David Lee Myers/Tod Dockstader - Bijou *

Artist:

Arcane Device

UPC:

752725021722

Description:

On Pond, soundsmith Tod Dockstader and feedback guitarist David Lee Myers churned up wildly creative abstract compositions from recordings of frogs. This time they work in the other direction, using abstract sounds and decontextualized sound quotes to put together a vivid feature film. The expression "cinema for the ear" has been used before in all kinds of contexts; in this case, it is unusually fitting. Bijou features some very precise sound environments that conjure up detailed mental images of wheres and whens. Snippets of voices stolen from movies or TV series introduce fugitive characters, while actions are instinctively deduced from recognizable sounds (a howling wolf, a flying helicopter, etc.). Yet, the listener who would solely focus on piecing a narrative back together from these elements would end up with a storyline as meaningless and patchwork-like as the few pages of screenplay found in the booklet. The listener is not meant to find a narrative or logic in the music, but to contribute his or her own narrative/logic. These short tracks (most of them are under four minutes in duration) stimulate the imagination, they move you from one setting to another, and they present you with pieces of an incomplete puzzle that has no box cover. Half meta-discourse on the "cinema for the ear" form, half inventive play on concrete/abstract signifiers from the moving picture paradigm, Bijou is, simply put, a very clever electro-acoustic work. And it deserves two thumbs up. ~ Fran?ois Couture

Track Listing:

DISC 1

1. Roll `Em
2. Perp Walk
3. Closer, Closer
4. Encasement
5. Illegible Proposal
6. In the Hold
7. Dementia
8. Scene of the Crime
9. Emergency Repsonse
10. Air One/Recovery
11. City of Industry
12. Bzzzzt!
13. Unfortunate Incidents
14. Cringing Unknown, The
15. Phoning Home
16. Return of the Cringing Unknown, The
17. Doktor Is In, The
18. Abstractions Unchained
19. Abstractions Unchained Director`s Cut
20. Contraptions (Short)
21. Dark Funnels
22. Underground Ops
23. Underground Ops Redux
24. Machine Mystique
25. Battle Finale
26. Credits
27. Wrap

Album Information

Release Date:

01/01/2005

Type:

Performer

Genre:

Electronic

Subgenre:

Ambient

Label:

ReR USA

Catalog Number:

2

Original Release Year:

2005

# of Discs:

1

Studio/Live:

Studio

Mono/Stereo:

Stereo

Portions copyright 2005 Muze Inc. All rights reserved.