I knew some noisers who are presents here on board, that after years of settling into "home recording", finally changing from headphones and convenient set up made out of compromises into different thing, made their work blossom with ideas and new strength.
It is hard to say how common this is nowadays, but the sheer amount of software substitutes one can see, compromises in artwork, compromises in presentation, compromises in aquiring sounds, I sometimes do wonder about how much of noise is born out of reasons of welfare, boredom, availability of easy solutions, etc. I wonder how much does the surroundings and conditions influence the sound thats being done, and can it really be that big, as I sense it would be?
Sometimes when I listen exceptional recordings, I do wonder how they managed to do it? How long it took to gather such a massive amount of source sounds. How difficult it was to process complex mixes that sound very natural. Was recording purely coincidence or totally intentional choise of finding inspiration from specific tools & location?
Based on my own "research", I can't come to other conclusion than seeing the correlation of special circumstances and great recordings. Special, not meaning that it would have to be really that special, but simply even set up of rehearsal bunker and pile of amps, as opposed to computer with synth software. Or source material gathered with effort of going where sounds are, than trying to survive with jiggling box of coins with contact mic taped on it and couple pedals.
I remember being very interested in early industrial pioneers ideas, where for example Z'ev would explain that the process of his percussive noise, starts not from pushing the rec button, but infact much earlier as theft of metal junk objects from junk yards. To make trespassing on place, where one could find metal objects that make the desired sound. It may sounds pretentious, but I feel it has effect to aura of recording, and which I can't feel from many other similar recordings. Just to clarify, talking about very earliest harsh pieces of his.
For some years, I can see now, looking back, I was personally restricted by modern comforts. Thinking one can simply plug few things together and survive. Oh yes, survive indeed, but I also notice when there was no passion bigger than that, no sweat, no sacrifice, no challenge, it was merely good. Or very good. But never amazing. Well, luckily I don't have urge to release everything, so not all the crap was put on circulation for public ridicule or boredom. As soon as I aknowledged situation, I thought that there are measures that needs to be taken. It started process of not creating things that would be no worth to create. Have strategy and execution of idea. Often with attempt to find something special and inspiring from conditions what are unique and not something that are born out of easiness and comfort. Knowing how easy it is to have small piece of metal and apply reverb and distortion. But how much better it will be, when travelling to the object.
As example, Today as one part of the process described, despite freezing weather of -20*C (-4*F), 20km outside Lahti, visit to abandoned tile factory became success. Process of perhaps 3 hours, under layers of winter clothes, commando mask, still with frozen eyes, frozen fingers, going through the structures of ruins of factory, capturing percussions, drones of resonating metal, collisions of broken glass, tiles, wood and metal thrown in concrete halls, metal stairways, wrecked machinery parts, oil barrels,... To withness some weird racket at nearby farm, trying to wander through woods to see what kind of machine would made sounds as that. Perhaps wood chipper (? right word, don't know) echoing in air. It was like listening THE HATERS being performed in middle of nowhere in snowcovered fields. Wandering through train tracks, and while I always have thought how the fuck people get accidentally killed by trains, my attempt to capture that sound described above, was reason I nearly didn't notice approaching train. Couple steps away and still impact of wind from fully loaded train with wood logs and other "industrial product", sound of my overdriving recorder in my ears blasting... it was set to capture much more delicate sound than full speed cargo train at 2 meter distance. Nevertheless, when listening the material at hand, I realize there is no way, this could have been done with any other way. The process alone and sound alone motivates me to continue further. The success of even half finished track is satisfactory. And while I notice that pace of releases is slower, I find myself actually doing more than ever. And through that, I also find myself listening more than ever.
Just like story of Z've inspired me for decades, I'd be very interested to hear if any others are following some similar path... or perhaps I'm just ehm, pretentious wanker? We'll see...
I think its lovely that youve found time to go outside and sniff the frosen flowers. those walks will ad years to your life or indeed end it fast by getting run over by a train or falling into a cave( I didnt expect to find those after moving to the east helsinki suburbs but low and behold just around the corner there are similar to the ones that can be found in my old hometown.these ones arent quite as long but you have to descent there via a rope. beatiful echoes , peace and quiet!)
I dont know about making exeptional records but going around with a dictaphone(fullsized tape and not microcassettes) hidden in my armpit is very near and dear to me. I doubt theres a pedal that sounds similar to creeping into a construction site and having the concealed mic sticking out your sleeve capture the sound of sandblasting brick and concrete with you standing so close it hurts your ears!!
