, who proceeded
to record the internal and external sonorities of the area placing a large
amount of condenser and contact microphones, whose captured sounds were
altered/processed and sent to a 32-channel mixer, then played in the building
through eight loudspeakers. The perfect balance reached by Afflux is
demonstrated by the beautiful results we achieved during consecutive
listening sessions: at a good level with windows closed, the overall mix deploys
a rapture of motors, trains and urban clattering juxtaposing the sublime of a
peripheral zone and the danger of walking alone at night in the street. But if
you let these recollections fuse with the sounds of life coming from outside -
which in my case included a cuckoo, a distant jet and the faraway voices of a
few Sunday country walkers among the rest - you could even feel entitled to
some sort of monastic pondering alleviating this era's insecurity and mental
tiredness. (Massimo Ricci)
The TNT cultural centre in Bordeaux was filled by "several hundred meters of
cables" by Eric Cordier, Jean-Luc Guionnet and Eric La Casa, who proceeded
to record the internal and external sonorities of the area placing a large
amount of condenser and contact microphones, whose captured sounds were
altered/processed and sent to a 32-channel mixer, then played in the building
through eight loudspeakers. The perfect balance reached by Afflux is
demonstrated by the beautiful results we achieved during consecutive
listening sessions: at a good level with windows closed, the overall mix deploys
a rapture of motors, trains and urban clattering juxtaposing the sublime of a
peripheral zone and the danger of walking alone at night in the street. But if
you let these recollections fuse with the sounds of life coming from outside -
which in my case included a cuckoo, a distant jet and the faraway voices of a
few Sunday country walkers among the rest - you could even feel entitled to
some sort of monastic pondering alleviating this era's insecurity and mental
tiredness. (Massimo Ricci)
GAZ-ETA (MAY 2006)
Bordeaux TNT stanowi zamknięcie trylogii przedstawiającej dźwiękowe
pejzaże, które trio Eric La Casa, Jean-Luc Guionnet i Eric Cordier nagrywało w
różnych rejonach Francji. Oczywiście pejzaże to szczególne, stanowiące nie
tyle dosłowny zapis, lecz próbę schwytania swoistego ducha miejsca, często
nieuchwytnego nieuzbrojonym uchem, bowiem Affluxowcy nie ograniczają się
tylko do rejestracji dźwięków, lecz często je przetwarzają, bądź miksują z
innymi. Na omawianej płycie przedstawiają fragment słuchowiska, z którym
przez sześć godzin mierzyli się goście centrum kulturalnego TNT w Bordeaux.
La Casa, Guionnet i Cordier rozmieścili mikrofony wewnątrz (przede wszystkim
w sali restauracyjnej) oraz na zewnątrz budynku i improwizowali,
przepuszczając modyfikowany dźwięk przez 32-kanałowy stół mikserski do
ośmiu głośników znajdujących się piętro niżej. Centrum, które mieści się w
budynku dawnej fabryki butów, ulokowane w pobliżu torów kolejowych i szosy
wydaje się być odpowiednim miejscem na tego typu przedsięwzięcie nie tylko
ze względu na to, że dostarcza materiał dźwiękowy, ale i dzięki temu, że
pozwala mu się swobodnie rozchodzić.
Jak już wspomniałem cały koncert - a może lepsza byłaby nazwa instalacja,
bowiem muzycy nie byli obecni w sali koncertowej ? - trwał sześć godzin, zaś
Bordeaux TNT tylko pięćdziesiąt jeden minut, i m.in. dlatego (kolejnym
powodem była konieczność zgrania wszystkiego na dwie ścieżki) materiał
przeznaczony na płytę został na nowo zmiksowany przez Erica la Casa. Nie
będąc świadkiem koncertu, trudno mi ocenić, czy aby przy tej okazji materia
nie została specjalnie "zagęszczona" po to, by akcja rozgrywała się szybciej. A
dzieje się tu wiele i dzieje się bardzo ciekawie. Odgłosy zewnętrza (ptaki, wiatr,
pociągi, samochody, niezidentyfikowane trzaski itp.) i wnętrza (szmery,
brzęczenie, głosy, itd.) splecione ciasno w mocny dźwiękowy warkocz,
przenikają się, dopełniają, przekomarzają, przekrzykują - zwykłe dźwięki
poddane manipulacjom ukazują swoją drugą twarz, niesłyszaną wcześniej,
często zachwycając i drażniąc jednocześnie. Absorbujący uwagę, pełen
smakowitych detali i niezwykłych barw elektroakustyczny kolaż, soundscape
który podsumowuje tytuł metamkinowskiej serii Cinema pour l'oirrelle.
(Tadeusz Kosiek)
Bordeaux TNT stanowi zamknięcie trylogii przedstawiającej dźwiękowe
pejzaże, które trio Eric La Casa, Jean-Luc Guionnet i Eric Cordier nagrywało w
różnych rejonach Francji. Oczywiście pejzaże to szczególne, stanowiące nie
tyle dosłowny zapis, lecz próbę schwytania swoistego ducha miejsca, często
nieuchwytnego nieuzbrojonym uchem, bowiem Affluxowcy nie ograniczają się
tylko do rejestracji dźwięków, lecz często je przetwarzają, bądź miksują z
innymi. Na omawianej płycie przedstawiają fragment słuchowiska, z którym
przez sześć godzin mierzyli się goście centrum kulturalnego TNT w Bordeaux.
