Discrete music, in the form of environmental sound would be familiar to a good deal of readers and this first offering by Chemins is well within the mould. The pointer to specific structure or attachment to modal structural forms is nothing new and many a group’s sound has been wrought from this template. Indeed it is familiar to anyone whose ear has been dipped into a minimalist sonic world. But the dye is fairly cast: build a sonic texture of discrete parts in an electro/acoustic manner incorporating organic sound and introduce flourishes or displays of instrumental play to add drama/colour/narrative to the piece. The sound recording on display is high end and the sonic manipulation is of a high standard displaying keen knowledge of granular synthesis and attainment of mastery over complex contemporary sonic software/hardware.
The general question in mind of why works such as CDR#1 remain well within a background focus for the tendency not to provide concrete focal ideas for a wider audience to grasp. It holds within it the very quandary of experimental music, how does one travel to the very edge of sound and then simultaneously seek to convey this as widely as possible without blunting the edge. Chemins are very much on a journey towards the edge in their own manner and CDR#1 is a introductory offering which acts as much as a revision lesson in sound as it does as a pointer to their future unwritten maps.
Innerversitysound