I never had a camera in my phone so I used to carry around a regular sized camera at work which resulted in great photos of nocturnal decadence but it broke for good and I havent found a new one. found means finding literally and not buying heh heh. this is something where techolocical advances are great. a man only has two hands and its difficult to duck for bums trying to hit you with a chair, carrying newspapers and taking pictures at the same time. if somebody is into SERIOUS nerdyness you can find spygadgets these days easily , even from regular electronics shops. cameraphone would be a good start but a videocamera in your glasses would be even better.
your story is cool, Mikko...just try to not wander onto anymore train tracks. I want to do stuff like this myself...
Last New Year's Eve I went out to video the fireworks that where going off over the city, but the video came out totally black, BUT the sounds survived (and in stereo, too). They later became a spiral I called "Septus"; hope to release it on Solar Anus soon. Have also used sounds of the fence next door banging in the wind ("Day Of Hell") and a storm that came and changed the weather from hot to cold ("Offal Offspring").
Personally, though, I like to add effects to these sounds. I can understand wanting the pure, more direct recordings of selective percussion if being manipulated, but for larger sounds, I don't care much for pure "field recordings", I like to use those sounds in conjunction with others.
Had a portable mini-disc recorder that was ripped off when my home got burgled a few years back. Couldn't be replaced by insurance as they couldn't find anything that recorded (offered me fucking mp3 players instead). I really, really need to get something for "field recordings". My ambition has always been to get on the peak hour trains with a hidden recording device to pick up all the inane, bullshit chatter of the citizens around me and utilise it mercilessly.
Quote from: FreakAnimalFinland on December 18, 2009, 11:11:34 PM
It is hard to say how common this is nowadays, but the sheer amount of software substitutes one can see, compromises in artwork, compromises in presentation, compromises in aquiring sounds, I sometimes do wonder about how much of noise is born out of reasons of welfare, boredom, availability of easy solutions, etc. I wonder how much does the surroundings and conditions influence the sound thats being done, and can it really be that big, as I sense it would be?
Being bored and being on the dole offered me massive opportunities to get stuck into recording. As for availability of easy solutions, though, I put all that second place to the original ideas and inspiration. Whether it takes as long as the piece itself to record or whether it takes half a year, it's all one to me if it ends up sounding good to me.
As for surroundings and conditions, in my case, yes, very much. In different ways. My first two cassette releases where based on physical and emotional feelings from the massive heatwave and firestorms we've had at the start of the year. I've found extreme weather perfect inspiration, and have been able to play and record during times of extreme heat and pain to come up with sounds I've been very happy with and proud of. The translation of surrounding into sound is as much a matter of interpretation as recording surrounding sounds.
The Rita is pretty well known for using recordings of ocean diving as source material.
Quote from: Andrew McIntosh on December 19, 2009, 08:24:37 AM
The Rita is pretty well known for using recordings of ocean diving as source material.
Does he record them himself, or does he have access to an audio library archive?
I think he must have made recordings himself, but I guess can be confirmed later. As much as I feel disconnected from skating etc, I can admire him turning one thing into another. There is the "snorkel" / "skate" LP out now on RRR.
Since very early days of my work, I have used sounds of water. It's not always obvious, but like 1995 split tape with WTWWC the grand finale of the track is simply sounds of dripping water, but with microphone going through 4-track to amp, allowing the line to feedback at the same time. It starts to sound almost like random wave synthesizer noise, almost like WASP synth... but just, different.
I just did field recordings of waterfall, and it is indeed wall of noise. Subtle texture, massive roaring rumble. Almost like white noise hiss, but just heavy.
Quote from: FreakAnimalFinland on December 19, 2009, 10:07:33 AMI just did field recordings of waterfall, and it is indeed wall of noise. Subtle texture, massive roaring rumble. Almost like white noise hiss, but just heavy.
Apparently it is then something closer to pink noise (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pink_noise).
Quote from: Zeno Marx on December 19, 2009, 08:59:46 AMDoes he record them himself, or does he have access to an audio library archive?