La Casa, Guionnet i Cordier rozmieścili mikrofony wewnątrz (przede wszystkim
w sali restauracyjnej) oraz na zewnątrz budynku i improwizowali,
przepuszczając modyfikowany dźwięk przez 32-kanałowy stół mikserski do
ośmiu głośników znajdujących się piętro niżej. Centrum, które mieści się w
budynku dawnej fabryki butów, ulokowane w pobliżu torów kolejowych i szosy
wydaje się być odpowiednim miejscem na tego typu przedsięwzięcie nie tylko
ze względu na to, że dostarcza materiał dźwiękowy, ale i dzięki temu, że
pozwala mu się swobodnie rozchodzić.
Jak już wspomniałem cały koncert - a może lepsza byłaby nazwa instalacja,
bowiem muzycy nie byli obecni w sali koncertowej ? - trwał sześć godzin, zaś
Bordeaux TNT tylko pięćdziesiąt jeden minut, i m.in. dlatego (kolejnym
powodem była konieczność zgrania wszystkiego na dwie ścieżki) materiał
przeznaczony na płytę został na nowo zmiksowany przez Erica la Casa. Nie
będąc świadkiem koncertu, trudno mi ocenić, czy aby przy tej okazji materia
nie została specjalnie "zagęszczona" po to, by akcja rozgrywała się szybciej. A
dzieje się tu wiele i dzieje się bardzo ciekawie. Odgłosy zewnętrza (ptaki, wiatr,
pociągi, samochody, niezidentyfikowane trzaski itp.) i wnętrza (szmery,
brzęczenie, głosy, itd.) splecione ciasno w mocny dźwiękowy warkocz,
przenikają się, dopełniają, przekomarzają, przekrzykują - zwykłe dźwięki
poddane manipulacjom ukazują swoją drugą twarz, niesłyszaną wcześniej,
często zachwycając i drażniąc jednocześnie. Absorbujący uwagę, pełen
smakowitych detali i niezwykłych barw elektroakustyczny kolaż, soundscape
który podsumowuje tytuł metamkinowskiej serii Cinema pour l'oirrelle.
(Tadeusz Kosiek)
WIRE MAGAZINE (JUNE 2006)
Afflux is an ongoing collaboration of French electroacoustic sound
technicians who have habitually tackled large scale installations and
convoluted recording situations. For Bordeaux TNT, the trio of Eric
Cordier, Jean-Luc Guionnet, and Eric la Casa set up dozens of contact
microphones and long-stringed devices throughout the 5000 square metres of
a factory in Bordeaux which is now home to the TNT cultural centre. During a
six hour performance, they amplified and manipulated the resonant hums,
drones, and creakings inherent in the massive building. The trio extract
the most engaging sounds from the building itself, with their gestural pings,
strokes, and metallic clamour sounding futile in comparison. Nonetheless, this
is a sophisticated piece of sound art. (Jim Haynes)
Afflux is an ongoing collaboration of French electroacoustic sound
technicians who have habitually tackled large scale installations and
convoluted recording situations. For Bordeaux TNT, the trio of Eric
Cordier, Jean-Luc Guionnet, and Eric la Casa set up dozens of contact
microphones and long-stringed devices throughout the 5000 square metres of
a factory in Bordeaux which is now home to the TNT cultural centre. During a
six hour performance, they amplified and manipulated the resonant hums,
drones, and creakings inherent in the massive building. The trio extract
the most engaging sounds from the building itself, with their gestural pings,
strokes, and metallic clamour sounding futile in comparison. Nonetheless, this
is a sophisticated piece of sound art. (Jim Haynes)
BLOW UP (MAY 2006)
La Casa (microfoni a contatto) con Eric Cordier (processing) e Jean-Luc
Guionnet (registrazione e mixing) sono gli Afflux, qui registrati nel materiale
sonoro relativo a una installazione effettuata al TNT di Bordeaux nel 2000.
La musica e piu vivace articolata rispetto aI 3", pur dipendendo
sostanzialmente da concretismi : glitch elettrici in comunella con scie
luminose di feedback tenerissimo e rumore digitale che si modula e adatta
con notevole efficacia. (Stefano I. Bianchi)
La Casa (microfoni a contatto) con Eric Cordier (processing) e Jean-Luc
Guionnet (registrazione e mixing) sono gli Afflux, qui registrati nel materiale
sonoro relativo a una installazione effettuata al TNT di Bordeaux nel 2000.
La musica e piu vivace articolata rispetto aI 3", pur dipendendo
sostanzialmente da concretismi : glitch elettrici in comunella con scie
luminose di feedback tenerissimo e rumore digitale che si modula e adatta
con notevole efficacia. (Stefano I. Bianchi)
SMALLFISH (JULY 2006)
Afflux is a collaborative project by Eric Cordier, Jean-Luc Guionnet and Eric
La Casa and features a series of excerpts taken from a 6-hour installation / live
performance at the TNT cultural centre in Bordeaux. The artists created a
wonderful soundscape by recording the inner space of the building itself, then
manipulating and processing it in real-time. Dense, striking and full of
interesting, engaging moments it captures the sense of a busy space with style
and panache. There's a beauty here that becomes more and more apparent
with each listen. Superb.
Afflux is a collaborative project by Eric Cordier, Jean-Luc Guionnet and Eric
La Casa and features a series of excerpts taken from a 6-hour installation / live
performance at the TNT cultural centre in Bordeaux. The artists created a
wonderful soundscape by recording the inner space of the building itself, then
manipulating and processing it in real-time. Dense, striking and full of
interesting, engaging moments it captures the sense of a busy space with style
and panache. There's a beauty here that becomes more and more apparent
with each listen. Superb.
