Review | By Frans de Waard / VITAL WEEKLY
Gold Lines | Bird & Renoult
Here are two musicias from France, DinahBird (no space apparently) and Jean-Philippe Renoult, with a strong interest in radio sounds. „Their work includes sound pieces, installations, broadcasts, performances and publications and is often inspired by early transmission technologies and archives. Their current interests include, electromagnetic hums, old weather, loops, drones, and high frequency trading.“ This new cassette deals with the fact that (again, apparently), radio transmissions are used in stock trading. Of the utmost importantce is speed, and radio provides something that is faster than the Internet. This is called High Frequency Trading, and Bird and Renoult are looking for pylons in the landscape used for this, and they recorded the pieces on the cassette ins-yu. One is a line from Frankfurt to London, and the other from New Yourk to Chicago, give or take. Sometimes a voice explains what’s going on, but it’s mostly music. I would have liked the music, even without the backstory, which I find an interestiing addition. Somewhere between a soundcape created with buzzes and hums, radio static and electromagnetic currents and proper electronic composing with these sound events we find the pieces (not sure how many there are on this cassette). Maybe there is some processing going on, and the whole thing has a musique concrète-like approach, which I enjoyed very well. Thanks to the occasionally spoken word, there is also a radiophonic component to this music. I understand the need for a release on cassette, but with the delicacy of some of the music here, I wouldn’t mind a CD version of this. Even when the background story isn’t entirely clear, especially what it is they recorded, the music is very enjoyable. Great release, altogether. […]