Brume by Ernesto Rodrigues, Nuno Torres, Eduardo Chagas, Abdul Moimême & Diatribes

Recorded on February 6th 2011, at Tcha Tcha Tcha Studio, Lisbon, Portugal.
Recorded by Joel Conde.
Mixed and mastered by d'incise.
Graphic design by d'incise.
Production by Ernesto Rodrigues.

REVIEWS

Autre disque de d'incise sous le nom de Diatribes cette fois, c'est-à-dire lui-même à l'ordinateur et aux objets avec son camarade Cyril Bondi, à la grosse caisse, aux objets et aux cymbales. Sur Brume, on trouve également en compagnie du duo quelques musiciens portugais habitués du label CS, Abdul Moimême à la guitare préparée, Eduardo Chagas au trombone, Ernesto Rodrigues au violon alto et Nuno Torres au saxophone alto. Cinq improvisations sans titres et sans surprises où les textures se multiplient et s'agencent avec calme et quiétude. Une grande sensibilité aux couleurs, à l'interaction et aux mélanges des sons, mélanges indistincts de techniques étendues variées et multiples. Sans surprises par rapport à l'ambiance assez commune aux productions portugaises, mais tout de même, Brume est composé d'agencements de couleurs toujours surprenantes et particulières. Un album qui porte bien son nom, tant l'univers est justement brumeux, avec cette multitude de bruits qui fusionnent en une masse informe de sons. Une architecture sonore un peu vaporeuse où la source importe peu par rapport au son collectif, une musique de groupe, collective avant tout, qui joue énormément sur l'interaction et l'étirement du temps, car on ne trouve évidemment aucune pulsation, aucun rythme, ni aucune mélodie ou note. Le son du groupe est assez prenant et nous emmène sur des territoires connus de ces musiciens, mais tout de même peu communs, entre les micropolyphonies de Ligeti et la scène réductionniste. Les fans seront ravis, les néophytes déroutés, et les amateurs pourront naviguer entre le scepticisme et l'admiration. Quant à moi, je ne sais pas où me placer, je me balance entre ces sentiments et ces pensées contradictoires... A vous de voir. hjulien (ImprovSphere)

I have been, for several months, and will continue to, for several months more, listen my way back through a large chunk of the somewhat overwhelming Creative Sources catalogue with the intention of writing something about the highlights of the label at some point. This exercise is of course not made any easier by the fact that new CDs just keep coming from Ernesto Rodrigues’ already two hundred disc strong imprint. Tonight’s CD then is the disc that marks the second century of releases, a sextet release namedBrume by Diatribes (the duo of D’Incise playing objects and laptop and Cyril Bondi, bass drum, objects and cymbal) alongside Abdul Moimeme, (prepared guitar) Eduardo Chagas, (trombone) Nuno Torres (alto sax) and Rodrigues himself playing viola. The disc contains five pieces of good, solid texturally focussed improvisation. I could leave it there to be honest, but I won’t.
Brume translates from the French as Fog, a choice of title that intrigues me quite a bit. When you get six musicians like this, often all contributing sounds at the same time as one another, particularly, as with this release focussing on texture over dynamic adrenalin, the sounds can all merge together into a thick haze of sounds. Given that I tend to naturally try and pick apart the different instrumentation involved in an improvisation as I listen to it, music of this kind, made by this number of musicians can often get foggy. So while we might not have a hope of separating each strand of fog hanging over the landscape we are trying to view, and we step back and just take in the whole, so we often must approach listening to a CD like this in a similar manner. In places the individual voices come through loud and clear, and if you go in search of any one of the sextet at any one time you can usually pick them out, but in doing so everything else blurs and dissipates in to the musical fog. In many ways this shows how the musicians gel together, how the individual voices combine into one communitarian whole. The danger is that the fog doesn’t become so thick that it becomes featureless and uninteresting.
For me, Brume doesn’t lose my interest. It is in many ways standard fare for this kind of music, perhaps somewhat unremarkably so at times, but then this is the area of music I like, the area that speaks to me. Perhaps not many boundaries are being pushed here, but perhaps they aren’t meant to be. The opening minutes of the first track here, a luscious forest of chiming metals, trickling field recordings, squiggly sax splutters, bowed sounds, dry strings and who knows what else is just fascinating and beautiful. It could only be formed in the moment, and could only be made by these six musicians, on the particular day it was recorded. These are the elements that bring me back to at least this area of improvised music time and time again. Listening to this album has been a real pleasure. It is entirely unoriginal from one perspective and like nothing else at all from another. If you don’t need another well made album of softly textural improvisation in your life then keep going. if like me this area of music continues to give great pleasure then seek this one out. Richard Pinnell (The Watchful Ear)

Diatribes, btw, are l'Incise (objects, laptop) and Cyril Bondi (bass drum, objects cymbal), here joined by Moimême (prepared guitar), Chagas (trombone), Rodrigues (viola) and Torres (alto saxophone). The sonic palette, as you might expect, is rich and attractive, though I found the improvisations more or less routine. Mostly dwelling in the quiet, rustling zone with the odd, moderate eruption, pleasant enough but not consistently gripping. The horns do an admirable job of seamless blending, the strings scrape and saw in solid fashion, the objects do their object-y thing and...well, it's fine, I don't mean to be that critical, it just doesn't stand out so much from many other recordings or concerts in the same vein. It's interesting that certain events here, for example Moimême's introduction of deeply plucked guitar notes in the fourth track, a more "traditional" sound, serve to greatly enliven things, the path having perhaps come around to a point of reappraisal of previously abandoned approaches. Brian Olewnick (Just Outside)