My understanding is that he does. On the recent release, that's him on the front cover in the rather fetishistic looking air-mask (some archaic WW2 thing, or something), and he got the microphone commissioned for underwater recordings. Sure beats gaillo.
it seems that almost everybody wants to do at least one track with a toilet bowl or the sink? possibly dedicated to peter kurten hit home or something but it really is not that neat of a sound bilibblipblipblipblibididblibblibblib. I would rather go sit on the ice and listen to it crack and move, hint hint( recording it would require a fancier thing than the one I have)
this morning I listened to armed to the teeth my mania. mrs brewer of wacko,texas(btw, welcome to the board!) if I remeber correctly recordead the sounds him self at a gathering of likeminded hobbyists. sounded tons better than I remembered. when the minigun started to saw it sounded like the disc is busted for a second. cool.
without trying to be too philosophical about things it feels that were closing in on some very good core values when somekind of noise is happening regardles or possibly causing irritation in other people and a guy rises from the ditch exited about capturing it and then taking it home as a treasure.
who has tried to build vivenza machines, werent there blueprints on some of the tapes?
Quote from: niko penttinen on December 19, 2009, 02:20:29 PM
this morning I listened to armed to the teeth my mania. mrs brewer of wacko,texas(btw, welcome to the board!) if I remeber correctly recordead the sounds him self at a gathering of likeminded hobbyists. sounded tons better than I remembered. when the minigun started to saw it sounded like the disc is busted for a second. cool.
AARGH! Just got that album day before yesterday! Shit, I need to put a review up of it. Great work.
Quote from: niko penttinen on December 19, 2009, 02:20:29 PM
it seems that almost everybody wants to do at least one track with a toilet bowl or the sink?
Are you fucking stalking me? One of the first things I recorded was the toilet flushing. Still sounds good to this day, actually.
Quote from: niko penttinen on December 19, 2009, 02:20:29 PM
armed to the teeth
First time I heard it; meh, second time; better, third time; good and so forth. I listen to this a lot in the car (where I listen to most music) and it's great. The bit where all the little guns go off at the same time and then this monster thing (pardon the terminology, maybe Keith can fill us in on more details on this amazing gadget) blasts away makes me chuckle. Brute force to the extreme and not a distortion pedal or any effects in sight. Just death spewed out repeatedly from a machine whose sole purpose is to destroy mankind.
I know that the artwork will always be basic from PacRec but it's a shame this didn't come in a box with lots of full colour pics of weapons and people firing them.
Inspiration for sound? I've done precious few field recordings but I take plenty of inspiration from running in the military training ground I have just around the corner. Not just for the environment but becase the action is inspiring in itself. The monotony, the excertion, the singularity of purpose is meditation. I do my best thinking when running.
Also a few nocturnal walks trought the area I live in. I took the photos for the Sleep Paralysis CD during one of those but the walk through the above mentioned training area one dark and very early morning last year was almost magical. You pass through a wooded area by yourself at night and, like the lunatic Vikernes said, it's as if the place speaks to you. I found it very intense and the photos I took of trees and bushes covered in frost were so menacing and gloomy. I should do it again and bring a better camera this time.
Field recordings/process/ritual/travel to the place of recording/place of the recording etc. is always the experience at least for your own self. Since I got my hands on decent marantz tape dictophone with XLR microphone input, it got even more interesting cause you sometimes just go out and wander without any clear aim till you find some interesting place that you didn't even know to exist to "play at" or so. Recorded also the passing trains, water, footsteps on snow, breaking branches of trees etc. etc. As for the trains - the most interesting records I've got was from in-between carriages. The sound in there is very intense and you can play with limiters of the dictophone in there, getting very interesting results. Once it was during the train-trip from somewhere home, everyone got asleep and I went to record in between carriages. I didn't have any normal/good tape, just some 15 year old pirated cassette of some strange pop songs. The cassette being so old, I got one layer of train sounds and somewhere in the background - silent and strange remnants of previous recordings. And since Lithuania has loads of left-overs from Soviet times - here are many bunkers, military rocket stations and so on. Now defunct, but the buildings are still there - massive metal hangars and so on - many interesting sources of sounds/reverbs etc. Once we were doing field recordings in such a now defunct military rocket station of USSR and got arrested for we trespassed the "restricted military area". I guess the people from neighbourhood called the military police and that's good that we were already finished with the recordings for we wouldn't make a good impression to the soldiers by banging, throwing etc. bricks, metal sticks and so on to enormous hangars. To explain to them that we were "recording the sounds" would be quite difficult I guess. And as I am always concerned about the atmosphere of the release - such journeys to recording places are worth it themselves.
