ALT SOUNDS

 Audiobulb Records continue to blow out the cobwebs accumulated in between the steel girders of Sheffield. 
 Founded by David Newman in 2003, Audiobulb, with their subtitle of ‘exploratory music,’ is the body from which
 much intriguing work has been emitted over recent years. They don’t just release artist works on CD either, as
 mentioned on their website.

 “Audiobulb Records is an exploratory music label designed to promote creativity in all its forms. Audiobulb 
 releases artist works on CD & download formats as well as multimedia works, VST (virtual instruments), audio 
 hardware and other creative tools. Our aim is to facilitate the development of new artists working within a realm 
 of care, quality and craft. Works supported by Audiobulb often explore the interface between the electronic and
 natural world. We embrace the complexity of unique electronics, intricate acoustics and detailed microsound.”

 Resonating Wires is an enchanting offering; collecting work from ten different sonic artists the result of which is
 a surprisingly cohesive package. There really doesn’t seem to be a glaring weak point here. Each track is a 
 succinct joy, navigating the often-substantial spaces carved open with a luscious intimacy reminiscent of some 
 of the finest in ambient experimentalism. There is a subtle injection of more beat-based work – Bluermutt’s 
 "Telephone Lullaby," for example – in between the greater number of more plaintive textural examples, Simon 
 Scott’s "Orexis" being a notable standout.

 One minor quibble: it would be nice if some of the excursions were longer, the most successful, "Untitled #241"
 by Francisco López (pictured below), being particularly engaging for it’s expanded temporal space (11’25”). 
 López’s work here really is quite special. The sounds of "Untitled #241" nibble at your cochlear whilst a distant 
 machine turns phantasmagorically within a backdrop of textured ambience, sporadic interjections of noise 
 opening up a space huge enough for the time-span to seem perfectly formed. This track also seems to 
 epitomize Audiobulb’s statement.

 Sonic-explorers and folks interested in music that does not deem it necessary to get up in your face and 
 announce itself should certainly check out Autistici Reworked: Resonating Wires. Sound like this shouldn’t just 
 be for the purists or tech-heads, this is work carefully crafted with an attention to detail needing to be heard 
 by the masses.

 HEADPHONE COMMUTE

 First up is a remix album from David Newman himself, comprised of reworks and interpretations by an incredible
 roster of artists. The contributors include Simon Scott, Sawako, Jimmy Behan, ISAN, Ian Hawgood & Danny 
 Norbury and Richard Chartier, among the many in this 10-track release. This is a glitchy, hissy, lo-fi collection of 
 tracks, drenched in field recordings and electro-acoustic noise. All accomplices on this recording remix 
 Newman’s single track: Resonating Wire, from Autistici‘s 2009 album, Complex Tone Test (KESH) [see our 
 selection in Headphone Commute's Best of 2009 : Music For Bending Light And Stopping Time]. At the center of 
 the album is an 11+minute concoction, ripped and torn by Francisco López, with deep rumbling drones, 
 background synth swirls, and a rhythmic noise checkpoint. Ian Hawgood & Danny Norburry’s piece incorporates 
 soaring strings, double bass plucks, and a confetti of crackles and jitters. And then Richard Chartier rolls up his 
 sleeves. A skillfully executed descent into a place where sound becomes air and noise becomes wind. 
 Resonating Wires  is an excellent compilation of minimal, experimental and electro-acoustic soundscapes that 
 stands high on the shoulders of contemporary reductionist giants.

