41°22'44.7"N 2°10'45.5"E 9.01pm

As an experiment I recorded the space and then listened to the recording after noting my initial impressions. What it is most obvious is the lack of selective focus that our ears and brains have naturally (it is surmised that losing this ability is a primary reason for being 'hard of hearing' in older people, rather than an actual loss in the ability to hear sound in general). Without the recording I would have described the space as being relatively quiet, however as you can hear there is pretty much constant 'noise'. What is also noticeable in the recording is the way all these sounds are effective in describing the space - the impulses arriving at the microphones are noticeably altered by the surfaces and geometry of and in the square

41°22'44.7"N 2°10'45.5"E 11.03pm

Warm tones. A fairly still night, it is the holiday of the Immaculate Conception so a hubbub of voices from a crowd gathered outside the Basilica de la Mercè. There a a few people near me where the fountain is at the south-west end of the square, their speech is more distinct and loud - individual voices can be made out. It is an interesting counterpoint to the muted roar of indistinguishable chatter of which no cadence of timbre can be made out, only that of its entirety - a real 'rhubarb rhubarb effect. The fountain is on, adding the characteristic tinkle and splash to the predominantly human ambiance present in the square.

41°22'44.7"N 2°10'45.5"E 6.48pm

The soft warm sound of flowing, bubbling water from the fountain pervades the mid-range frequencies. Underneath is the ever-present yet always changing low road of traffic bleeding in from the Passage de Colon. A taxi driving up the one-lane road down the north-west side of the square dominates the spectrum, surprisingly loud against the background. Its doors slam as people disembark to my left, punctuating the ambiance even more than its progress did.
Even just a few steps away from the fountain towards the Basilica the tonal qualities of the fountain change. A previously masked droning sound comes to the fore - it too - like the traffic and the fountain is constantly in flux, always changing, always the same. Not a particularly large amount of variation, but present nonetheless. I decide it is a vacuum cleaner, though due to the constant nature of the sound and the qualities of the space working out exactly where it is coming from is almost impossible.

41°22'44.7"N 2°10'45.5"E 11.08pm

Rain! Often I get asked what I'm studying/doing, and 'sound artist' is really hard to explain. Sometimes a follow-up question will be about what my favoured sound is. I don't have a specialty, but I think I could say with some degree of certainty that I find recording water to be quite rewarding. Tonight the rain completely covers all the usual ambient sounds of the square, and in it's place is a multitude of new constant textures. Under my umbrella the fabric gives the droplets a bassy quality, whereas the surrounding stone ground is more of a sizzle. The defining features of the space cease to exist apart from the immediate building materials interacting with the downpour.

41°22'44.7"N 2°10'45.5"E 3.20AM

The perfect weather for field recording tonight. The air is still and it is cold, sounds travel much further and echo more, the time means most of the traffic noise and human activity isn't present. Possibly the best time to gauge the qualities of a public space. It is possible to hear the hard surfaces all around - distant sounds from garbage removal trucks and the occaisional car from the Passage de Colon make their way into the square, echo off the building facades and dissipate into the night. I think about making an IR recording, in Barcelona if might be possible to get away with a loud twelve second swept sinewave at 3 in the morning? Could definitely get away with popping a balloon with a multichannel mic in the square...

Review of Repressured by Vital Weekly

well received...

AUTOMATING - REPRESSURED (cassette by Patient Sounds)
Work by Australia's Automating has been well received here (see Vital Weekly 930, 862, 843 and 841) and here Sasha Margolis offers a rather short tape of two new pieces of music. Loops seem to be the primary interesting here, still, which sound as rusty as they could be. Or should be rustic? While 'Cloud Burst' is more electronic, 'Third Eye' seems to have more recordings from the farmland, with the sound of water running down pipes and a shifting microphone. Mistakes are left in. Sometimes things swell up to with processed sounds, all dark, all ambient, and what I noted before seems still valid here: Automating owes to the music of The Hafler Trio, but surely has more to say. Again, on 'Third Eye', it slowly develops into a musical song of sorts, with a decaying rhythm and a surprisingly musical ending. 'Cloud Burst' starts out with shorter, Reichean looped sounds, which, as the piece evolves, slow down and space out, before entirely disappearing and just some sounds stick around, humming on end, making vague orchestral gestures. Twenty-some minutes of more great music! Another excellent Automating release. (FdW)