Ah, and recordings by the sea are always interesting. When you walk on the seashore trying to catch various feedbacks and suddenly some pair of lovers appear from nowhere I guess it's even more interesting for them to guess and wonder what was there...
Armed to the teeth is really excellent record. I also liked very much the sounds in Ultra-Negative. Was listening to latter one even more, I think.
I really need to get myself some proper field recording equipment... I used a few sounds on my first tape recorded with my mp3player (=abysmally low bitrate) at different jobs I had - one is the whirl of voices at a telemarketing company, if you listen closely you might be able to hear what is being sold, it made great ambience & had relevance to the overarching thematics of the music I was working on then... no one wanted to work there, no one wanted to buy anything, the bosses were vampires just craving money, regarding the employees as something between 6 year olds and cattle, it was in the middle of Malmö with a view over a massive cemetary filled with blooming trees, very strange atmosphere. Another recording I did was the MASSIVE clanging thumping of a machine pressing big sheets of metal - the whole thing was about 7 meters high, a goddamn dinosaur. Traditional sounds perhaps but what the hell...
Since the bitrate was so awful (32kbps I think, or maybe even 16), I had to churn the sounds through this old tape deck I have... at least took away the horrible "digitalness" of the audio files, adding some warmth... Think I've used some trains passing in the distance too.
I'm still in the process of finding out ways to record noises & rumbles so I am far away from mastering the methods; most recordings happen by "controlled accidents", trying out things and then reshaping and editing and fucking up beyond belief... but I'd never call my stuff improvised, there is always an idea or "feeling" behind what is being created. Not being in total control is (so far) part of the outcome (or an excuse for not trying harder?). To this day I come up with new methods that I then realize has been standard procedure for the genre since the early days of the eighties. Maybe restricting but I appreciate not taking the "how to make noise 101" course, the methods might be archaic & outdated but they're original to my own creations so I don't care...
There's no room in my apartment to have a recording set-up set up constantly so when I finally get around to record my ideas there is so much shit surmounted that, well, it might actually turn out half-decent...
QuoteMy understanding is that he does. On the recent release, that's him on the front cover in the rather fetishistic looking air-mask (some archaic WW2 thing, or something), and he got the microphone commissioned for underwater recordings. Sure beats gaillo.
The sources for the RRR 'Snorkel' side are all taken from numerous diving horror and adventure genre films. It was originally to be part of the 'foley' series, hence the movie sound effect samples.
The still from the cover of 'Voyage of the Decima MAS' is an actual Italian WWII frogman in a full face mask. Along with some other Decima MAS diver photos, the jewel box insert includes a couple of photos of me during the recording wearing a similar vintage full face mask.
From a recent email to a colleague:
"The 'Voyage of the Decima MAS' recordings were all done in Pender Harbour, BC in the ocean using an ocean safe contact mic with a 25 foot cord. the recorder was set up on the beach with watcher that made sure it didn't become unplugged, pulled into the ocean, etc. using the surface, coral, seaweed, and even a couple of different live crabs; i scraped, rubbed, and let the mic float all over everything - from the surface to depths of 20+ feet (i was lucky enough to have the recorder perched on the edge of a cliff that descended straight into the ocean)...
...The conscious act of ocean snorkeling as an obsession/interest/activity eventually translates into the dynamism of the material... the recognition of usable sounds, use of gain, overdrive, layering - dependent on the strength and movement of the raw materials."
A sick fetish blossomed in my late teens for riding the screeching beast (to paraphrase a Macro track title). Hometown TO, southernmost bend. Summer afternoons, or after a short rainfall. Absolutely beautiful harsh screechings intertwining from every which angle. And LOUD. To this day the SMELL of burnt metal gives me a woodie.
What especially amplified the experience, to surreptitiously read the expressions on my fellow passengers, was the hum-drum banality of it all. Here we have this intense shrieking chafe that would put Incapacitants to shame and everyone looks bored as shit (though in my case it was a carefully studied pokerface with the occasional grinning lapse).
