Slow Music Meltdown - A repository for mixes and other music miscellanea

Friday, September 13, 2013

Adventures in Dubbing #1 - Aleks Jurczyk



Finally making some time to post about the tapes I won from Adventures in Dubbing in the Scotland via their Facebook page. I received a compelling package of cassettes all nicely packaged and full of disparate sounds to explore. I hope to make the time feature one of the cassettes on the upcoming episodes of Slow Music Meltdown on Hollow Earth Radio starting tomorrow 9/14. Broadcasts are from 12-2pm PST.

First up is Brutal Britain by Aleks Jurczyk. To quote the liner notes:

"The work ‘Brutal Britain’ was originally created as a soundtrack for a series of photographs that formed part of a piece on Brutalist Architecture by textiles designer, Emma Shannon. In keeping with the work it was created as an accompaniment to, the soundtrack was made using a field recording taken from a key example of Brutalist architecture in Glasgow, the Wyndford estate in Maryhill. This recording formed the basis for the soundtrack. It was then woven together with several live synthesised performances to form the completed piece."


It starts with a dark afterburner blast that slowly churns throughout, underneath electronics reminiscent of Wendy Carlos' work and what may be ambient recordings of birds or other wildlife appearing here and there. One embarks on a somewhat harrowing but fascinating journey - you are a bit scared, but don't want to close your eyes.