a r t i s t : Jim Fassett
t i t l e : Symphony of the Birds
d a t e : 2005
l a b e l : EM (EM1044CD)
g e n r e : Other
r l s. d a t e : Jun/2006
t r a c k s : 07
b i t r a t e : VBRkbps
s i z e : 47,6 MB
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We recently discovered a completely amazing Japanese label
called EM Records. Pretty hard to pin down what exactly it is
that they specialize in but that's precisely why we're so
smitten. From not one, but -several- singing saw records, to
acid psych reissues, long lost singer songwriters, early
experimental tape music, bizarre robot disco, fifties rock and
roll, Australian dub, Isophonic boogie woogie (?) and tons
more. We've only begun to dip into the wonderful world of EM,
but we're going to start listing them one at a time. This
record was initially the release that convinced us to get in
touch with EM. Jim Fassett's Symphony Of The Birds is bizarre
and beautiful and had AQ written all over it. The liner notes
are mostly in Japanese so it's hard to know too many of the
details, but Symphony Of The Birds is an amazing example of
early tape music, it just so happens that all the tapes used
were recordings of songbirds, which Fassett chopped, and cut,
spliced and sequenced into a totally unique symphony of bird
calls.
The record opens with Fassett's explanatory comments featuring
our favorite line: "But keep in mind, as you listen, that
nothing has been added. If you think you hear something that
sounds like a particular musical instrument, or a human voice,
or anything else other than birdcalls, YOU'RE WRONG." The
first movement is definitely the best, whistles and chirps,
chopped and stretched into dense swirls of psychedelic sound,
if you weren't paying close attention, you'd be hard pressed
to hear that it was birds making these sounds. Very trippy and
spacey and alien sounding, like some crazy analog synthesizer
freakout. The second movement involves a lot more itch
shifting and changes in tape speed, resulting in sort of
clunky purposeful melodies, the same bird call in different
pitches to assemble very simple sing songy melodies. The third
movement gets back on track, with some of the bird call slowed
WAY down so they becomes rumbling drones, while others are
sped up and repeated rapidly making impossible trills that
almost sound like some blast of Sunroof!-y skree.
The last three tracks feature Fassett narrating an imaginary
trip through a meadow, allowing us to study closely the bird
song of each different bird isolated from the others, with
some deft mixing and stereo panning, and the affect is
actually quite stunning, with each bird getting 30 seconds to
a minute right up on the mic! Cool!
The whole thing comes packaged in a super tough oversized (to
accommodate the massive booklet) jewel case. The booklet
contains lots of great photos, liner notes in Japanese,
transcriptions of Fassett's spoken word segments on the disc,
the album's original liner notes, and strangest of all, a
pictorial guide to various and random birdcall records,
separated by theme it seems: whistling accompaniment of
instruments or big band, field recordings, canary training,
instrumental, experimental happening (?) etc. Weird!
http://www.aquariusrecords.org/
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01-Explanatory Comments [06:24]
02-First Movement (Andante e lirico) [06:51]
03-Second Movement (Buffo) [03:12]
04-Third Movement (Misterioso) [04:20]
05-Cardinal, Mockingbird, Catbird, Robin, Summer Tanager [08:07]
06-Yellow Warbler, Blackburnian Warbler, Song Sparrow, [04:12]
Vesper Sparrow
07-Carolina Wren, Goldfinch, Indigo Bunting, Purple Finch [04:13]
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37:19 min