SOUND ON
Welcome to the Bridge Listening Room. The Listening Room is a discovery space programmed by the editors of the Bridge Journal featuring curated dance and music videos from our Bridge Film and Video collection, Soundcloud playlists, Bridge Audio and Readings archive recordings, and other featured recordings; sound art (such as guided sound walks, audio sculptures and installations, place sounds, etc.), live performance recordings, and other audio. Updated periodically.
REVIEW: Relative Intensity Noise at Elastic Arts Brings Actionism into a New Age of Clutter
About a year ago, Chicago performance artist Rin Peisert was granted a curatorial residency at Elastic Arts, the end result of which became the quarterly performance series Relative Intensity Noise. The central aim of the series was to bring together performers from the performance and sound art fields and have them perform their individual work simultaneously as part of a continuous, longform collective performance. The performers are granted freedom to use the space in any way they choose, and the barrier between the artists and the audience is effectively reduced to nil. Each of these performances have taken place with minimal lighting and fog machines blasting in every corner, adding to the disorientation. One year later, it’s safe to say that every performance in the series has delivered an immersive, delirious mindfuck of an experience, one that is both challenging and engaging in equal order.
TALKING WITH ARTISTS BRIDGE TV INTERVIEW: Allen Moore
Talking With Artists is a new original series produced for Bridge TV, hosting discussions with artists in all disciplines. Most episodes of the current season of the series are currently available for viewing now in the Bridge Video collection (subscription required). New episodes are added throughout each season.
It’s a fitting that this interview appears as the second to last magazine article this year, as it continues a discussion began in V23N1 of the Bridge Journal published at the start of 2023. We hope you’ll enjoy this studio visit and conversation with artist, DJ, and Bridge board member Allen Moore.
IMAGE UNION: “Cool Out” by Magnum Force
This week at Bridge Audio we present a special Image Union Featured Film: “Cool Out” by Magnum Foce. Directed by Dan Dinello.
MOVEMENT MATTERS DANCE FILM SERIES: Secrets In Strawberry Frosting by Natalia de Miguel Annoni
This week we continue the Movement Matters Bridge Dance Film & Video Series, a new occasional feature at Bridge Audio. As an art form with unique capacities to respond to music, sound and other types of audio art, the dance film series will showcase works that respond to, emerge from and at times expand definitions of sound as a medium for art-making. New featured dance films presented here will showcase the work of dance, performance and movement artists selected as a category of the Bridge Video micro-streaming service, and as specially-curated works presented by the Bridge artistic collective from an international roster of artists. New occasional dance film, video and dance for camera works will be showcased throughout the season.
DANCE FILM:
Secrets In Strawberry Frosting by Natalia de Miguel Annoni
Description
For this work, I wanted to play with surrealism and planimetric composition. The piece is inspired by the dynamics of friendships between women and Queer people. Unlike the relationships between men that tend to revolve around an activity, the relationships between women and Queer folk tend to encompass more feelings. The sharing of secrets and moments in our lives, good or bad. These relationships lend themselves to be more intense, special, and beautiful.
Runtime: 3 minutes, 51 seconds
MUSIC VIDEO: “Dark Horse Matter” by Man’s Body
A Music Video World premiere for “Dark Horse Matter,” a track of Chicago / L.A. “soft punk” band Man’s Body. Directed by Wes Tabayoyong.
From the Liner Notes: “A few years ago I watched a documentary on Lorena and John Wayne Bobbitt, and wrote the lyric for Dark Horse Matter right afterward. The song is basically about how some things are so badly planned that they are over before they start. I use a lot of different images to communicate this: “bodies shaking,” “all codes broken,” “pissing up a rope in the rain,” “dying on an unknown road.” There have been such amazingly star-crossed lovers, Shakespearean and biblical, bad affairs to say the least, but in modern times when they make the tabloids and they aren’t even celebrities, it becomes the most epic fail ever. Usually people will pick sides – they will say “he” acted selfishly, he was abusive, and no doubt that is most likely the case – his wife is certainly a victim. But what I’m suggesting is different.“
REVIEW: Norman W. Long, “Calumet in Dub”
Norman W. Long is a Chicago-based sound artist whose music has been released on labels such as Reserve Matinee and Hausu Mountain. His latest release, Calumet in Dub, was released last month on Blorpus Editions, a sub-label of Hausu Mountain. The project was initially an eight channel sound installation at the Glass Curtain Gallery last year, which I had the privilege of experiencing in person. Long works primarily with field recordings, and his work is influenced by Annea Lockwood’s sound maps and the deep listening practices pioneered by Pauline Oliveros. The nature recordings Long utilizes are not the loud, vast natural soundscapes one would associate with artists such as Francisco Lopez. Rather, Long focuses on the intricacies of natural sonic phenomena, with examples including the percussive textures on “Indian Marsh Ridge” and the rippling aquatic sounds on “Little Calumet.” These are sounds that are always peeking out of the fray, never bursting out like a waterfall.