 VITAL WEEKLY

 Recently I reviewed two of his old archive releases (Vital Weekly 720 and 732) and its his turn to deliver a remix 
 album. He has send a recording of 'one vibrating wire from an acoustic guitar, captured, sculptured and morphed
 into a buzzing pad of noise. Tiny details were added, xylophone, cello, double bass, electronics and the crumpled
 sound of household objects exploited and manipulated' to ten artists for a further deconstruction. The results are 
 a varied bunch, very varied to my very surprise. The opening pieces by Simon Scott, Bluermutt and Sawako, may 
 hint at the original (which can be found on 'Complex Tone Test' released by Kesh), with sampled rhythms, voices 
 and keyboards making a sort of mild IDM music with lots of ambience, but then Jimmy Behan makes things even 
 more ambient, whereas Francisco Lopez goes in some eleven minutes for the most radical deconstruction of all. 
 The three pieces to follow (Isan, Justin Varis and Ian Hagwood & Danny Norbury) are all interested to work with 
 the cello parts of the original as leading voice for their remix, whereas Richard Chartier (with nine minutes not 
 much shorter than Lopez) probably does that too, but going in his own line of work with a beautiful extraction of 
 a millisecond expanded, and He Can Jog closes with a nice warm minimalist electro tune, no beats included. A 
 varied compilation indeed, but its in this variation that there is beauty. A great remix compilation: a fine example of 
 possibilities. A rare thing! (FdW)

 IGLOO

 Finally, there's Autistici Reworked: Resonating Wires, on which a variety of sonicians, ambient and otherwise 
 electronic, are convened for reworkings of an Autistici track from 2009's Complex Tone Test (Kesh). The original
 "Resonating Wire" found him taking the eponymous slender strand for a crepitant consitutional, having it captured
 and raptured in a pointillist forest of fuzz-buzz, cello and xylo, and digitized domestica. Here it gets a further, 
 more extended, outing, in which it is comprehensively unpacked and variously reassembled into a series of tracks
 exploring time-space (and possibly the-universe-and-everything) relations, etc. It may not achieve transcendence
 from a collection of disparate interpretations to wholeness, but there are enough interesting landmarks within it. 
 There's quite a gulf, though, to get between these - from the tenebrous shoeless-gaze of Simon Scott's 
 microsonic DSP-eration to the comforting deep rumbling swirls and rhythmic noise of a ripped and torn tract from 
 a by no means totally atonal Francisco López. In between, less forbidding, almost light-skipping terrain is traversed
 - through the over-ingratiating melodic IDM-flirting "Telephone Lullaby" of Bluermutt, via the J-pop twee-tronica of 
 Sawako, to the twinkling elegiac overtones of Jimmy Behan, the last mentioned something of a pleasant relief from
 the preceding flimsiness with its more ambiguous mood. Then, again, between leaving López land and becoming 
 transfixed in the zone of Richard Chartier's "Wire.Re," which executes a customarily artful descent into a place 
 where pitched sound evaporates and the comfort of the harmony-noise polarity is unsettled, there's the more 
 homely territory of ISAN and Ian Hawgood & Danny Norbury; the former's broken toy instrument cupboard is 
 raided once again for a typically happy-sad version, while the latter duo have cello-meister DN breaking out with
 plangent string saws and bass plucks, to IH's cascade of crackle and tinking keys. After Chartier's more internal 
 odyssey, He Can Jog prefers to close down by opening out into a more direct appeal, his "Chorale Mix" couched 
 cracklingly and crumblingy in a froth of fragmented keyboard dreams. Overall a well-turned assemblage of minimal, 
 experimental and electro-acoustic soundscapes augmenting the savoury primo and secondo of Autistici's early 
 works with a sweet terzo.

 THE MILK FACTORY 

 Resonating Wires is a very different piece of work, and one which stems from one of the driving ideas behind 
 Audiobulb, that of having a very diverse set of people work on a single project. All the tracks from this record are 
 based on Resonating Wires, originally featured on Complex Tone Test, which was based on the sound made by 
 the vibrating wire from an electric guitar which was processed and layered with other sounds. Taking this idea 
 further, Newman asked ten artists, all evolving within an electronic or experimental field, to give their own 
 interpretation of the piece. The result is, expectedly, very diverse, yet these tracks are made to work as an album
 in itself rather than a simple collection of remixes, and actually manage that pretty well. Although the interpretations
 differ greatly, from the microscopic sound and glitch placement of the Simon Scott or Francisco López versions to 
 the autumnal overtones of reworkings by Jimmy Behan or Ian Hawgood & Danny Norbury or the more 
 straightforward approach adopted by Sawako or He Can Jog, both going for a smooth and ethereal form of 
 dreamy electronica close in essence to pop music, or by ISAN who have created a magical sound world, at times 
 evocative of a box full of broken toys, for their typically melancholic version.