Later, I began to record these hum-drum escapades, standing in between cars. But without the half-zombied commuters to lend the experience that all important atmos, it just wasn't the same. Nor, given my then militant philosophical disposition re- pointlessly self-referential concepts like "artistic process", would I dare incorporate this into the formal recorded work... if a self had to be referenced, it wouldn't be the clown I had to face every day. (Bits did find their way onto tracks submitted for collab projects, but that felt justifiable since a significant degree of control was abdicated.) Assorted fragments from these and similar hunter-gatherer expedition have slowly trickled into the released work, but - tipping the jimmy hat to that teenage militancy - buried so far down that functionally it doesn't much matter.
I do like these stories and find them most inspiring; something I can really relate to - like Thomas Koner's declaration that "it's sometimes nice to visit (the country); but after three weeks I have to go to the nearest town, sit down and get some good diesel engines and scraping metal sounds."
But nothing - certainly not a bunch of lifeless text - can match the physical experience of that screeching beast, nor the amplified "ferocity" (to paraphrase Hijokaidan) of the intensely banal.
Quote from: alpharmania on January 03, 2010, 04:24:08 PM
a bit off topic, but before the finance crisis I was metal worker constructing waste mills for recycling industry. I always had tape recorder at hand and collected hours of raw sound that I still have use for when doing cutups...
my co-workers thought it was a bit strange that I found such pleasure in what they just considered disturbing part of their work environment... highlight was when we tested the machines and they shredded everything that fell into them. there has been two accidents where sloppy personell has fallen into the mills and come out as swedish meatballs....
Yesterday my role was playing the casualty during extrication (RTC) training. As the hydraulic tools were cutting up the car I was inside I cursed myself for not having brought the H4 to work.
(http://www.cfprod.com/keikka/outdoor-conditions.jpg)
(http://www.cfprod.com/keikka/outdoor-conditions2.jpg)
mask wasn't (all) about posing. It was cold out there. See the snowy frozen area in mask when all moisture of breathing just froze on your face.
This was recording / photo trip, so cameras happened to be around. It is possible there will be series of photo/recording industrial sound documentation tapes coming at some point.
it looks fucking cold, mikko! what kind of place is it?
here are a few photos from one of our recent recording sites:
(http://img11.imageshack.us/img11/5267/pa101521k.jpg)
(http://img189.imageshack.us/img189/2120/pa101538.jpg)
(http://img189.imageshack.us/img189/4886/pa101541.jpg)
(http://img189.imageshack.us/img189/8941/pa101536.jpg)
(http://img3.imageshack.us/img3/5161/pa101542.jpg)
(http://img3.imageshack.us/img3/7109/pa101525.jpg)
(http://img3.imageshack.us/img3/7113/pa101529.jpg)
(http://img3.imageshack.us/img3/7862/pa101534.jpg)
(http://img3.imageshack.us/img3/9533/pa101522.jpg)
(http://img6.imageshack.us/img6/7159/pa101518.jpg)
(http://img706.imageshack.us/img706/1559/pa101533.jpg)
no pictures from actual session but pretty inspiring place... located 20 minutes outside sundsvall. some video footage can be seen in this clip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7aqrRSnB49o&feature=player_embedded
See opening message for story of the actual session.
This is ruins of 3 floors high brick factory. Even if it's located pretty much in middle of nowhere, in middle of woods, about 20km from Lahti, it's totally spray painted, some guys play paint-ball gun matches there most likely. Althrough it is hazardous area, since there are huge holes in floors where man of any size can fall from top floor down to basement.
All windows have been smashed and anything that burns, has been burned. When I first visited the place, there was still things like bathrooms. But later it was burned, and all the toilet seats and stuff like that is totally smashed to pieces, so floors are just covered with tiny rubble of glass and "clay". There are things like oil barrels and such around the place, good instruments of course.
sounds almost identical to this place. in northern sweden (and finland too obviously) there are many places like this that just stand as empty monuments of once active industrial life. reason why these buildings are still around is because of the high costs for doing sanitary work. no one is willing to take responsibility for all the poison and contaminated soil. always nice with new locations...
for "kodon" tape me and a friend broke into a just abandoned mental hospital called sidsjön. some work with crowbar and then it was all our for some hours of recordings. second time I went there they had installed alarm. in mid/late 90s there was also abandoned sanatorium (later mental asylum) that we spent lots of time in for the sick atmosphere. some rooms had piles of used clothes, personal letters, pornomags etc everywhere... some bathtubs with restraining devices... likbod (where corpses where kept for hygiene reasons). inside the childrens part of the hospital we found huge stash of 8mm porno films (no idea where they are today)...
some years ago they tore down the whole complex and built very fancy apartments for the filthy rich. before they started tearing the place down to give room for the new houses it was one of the most morbid places I visited. decades of anguish and despair captured inside these walls...