REVIEW: “Water Made Us” by Jamila Woods
“All water has a perfect memory and is forever trying to get back to where it was”
Jamila Woods shared with NPR this Toni Morrison quote that inspired the title of her third album Water Made Us. One thing Jamila Woods and I share is an intense love, and the highest regard, for writers like Toni Morrison. The full quote reads,
“You know, they straightened out the Mississippi River in places, to make room for houses and livable acreage. Occasionally, the river floods these places. 'Floods' is the word they use, but in fact it is not flooding: it is remembering. Remembering where it used to be. All water has a perfect memory and is forever trying to get back to where it was. All water has a perfect memory and is forever trying to get back to where it was.”
TALKING WITH ARTISTS BRIDGE TV INTERVIEW: Contour at Pitchfork 2023
Talking With Artists is a new original series produced for Bridge TV, hosting discussions with artists in all disciplines. Most episodes of the current season of the series are currently available for viewing now in the Bridge Video collection (subscription required). New episodes are added throughout each season.
For this week’s episode, Bridge Music Editor Efua Osei interviews Contour following his live stage performance at Pitchfork 2023.
Photo by Matt Lief Anderson
REVIEW: Noname, “Sundial”
As the world spins into oblivion, Noname’s Sundial cuts through the noise. Her rhymes narrate the conflicting experience of celebrating small pockets of joy and community amidst the dystopian realities of our world as Noname sees it. Noname’s music has always spoken to Black pride, the struggle for liberation, and a nostalgic love letter to her Chicago roots. Her tongue and wit has only gotten sharper. In the five years post Room 25, Noname as an artist, an educator, and a writer has evolved tenfold. As she’s moved away from the musical spotlight and pursued Noname Book Club and community organizing, her art has only gotten more informed and thus more critical.
INTERVIEW: Carl Stone
Carl Stone is an acclaimed computer music composer known for pioneering the usage of sampling in an experimental music context. He recently released a new compilation of archival material titled Electronic Music from 1972-2022 on the Unseen Worlds label. Stone is currently on a tour of the US and will be performing at the Empty Bottle on Oct. 17th, and will be giving a talk at SAIC on Oct. 18th.
REVIEW: Enginn Gleypir Sólina, Two Sound Installations by Magnús Pálsson
Earlier this summer, I received a small book in the mail. A pinkish purple CD-booklet containing the recordings of two sound installations by Icelandic artist Magnús Pálsson, re-released by the archival label Mumbling Eye. Adam Buffington, who runs the label along with Magnús’ son Tumi, wrote that these are recordings of sound installations from an installation at Gallerí 11 in Reykjavik, which were exhibited in 1993. The piece begins with grunts, moans, sighs. Through the curtain of voices that sound like mist, a woman’s voice then clearly states “enginn gleypir sólina,” the title of the piece. This translates to “no one swallows the sun.” Voices continue with rhymes, onomatopeias, and sometimes reciting tales normally told to children, such as one about a mouse going into its hole.
TALKING WITH ARTISTS BRIDGE TV INTERVIEW: KP of Black Belt Eagle Scout at Pitchfork 2023
Talking With Artists is a new original series produced for Bridge TV, hosting discussions with artists in all disciplines. Most episodes of the current season of the series are currently available for viewing now in the Bridge Video collection (subscription required). New episodes are added throughout each season.
For this week’s episode, Bridge Editor-In-Chief Michael Workman interviews KP of Black Belt Eagle Scout following her live stage performance at Pitchfork 2023.
MOVEMENT MATTERS DANCE FILM SERIES: ?!%$&*#@$^*()}!@#|%>? by Clare Chong & Sonia Kwek (Singapore)
This week we premier the Movement Matters Bridge Dance Film & Video Series, a new occasional feature at Bridge Audio. As an art form with unique capacities to respond to music, sound and other types of audio art, the dance film series will showcase works that respond to, emerge from and at times expand definitions of sound as a medium for art-making. New featured dance films presented here will showcase the work of dance, performance and movement artists selected as a category of the Bridge Video micro-streaming service, and as specially-curated works presented by the Bridge artistic collective from an international roster of artists. New occasional dance film, video and dance for camera works will be showcased occasionally throughout the season.