 Each one of the tracks presented here is totally immersive and takes on some of the qualities of the original to 
 mould them into something so unique that it is difficult to believe that these artists worked from the same set of 
 recordings. Yet, there is something strangely consistent which binds these tracks together as part of a coherent 
 whole, whether they are beautiful melodic pieces or more experimental revisions. What transpires is the fine 
 processing work adopted by Newman on his original, and how malleable it is in the hands of his remixers. In fact, 
 the very notion of remix doesn’t quite apply here, as each of the ten acts involved offer here a personal 
 interpretation of Newman’s sound pool rather than simply rearrange his original composition.

 These two releases, focusing on vastly different ideas and points in David Newman’s career, still appear very 
 much linked to each other as they expose his thought process with music and sound and the way he has come to 
 work with them. That both records, while made up of very diversified components, end up sounding like coherent 
 works is a credit to his overall vision and his deep knowledge and understanding of his collaborators.

 NEURAL

 David Newman, head honcho of Audiobulb, is back as Autistici, this time remixed by a large group of colleagues, 
 all well-known producers in the contemporary experimental electronic scene. From the first sequences Simon 
 Scott (former drummer of Slowdive and collaborator with Brian Eno) gives us a rarefied, cryptic, sensitive and 
 abstract soundscape. Soon the mood turns more airy with the sweetly melodic evolution by Bluermutt and the 
 synthetic resonances of Sawako, a microsound chanteuse with a Venusian charm. Dazed lunar lullabies in "Isan 
 Ice Later", are followed by the delicate juxtapositions of Justin Waris and by the dilated and aesthetic scores of 
 Ian Hawgood and Danny Norbury. The album ends with He Can Jog (Erik Schoster), a digital manipulator who 
 remains delicate and dreamy, poetically ambient and elegiac. Mention must also be made of Richard Chartier and 
 Francisco Lopez, who reiterate their skills at forming avant-garde twists and passages, consumed in reductionist 
 beats, resonant and stylized.

 BOOMKAT 

 Audiobulb label owner David Newman presents another set of Autistici works, this time remixed by the great and 
 the good of conteporary electronica: contrbutions come from acts like Richard Chartier, Francisco Lopez, Isan, 
 Sawako and Ian Hawgood with Danny Norbury. The album begins with ex-Slowdive drummer Simon Scott, 
 whose 'Orexis' takes on a studious dissection of static and tiny acoustic timbres. From within all this whirring 
 minimalism a backdraft of granular drone rises up and takes the track to its finale. Bluermutt's 'Telephone Library' 
 is a more melodic electronica enterprise, in keeping with Isan's tuneful electroacoustic study 'Isan Ice Later', 
 which beautifully mixes together percussive sounds, crystalline bell tones, xylophone (and very possibly 
 something to do with ice, given the title) plus bowed strings. A similar strategy is adopted by Ian Hawgood and 
 Danny Norbury, whose collaboration yields some arrestingly lovely results, particularly thanks to the addition of 
 Norbury's arcing cello strokes. Bridging a gap between this and the more experimental material is Sawako, 
 whose music is either very experimental electropop or very tuneful microsound, depending on your perspective. 
 Either way, her 'Tide Ride' is a clear-cut album highlight. Richard Chartier and Francisco Lopez fly the flag for the 
 more lowercase end of the experimental music spectrum, fashioning some incredibly detailed, incredibly quiet 
 compositions from the source material, with Chartier's 'Wire.Re' standing out in particular.

