Location, Location, Location

Living Sound, Patent Pending by Maryanne Amacher

Great juddering reverberations!! I’ve been circling around what to say about “OHM: The Early Gurus of Electronic Music”, easily one of the best compilations ever. It’s vast. OK, it’s only three cds long, but really, we’re talking a cultural planet the size of Jupiter here. You could lose a decade following the stray patch leads and oscillator thrums, and it would be a decade well lost.

The best way to tackle this is to just talk about one thing, because you can all click on the link below to get an idea of who is on it. I love Maryanne Amacher‘s “Living Sound, Patent Pending” because it’s a great piece of destabilised drone work and such a totally fantastic proposition.

Here‘s something I found earlier: “An entire building or series of rooms provides a stage for the sonic and visual sets of her installations, produced almost exclusively in large expansive architectures“. Now this is the kind of gig I’m interested in. Something you walk through, vanish into, the sound circling and changing. Close your eyes….which is of course not so very far away from good old organ music in a cathedral. Once I was in York Minster when the organist decided to hit the lunch time crowd with some impromptu Bach. You can’t really listen to Bach on a two bit stereo after hearing it in that context.

One of the reasons I don’t like much live music is because of the you down there me up here nailed down favourites routine that makes up so much of what we regard as being entertainment. Yes, I’m one of those overly earnest people who doesn’t find entertainment entertaining. But this is more like it. And Phill Niblock in his loft with his dirty great big suspended speakers cranked way up (does he have neighbours?). Or Susan Hiller‘s “Clinic“, where sensors trigger the voices as you move through a space. Even the thought of it fires the imagination.

Where was I? Being wilfully enthusiastic. Track it down, people!

Buy - Ohm+: the Early Gurus of Electronic Music 1948 - 1980 Amazon
Buy - Maryanne Amacher - Sound Characters [Import] Amazon

Visit - OHM- The Early Gurus of Electronic Music
Visit - Maryanne Amacher in Conversation with Frank J. Oteri
Visit - Being Uncle Thurston and Maryanne
Visit - Susan Hiller
Visit - Phill Niblock