IBM 1401: A User's Manual
Nov. 10th, 2006 11:28 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
elfsWow.
I like avant-garde music, although I don't have a lot of respect for the people who can't play but just make up stuff and call it "art". I want to listen to people who I know can write music, who command the respect of other musicians for their proficiency, their investment in time, and their dedication to their craft. Johan Johannsson's five-part symphonic piece, IBM 1401: A User's Manual shows that he is definitely in the latter category.
The idea was simple: Johannson's father worked on one of these things in the 1960's when living in Iceland and recorded the AM sounds that would come off it as it worked, making "music." Johannson mixes those ancient tapes into a symphonic piece with five movements that is, without lyrics, utterly heartrending and otherworldly, a technological Four Seasons for the chronically melancholy. The last track is so moving that I found myself with tears in my eyes toward the end without being able to say why, since there were no lyrics. This music is not like anything you'll find in the U.S., and we are all the poorer for that fact.
If this album has a single weakness, it is the second track, "The Printer", which mixes in a recording of Johannson's father giving a lecture, in English, on how to maintain the printer. It's very technical and sounds like it comes from another time and place (and it did!), but the cold lecture voice is very jarring on top of Johannson's atmospheric, signatorial composition style. But that weakness can and should be overlooked, because overall the album delivers on style and affect, and even that track acheives what Johannson was trying to acheive.
I've only listened to the album once, but felt compelled to write about it. I don't know if I'll feel this way after a second or third listening, but I was just so stunned by that first listen I felt I had to post. Yes, I bought it because the title was so funky, and it was cheap, a used CD the store didn't know what to do with.
I like avant-garde music, although I don't have a lot of respect for the people who can't play but just make up stuff and call it "art". I want to listen to people who I know can write music, who command the respect of other musicians for their proficiency, their investment in time, and their dedication to their craft. Johan Johannsson's five-part symphonic piece, IBM 1401: A User's Manual shows that he is definitely in the latter category.
The idea was simple: Johannson's father worked on one of these things in the 1960's when living in Iceland and recorded the AM sounds that would come off it as it worked, making "music." Johannson mixes those ancient tapes into a symphonic piece with five movements that is, without lyrics, utterly heartrending and otherworldly, a technological Four Seasons for the chronically melancholy. The last track is so moving that I found myself with tears in my eyes toward the end without being able to say why, since there were no lyrics. This music is not like anything you'll find in the U.S., and we are all the poorer for that fact.
If this album has a single weakness, it is the second track, "The Printer", which mixes in a recording of Johannson's father giving a lecture, in English, on how to maintain the printer. It's very technical and sounds like it comes from another time and place (and it did!), but the cold lecture voice is very jarring on top of Johannson's atmospheric, signatorial composition style. But that weakness can and should be overlooked, because overall the album delivers on style and affect, and even that track acheives what Johannson was trying to acheive.
I've only listened to the album once, but felt compelled to write about it. I don't know if I'll feel this way after a second or third listening, but I was just so stunned by that first listen I felt I had to post. Yes, I bought it because the title was so funky, and it was cheap, a used CD the store didn't know what to do with.
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Video on YouTube, sample of same track, Amazon listing
Date: 2006-11-12 04:06 am (UTC)http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/boingboing/iBag/~5/31898132/jjohannsson_the_suns_gone(edit).mp3
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000I0SGSA
Yes, this is very good stuff. I already ordered the album from Amazon. Thanks, Elf. :-)
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