The use of field recordings as a source of musical aesthesia has a long and venerable history by now. It says something about the basic strength of the idea that, despite the superficial “sameness” of ambient sound, the dexterous and incisive ear can still find samples or interpolations of sound that are not only fresh but endlessly rich and deep, hitting the listener on several levels both conscious and not (Olivia Block springs to mind). Part of the success of such ventures lies in allowing the captured sounds to “speak for themselves,” to not be awkwardly forced into some pre-existing imagined structure, to let them retain a good measure of their natural flow. The absence in this level of trust in found sound is the overriding problem with Out of Town, a disc by Stephan Moore and Scott Smallwood, together known as Evidence.
The sound sources utilized share much in common with past practitioners of the genre albeit with a tendency toward the grungily industrial: various bathroom ambiences, a staircase under a highway, a pumphouse. These sounds, interesting in and of themselves, are substantially manipulated via computer, recording devices and so on, mutating their character accordingly. Even at this point, I might have preferred to leave well enough alone, to have the sort of confidence in the original capture that one finds in, say, Luc Ferrari. But to make matters worse, the pair almost inevitably constructs loops from their material, imposing a rhythmic track that adds nothing, by and large deadening any interest one may have had. The idea of introducing these rhythms seems misplaced enough but the fact that they’re inherently banal, sounding like something out of a less-than-inspired Laswell session, only makes matters worse. Additionally, pieces like “They Who They Find” contain more than a little of the New Age spaciness that contaminates a number of the Deep Listening crew. The title track takes the potentially rewarding idea of dealing with radio transmissions at the edge of audible reception but embeds these captures in a metallic, ghostly haze that conjures up trite science fiction film soundtracks. The last and longest track, “Aurora Viaduct,” is perhaps the most disappointing. Recorded under a busy highway, it initially fascinates with the (either unenhanced or only subtly changed) sounds of vehicles passing overheard, the roar of the engines mixed with the irregular rhythm of tires hitting the road seams. Unfortunately, and it seems inevitably with these fellows, the thuds and pops, which contained plenty of charm and intrigue in their randomness, are wedged into an artificial and lackluster pattern. One rather jangly element takes on the role of desultory tambourine in a third rate bar band. It all simply seems so much beside the point.
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