In very central of Lahti, when I moved here c. 10 years ago, was huge factory. I don't know exactly what they made, but it was gigantic in size (compared to how close it is to living areas), and very close to central. They tore it down and build new music house instead.
But I did some recordings there. Alchemy of the 20th Century has track called "Raumis" which many locals referred the place. Just echoing metal junk recordings. This place, with couple different buildings, one was 5 floors high normal blockhouse type place. I did some of my first industrial aesthetic + fetish photos there. Also remember once was fucking there in top floor, and group of teenage girls had been listening. When we stopped, they peaked into hall, laughed and run away. We watched from window of girls walking away and security cars driving circles. One of the walls was missing, so every floor had one wall you could simply jump out. Therefore hazardous area, but they had no luck keeping people out of there. Some drinking sessions in the roofs... It's unfortunate that in urban landscape, all that is old, is being torn down. If not, then spraypainted to total shit. If there is something I really really despise, is the bullshit tagging of anything that's been abandoned. And not only that, but basically everything. I want grey concete monuments decaying, with only color being the rust. Any spray can guy I could find, I'd hope to invite to heavy duty anal insertion ritual. I don't mind in places like NYC where it seems natural, but for fucks sake, baggy pants running loose in abandoned factories of Finland. No thanks. This makes many of the places pretty much ruined what comes to photographing the monuments & colossal architechture.
We once shoot some scenes for a film in an abandon mental hospital in nothern Italy. Great big place but what was the place in the whole complex was the old cinema. The place just screamed for a film festival concentrating on mental hygiene films...
Interesting. I used to do some interesting "urban exploration" in past but nowadays I rarely have the time and energy... like Mikko said, graffiti really ruins the atmosphere of abandoned places... extremely disturbing. It doesn't belong here up north...
once me and my neighbour caught some white trash youth tagging down the walls of our house. we gave them a disciplinary lesson and they never came back.... ha
Strömkarlen = JK?
Utilizing surrounding environment sound as source material I consider being valuable beyond measure. It adds a true element into compositions that cannot be replicated by artificial means. I am constantly noting mentally when a new sound presents itself identifying the source and charting how to capture and utilize the source material for later mixes. There was an abandoned dairy factory many years ago that yielded a treasure trove of material and exploration. Leaving the party goers to swill on the rooftop, I found huge cavernous rooms with glass littering the floor providing immense reverberations to be truly inspirational. I consider findings like this to be a fundamental of industrial, employing the wreckage around to create beautiful violent dissonance. The pictures Mikko posted are most inspiring to get out and do some new exploring!
Tonight me and my colleagues dropped a TV, a tyre/wheel and a 30 litre barrel full of water on top of a car with a sunroof from the drill tower which is approximately 15 metres high. The roof of the car is well caved in. Strapped inside the vehicle was an H4 which recorded the lot. Needless to say it sounds ace.
I worked in the same machine shop for 19 years, and over this time (at least since purchase of mini-disc recorder) logged at least 10 full mini-discs of machine samples. Most memorable story is being caught by my boss stuffing carbide bars into the headstock of a blanchard grinder spinning at 2000 rpm. Very dangerous to both machine and humans. No use to explain to the completely clueless dick what my agenda was in doing so. The result however, was a great percussive chugging rhythm. Perfect when looped. It is the main source material for the first track on my upcoming release on Danvers State. Field recording is what makes my music most personal, therefor i feel the purchase of the minidisc is the best money i ever spent!
Pulling this one up from the depths, but I stumbled across this site today and thought it was really interesting.
http://www.gruenrekorder.de/fieldnotes/
Interesting topic and many nice stories !
I try to carry around an old tape recorder almost wherever i go , so i can catch interesting sounds ..be it loud voices at some party , big fire crackling , train brakes screeching , junkies and gypsies screaming loud , sea waves , boats or whatever else..
In my hometown you can easily get great sounds because of the marble quarries : mine explosions , tons of scrap rocks being thrown down mountains all around you , big trucks carrying huge pieces of marble , people cutting and sculpting marble , etc.