?!%$&*#@$^*()}!@#|%>? By Clare Chong
Two bodies emerge, one of flesh and one of metal. Both are cautious of, yet compelled towards each other. This evolves into a game of hide and seek.
“Can you see me now?”
“Can you see you now?”
Can friendship truly form, or will we always be stuck in a limbo of a human vs machine narrative? ?!%$&*#@$^*()}!@#|%>? is a cry to connect, to be seen by each other, to come together. Runtime: 7 minutes, 25 seconds
INTERVIEW: Getting to Know Rie Osei: the Sugar, the Spice, and Everything that Makes her Nice — at Ghanafest 2023
Rie Osei is a 24 year old Ghanaian - American artist and songwriter. Born in Chicago, but she hails from West Legon in Accra, Ghana. Inspired by the musical talents of her grandmother and father in particular, she started writing songs at 6 years old. Rie Osei was raised between Chicago and Accra. In her younger childhood, she spent more time in Ghana in Chicago. She spent her entire middle school experience in Ghana and was started as a sophomore when she came back to the US. She was also in the DMV for some time. Moved to Milford Mill, Baltimore County then to Capitol Heights, Southeast DC area. She recalls really loving her time in all the places she’s grown up, but is ready to go back to the DMV.
Rie Osei was one of the opening acts for the 2023 Annual GhanaFest, held in Washington Park. For 35 years, the Ghana National Council of Chicago has put on GhanaFest; a celebration of the history and culture of the West African nation.
TALKING WITH ARTISTS BRIDGE TV INTERVIEW: Yaya Bey at Pitchfork 2023
Talking With Artists is a new original series produced for Bridge TV, hosting discussions with artists in all disciplines. Most episodes of the current season of the series are currently available for viewing now in the Bridge Video collection (subscription required). New episodes are added throughout each season.
For this week’s episode, Bridge Music Editor Efua Osei interviews Brooklyn-based Rn’B artist Yaya Bey following her live stage performance at Pitchfork 2023.
INTERVIEW: Loss Works on Multiple Levels, A Conversation with Mark Solotroff
Mark Solotroff is a compelling person: both deeply sincere (or, at least, convincingly generous and self-effacing) and darkly enigmatic (as someone whose work explores the dark enigmas of violence, loss, and erasure). Solotroff’s art spans the course of three decades and several projects, including BLOODYMINDED and Anatomy of Habit. Anatomy of Habit recently released a phenomenal album, Black Openings, which is an uncanny potion of doom metal, post-punk, death-rock, and shoegaze that sounds like all and none of these individual ingredients. My own band, Kill Scenes, had the honor of opening for them at the Cobra Lounge alongside burndy (a gloriously brutal noise project featuring Solotroff’s BLOODYMINDED compatriot, Megan Emish).
Mark Solotroff met with me over Zoom on a mid-April evening two weeks after the Black Openings release show. On his side of the screen: an elegantly dressed man — all in black, of course — sipping a glass of red wine. On my side of the screen: a woman nervously fiddling, painfully aware that she’s speaking with a singular artist, a longstanding figure in the Chicago music landscape.
INTERVIEW: A Metamorphosis in RnB: How Kehlani & Lexii Alijai Inspired Poet22’s “Chrysalis”
TLC, Kehlani, and Lexii Alijai are just a few of the voices that have inspired Kala Lones, better known as the RnB artist, “poet 22”. While a lot of her family was raised in Chicago, she grew up in Appleton, Wisconsin. She explains how, in her household, her family sang about everything. It was just how they communicated. She distinctly remembers being introduced to poetry in fourth grade, learning what similes and metaphors were. She credits that early exposure as a “catalyst” to her songwriting. “Once I was able to understand there's a way to convey a message a certain type of way, it lets me know that my writing can be a little bit more creative. And I feel like poetry allowed me that freedom that standard type of writing didn't give me.”
REPORT: Back Alley Jazz 2022
It’s a sweltering day in Chicago’s South Shore neighborhood, the mercury topping 95 degrees, and I’m walking with my son Tristan along the sparsely tree-lined street of Paxton Avenue, where the event is situated on Paxton and Oglesby Avenues, centered at 73rd and Paxton with a mobile stage. We’ve arrived just in time for the procession which opens each edition of the annual event, sponsored by Hyde Park Jazz and co-produced by residents Gail Mangrum and Zenja Vaughn, Jeannine “Katie” Sharpe, her sister, Jonita.
REVIEW: Saba, Few Good Things
Following the critical acclaim for CARE FOR ME, Saba returns with his 3rd studio album, Few Good Things. Like much of his past work, this album speaks to his upbringing on the West Side of Chicago, but with special focus on fond memories of his “Granny’s house.”