Get it here! (in the states) ... or HERE from Australia <-- There's also a free download on this one

New music, for FREE

First of all, the official THEME for this years World Cup:

Secondly, the wonder 'Vexed Axis' series of compilations has a new new one out, and both Constant Light and Automating are on it!

Lastly, the Electric Sounds remix of 'Third Eye' from the Repressured cassette is a free download also

Have at it!

Automating - Repressured

New cassette release out on Patient Sounds label from Fort Collins!

“PS057 - Automating - Repressured

Hailing from Australia, Sasha Margolis creates mixed media sound collage and ambient compositions as Automating. On “Repressured” we find Margolis entering a slow motion shambolic ambient haze. Clustered tones, textures and swells, rolling piano lines, ebbing across the brain frequency. These two pieces typify the kind of delicate gusto we find appealing in brain music.

edt 50 / black c22 / b&w jcard & labels”
— http://www.patient-sounds.com/#!ps057---automating---repressured/c1869

Review of Bereitschaftspotential by Vital Weekly

Some nice words here...

AUTOMATING - BEREITSCHAFTSPOTENTIAL (3"CDR by Ice Age Productions)
Sasha Margolis hails from Melbourne, Australia and offers here a highly limited 3"CDR (edition of 25 copies) of 'studio created binaural soundscapes and archaic tape based drones. Field recordings, found sound, tape manipulation, noise and effects units', which perhaps sums it all up, already. We reviewed some previous works (Vital Weekly 841, 843 and 862) and I still have not much more information than just this, so let's go straight the music, which lasts exactly twenty-one minutes, and goes from noise 'n rhythm to drone to medium sized noise walls. And one point the sound goes down a bit, and overall this quite a diverse piece of music, moving in a dynamic way from medium low to a harsh ending. It has perhaps something that one could identify as 'retro sounding': the (perhaps) low resolution samples of the casio SK-5 maybe, topped with some fine sound effects and somewhere in the end stages of the piece a meandering desolated melody. This piece is made with some great care and consideration. Someone who knows what works and what not. I wouldn't have minded some more music by Automating, whose previous releases already gave me much pleasure. (FdW)

Listen to an excerpt in the podcast below before it disappears, or click on this to stream/download/buy the whole thing from Iceage Productions

Source: http://www.vitalweekly.net/930.html

Walk That Sound von Lukatoyboy (Ursendung) - Radio Broadcast

A rather excellent part of the recent CTM Festival in Berlin was the Walk That Sound installation by Lukatoyboy which I was fortunate enough to be a part of. You can hear a special radio edit at 23.05 GMT 13/02/2014 (00.05 CET 14/02/2014) here on Deutschlandradiokultur.

More information: http://www.deutschlandradiokultur.de/walk-that-sound.1022.de.html?dram:article_id=267004

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Source: https://www.facebook.com/events/1421411948...

OB-A 21 Neuro Modulator

I have an audio/visual work as part of this piece, it's at the Pori Art Museum until the 25th of May. A youtube formatted version is below.

Artist Teemu Räsänen brings to the exhibition OB-A 21 Neuro Modulator -brain modulator machine,  which has been planned for psychological manipulation of the user’s mind and cognition. The device has been modified for the museal environment and carries a programme for customised affective art modulation. The device and its programming are based on the methods of cognitive psychology, NLP and suggestion. The device may only be used in the presence of museum staff. A modulation cost 5 euro / person, and there is age recommendation. 

Video for an installation by Teemu Räsänen

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Source: https://www.facebook.com/events/2516218816...