Went reverb hunting today and decided to take a couple of pics as well. Really nice echoes with many possibilities from smaller room reflections to huge hall reverberations, and a great atmosphere in general.
(http://s14.postimage.org/4ceneq6ql/P1012691.jpg) (http://postimage.org/image/4ceneq6ql/) (http://s14.postimage.org/szaicagm5/P1012695.jpg) (http://postimage.org/image/szaicagm5/) (http://s14.postimage.org/71e1ii1lp/P1012698.jpg) (http://postimage.org/image/71e1ii1lp/)
(http://s14.postimage.org/jy0kcf82l/P1012702.jpg) (http://postimage.org/image/jy0kcf82l/) (http://s14.postimage.org/qe9j2igm5/P1012709.jpg) (http://postimage.org/image/qe9j2igm5/) (http://s14.postimage.org/oc91o9in1/P1012713.jpg) (http://postimage.org/image/oc91o9in1/)
(http://s14.postimage.org/8j8oljl3x/P1012738.jpg) (http://postimage.org/image/8j8oljl3x/) (http://s14.postimage.org/yl647tw2l/P1012741.jpg) (http://postimage.org/image/yl647tw2l/) (http://s14.postimage.org/xmpr5jiql/P1012759.jpg) (http://postimage.org/image/xmpr5jiql/)
(http://s14.postimage.org/7om4zid99/P1012749.jpg) (http://postimage.org/image/7om4zid99/)
Ugh, no abandoned factories around here. Wish there were. "Eros + Massacre" has field rec'ings at a site with old construction equipment that was down the road from where I use to target shoot. It's all locked up now. Upcoming recording on split with Coma Detox has some rec'ings near a small town. I played on a busted up piano in a ruined church & threw bricks down a well that had deadbirds at the bottom. The heavy banging sounds on "Ultra-Negative" were recorded in my local park on the legs of the electrical towers. One guy told me you could hear them all over the park.
When my buddy and I started recording Deeper Wells material, we were at school in central Illinois. We were pretty much on the same page as to how we felt geographically- in the middle of corn fields, yet still feeling claustrophobic. I can't speak entirely for him, but I know I was in a moment of "settling," leaning discontent with where I was/what I was doing there. These thoughts and feelings, while not exactly put forth sonically, definitely drove us to record. Now we're both in the Chicagoland area, and while we sound the same (same instrumentation, gear, etc.), I hate to think the feelings are somewhat dissipated from what they were at that previous time.
Stumbled on this field recordings blog. Lots of sound examples & text, with technical explanations etc. Not all of the sounds are necessarily that 'special' but interesting nevertheless for FR enthusiasts. Might give some practical ideas/inspiration etc.
HLJÓÐMYND – SOUNDIMAGE (http://fieldrecording.net/english/)
Quote from: alpharmania on January 05, 2010, 06:24:30 PMInteresting. I used to do some interesting "urban exploration" in past but nowadays I rarely have the time and energy... like Mikko said, graffiti really ruins the atmosphere of abandoned places... extremely disturbing. It doesn't belong here up north...
once me and my neighbour caught some white trash youth tagging down the walls of our house. we gave them a disciplinary lesson and they never came back.... ha
Strömkarlen = JK?
I also agree with that sentiment too. The colorful tagging or graffiti definitely takes away from the corroded monochromatic atmosphere. The sense of old, rusted and obsolete structures can really serve for great atmosphere and aesthetically pleasing to when it comes to imagining some sort of dystopian type of industrial vibe, like it was lost in time and looks like the future in some weird sense. I like anything that looks like the set from Alien 3, often I feel like when you got old decayed and worn down structures from the past, that it almost resembles some weird place from a future time that ran out time. Shopping malls across the United States are starting to look like this today. The gigantic retail relics which are in total decay today and might look more aesthetically sophisticated to the youth of today. When they were first designed it was at a more financially stable time for America and it might appear to youth of today a more sound and structurally innovative time, compared to the cheap shit structures made today that look like ruins in few years time. Graffiti definitely gives a colorful vibe to abandoned structures though and that I loathe. it's often rooted in early 90's hip hop culture with some modern flares and drives too much color into the industrial monochromatic landscapes that I'd like to see. It's best left alone and for time to descend upon.
Influences vary from human garbage I'm surrounded when I commute, nightlife animals and everything i read where regarding bodies revolting against other bodies or against themselves.
Been very inspired also by woke/incel dicotomy.