Afflux (Bordeaux - TNT)

Long after the first two releases issued by Ground Fault and Edition Ellipsis, and/OAR & Alluvial Recordings are pleased to finally be able to present the final release in a trilogy covering the sonic expeditions of the French location-specific electroacoustic 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.
(Dale Lloyd)

$10.00 post paid in North America. Elsewhere see additional postage rates in the Alluvial Shop.

REVIEWS

Vital Weekly 521(Frans de Waard, Nederland)

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 focussed on this CD, and not the rain
outside, or own coffee machine. This 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.

Touching Extremes May 2006 (Massimo Ricci, Italia)

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.

GAZ-ETA Number 43, May 2006 (Tadeusz Kosiek, Poland)
"Bordeaux TNT" stanowi zamkniÄ™cie trylogii przedstawiajÄ…cej dźwiÄ™kowe pejzaże, które trio Eric La Casa, Jean-Luc Guionnet i Eric Cordier nagrywaÅ‚o w różnych rejonach Francji. OczywiÅ›cie pejzaże to szczególne, stanowiÄ…ce nie tyle dosÅ‚owny zapis, lecz próbÄ™ schwytania swoistego ducha miejsca, czÄ™sto nieuchwytnego nieuzbrojonym uchem, bowiem Affluxowcy nie ograniczajÄ… siÄ™ tylko do rejestracji dźwiÄ™ków, lecz czÄ™sto je przetwarzajÄ…, bÄ…dź miksujÄ… z innymi. Na omawianej pÅ‚ycie przedstawiajÄ… fragment sÅ‚uchowiska, z którym przez sześć godzin mierzyli siÄ™ goÅ›cie centrum kulturalnego TNT w Bordeaux. La Casa, Guionnet i Cordier rozmieÅ›cili mikrofony wewnÄ…trz (przede wszystkim w sali restauracyjnej) oraz na zewnÄ…trz budynku i improwizowali, przepuszczajÄ…c modyfikowany dźwiÄ™k przez 32-kanaÅ‚owy stół mikserski do oÅ›miu gÅ‚oÅ›ników znajdujÄ…cych siÄ™ piÄ™tro niżej. Centrum, które mieÅ›ci siÄ™ w budynku dawnej fabryki butów, ulokowane w pobliżu torów kolejowych i szosy wydaje siÄ™ być odpowiednim miejscem na tego typu przedsiÄ™wziÄ™cie nie tylko ze wzglÄ™du na to, że dostarcza materiaÅ‚ dźwiÄ™kowy, ale i dziÄ™ki temu, że pozwala mu siÄ™ swobodnie rozchodzić. Jak już wspomniaÅ‚em caÅ‚y koncert - a może lepsza byÅ‚aby nazwa instalacja, bowiem muzycy nie byli obecni w sali koncertowej ? - trwaÅ‚ sześć godzin, zaÅ› "Bordeaux TNT" tylko pięćdziesiÄ…t jeden minut, i m.in. dlatego (kolejnym powodem byÅ‚a konieczność zgrania wszystkiego na dwie Å›cieżki) materiaÅ‚ przeznaczony na pÅ‚ytÄ™ zostaÅ‚ na nowo zmiksowany przez Erica la Casa. Nie bÄ™dÄ…c Å›wiadkiem koncertu, trudno mi ocenić, czy aby przy tej okazji materia nie zostaÅ‚a specjalnie "zagÄ™szczona" po to, by akcja rozgrywaÅ‚a siÄ™ szybciej. A dzieje siÄ™ tu wiele i dzieje siÄ™ bardzo ciekawie. OdgÅ‚osy zewnÄ™trza (ptaki, wiatr, pociÄ…gi, samochody, niezidentyfikowane trzaski itp.) i wnÄ™trza (szmery, brzÄ™czenie, gÅ‚osy, itd.) splecione ciasno w mocny dźwiÄ™kowy warkocz, przenikajÄ… siÄ™, dopeÅ‚niajÄ…, przekomarzajÄ…, przekrzykujÄ… - zwykÅ‚e dźwiÄ™ki poddane manipulacjom ukazujÄ… swojÄ… drugÄ… twarz, niesÅ‚yszanÄ… wczeÅ›niej, czÄ™sto zachwycajÄ…c i drażniÄ…c jednoczeÅ›nie. AbsorbujÄ…cy uwagÄ™, peÅ‚en smakowitych detali i niezwykÅ‚ych barw elektroakustyczny kolaż, soundscape który podsumowuje tytuÅ‚ metamkinowskiej serii Cinema pour l’oirrelle.

WIRE Number 268, June 2006 (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.

PARIS TRANSATLANTIC JULY 2006 (Massimo Ricci, Italia)

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 cafe 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.

BLOW UP, May 2006 (Stefano I. Bianchi, Italia)
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 instal lazione effettuata al TNT di Bordeaux nel 2000. La musica e piu vivace articolata rispetto aI 3", pur dipendendo sostan zialmente da con cretismi : glitch elet trici in comunella con scie luminose di feedback tenerissimo e rumore digitale che si modula e adatta con notevole efficacia.