 TEXTURA

 Some regard the remix album as a lazy move on the part of the artist—after all, how much effort can be involved
 in rounding up a crew of remixers and giving them carte blanche  on existing tracks?—while others more charitably
 see it as an opportunity for previously issued material to be illuminated further when filtered through other 
 producers' interpretive sensibilities. Regardless of one's personal stance on the issue, Resonating Wires  remains 
 a fascinating take on the genre. In this case, David Newman, aka Austistici and Audiobulb Records head, first 
 created the track “Resonating Wire” by electronically manipulating a recording of an acoustic guitar's vibrating wire, 
 and then supplementing it with xylophone, cello, double bass, and even the crumpled sounds of household objects, 
 with the result included on the Complex Tone Test  album released on Kesh.  Resonating Wires advances the 
 concept further by having an impressive cast of contributors—Simon Scott, Isan, Richard Chartier, Sawako, and 
 Francisco López among them—re-interpret the original in strikingly bold manner; that each track is so dramatically 
 unlike the original is signified by the fact that many of the interpretations have been newly titled (in place of the 
 more predictable “Resonating Wire (Remix)”).

 Newman sequenced the album so that each track flows into the next, making for a fifty-five-minute travelogue. 
 Scott introduces the album with “Orexis,” a texture-heavy ambient-drone that emphasises atmosphere over melody, 
 whereas chiming melodies and clip-hop beats are the focal points in Bluermutt's densely layered serenade 
 “Telephone Lullaby.” True to form, López recasts the original in “Untitled #241” as an ever-mutating stream of tears, 
 blips, rattles, rumbles, and—slowly surfacing near track's end—sinister string flourishes—a feast for the ears that 
 sounds as if it was recorded in both a NASA control room and at the center of an ant colony. Also memorable are 
 the orchestral-ambient treatment by Ian Hawgood and Danny Norbury, whose ruminative sparkle is elevated by 
 lovely string passages, and Isan's slow-motion meditation “Isan Ice Later,” which emphasizes strings, percussive 
 accents, and electronics. In addition, Sawako bewitches the listener with a twinkly vocal-enhanced treatment 
 (“Tide Ride”), and Jimmy Behan contributes a ponderous electro-acoustic dirge with cello, clarinet, fuzzy 
 electronics, and double bass the prominent front-line. All told, the artists take full advantage of the possibilities 
 offered by Newman's original, and, as a remix project, Resonating Wires is about as diverse an outcome as one 
 could hope for. 

 AUTRES DIRECTIONS

 « La réalité est à la fois multiple et une, et dans sa division elle est toujours rassemblée ». Le nouvel ouvrage 
 sonore de l’anglais David Newman (Autistici) fait suite aux archives et recherches exposées sur Detached Metal 
 Voice - Early Works (Vol. I) et Slow Temperature - Early Works (Vol. II). Il y avait déjà là de quoi méditer. 
 Resonating Wires est donc tout sauf un simple album de remixes. C’est un exercice platonien. Résonances sur le 
 fil, formes floues et manipulations électro-acoustiques y forment une ligne d’horizon. Auteurs, interprètes, 
 architectes ? Une dizaine d’artistes s’illustrent et se joignent. La source d’origine est cependant aussi identifiée 
 qu’absente : extrait de l’album Complex Tone Test (Kesh, 2008), Resonating Wires n’est plus un morceau mais un 
 album entier qui brille autant par ses nuances esthétiques et musicales que par sa prise de position générale. Si la 
 réalité n’est qu’affaire de point de vue, le casting en dit long sur l’ensemble des possibles : corde sensible (Ian 
 Hawgood & Danny Norbury), plongée abyssale (Simon Scott) ou remontée céleste (Isan), Resonating Wires est 
 tout à la fois pluriel et indivisible.

 Audiobulb Is an exploratory music label designed to support the work of innovative artists. 


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