Véritable socle de leur travail en collectif, cette lenteur se fait évidemment méditative, mais aussi très dansante, ondulante. Quand elle n'est pas tension circulant à travers les souffles du trombone d'Edouardo CHAGAS et du du saxophone alto de Nuno TORRES, les cordes du violon d'Ernesto RODRIGUES (et fondateur du label portugais Creative Sources) et la guitare préparée d'Abdul MOIMÊME. Accompagnés vous l'aurez compris du duo DIATRIBES. Une réelle connexion s'installe parmi les artistes dès la magnifique deuxième pièce du disque (cinq au total). Improvisation parmi celles qui fonctionnent au premier instant et qui vous soulèvent, vous transportent. Qui dit lenteur ne dit pas économies de sonorités. Bien au contraire. Là où ils réussissent le mieux leur rencontre réside dans leur capacité d'écoute mutuelle, de circulations alternées de rythmiques et de notes parfois continues, variations appropriées de dynamiques et de sons minimaux où il se passe toujours quelque chose, et qui raviront entre autres les fans du catalogue Potlach. Une très belle rencontre. Cyrille Lanoë (Revue & Corrigée)

Two extended improvisations using a mix of acoustic and electric instruments from the sextet of Ernesto Rodrigues, d'incise, Cyril Bondi, Abdul Moiemem, Eduardo Chagas, and Nuno Torres. The sets build with a fascinating set of textures, the orchestration fascinatingly diverse with saxophone, viola, trombone, prepared guitar, laptop, cymbals, drums and objects. The group keeps the interplay in control, never falling prey to chaotic interchange, instead listening closely and moving as a group from one section to the next. The results remind of bands like Bruire, effectively mixing acoustic and electronics to create darkly complex sound worlds. It's a bit like passing through a forest at night, intently listening for danger, and marveling at the beautiful peril you find yourself in. Phil Zampino (Squidco)


On the occasion of the remarkable goal of the 200th release, Creative Sources label manager Ernesto Rodrigues propose the result of an artistic partnership, recorded in Lisbon on 6th February 2011, between some regular collaborators of the label - Nuno Torres (alto saxophone), Eduardo Chagas (trombone), Abdul Moimeme (prepared guitars) and himself on viola - and the synaesthetic electroacoustic Swiss project Diatribes, whose aim according to the intent of their heads, talented drummer Cyril Bondi and experimental noise artist Laurent Peter aka D'incise materializes in a sound where construction and deconstruction run side by side. During its five long-lasting tracks, Brume (French word for "fog") unravels intriguing sonic skeims, where different instrumental voices come before a sonic space which looks like wooly, mysterious, somewhat sinister and saturated by an electronic undercurrent, an authentic sonic thich fog where different elements seem to play hide-and-seek, so that they're not easy to be recognized due to extended techniques applied on them, whereas recording of objects by D'incise sounds particularly enthralling and plays a central role in the recording - not only because he finally gave a certain musical worthiness to plastic bubble wrap, whose typical popping sound after compression and rupture appears in the middle of the second track! - as it's likewise enthralling the way different voices become gradually amalgamated by a sort of ever-growing gelatin like they explicate a kind of acoustic polysyndeton. Vito Camarretta (Chain DLK)


A sextet, though five names are on the marquee (Diatribes is actually a percussion duo consisting of Cyril Bondi and D’Incise), playing free improvisations made of microscopic sounds and textures. Objects on a bass drum, laptop, prepared guitar, trumpet, viola, alto sax. I like this sound palette, and I like these musicians, but Brume offers too little diversity to maintain my interest beyond a listen or too. In the end, any track could be mistaken for any other on this album. François Couture (Monsieur Délire)


The duo Diatribes (Cyril Bondi-bass drum. objects, cymbals and D'incise-objects/laptop) joined by Nuno Torres on alto sax, Ernesto Rodrigues on viola, Eduardo Chagas on trombone and Abdul Moimeme on prepared guitar. A sextet of seasoned improvisers using electronic and acoustic instruments to create carefully rendered soundscapes. A floating cloud of largely unidentifiable sound, pierced by the occasional familiarity of a definite string or horn. Soft buzzes and deep thumps travel with crackly static and metallic, sharp-edged tumblings. Breaths and rubbings and feedback that are quickly reined in, with something bouncing on guitar strings. Careful, careful, like a many-handed lab tech working with volatile compounds, these guys never spill a drop, and the concoction never boils over to extinguish the flame. Occasional recurring motifs underscore a succession of quickly morphing interjections.
I am reminded a bit of the late British improv group Morphogenesis, but these gentlemen seem altogether more considered in their sound selection and placement. Things don't so much sit alongside each other here as meld together, a mixture as opposed to a lamination. And while it's often a simple task to define many of the sounds and what instrument is making which, it's more fun to just listen to the unfolding. There is the odd bit of humor on display, often in fleeting interchanges, especially during the first few minutes of the second track. The lack of evocative titles for these pieces serves to underscore the importance of listening; one is given nothing to hang their mental machinations on. Jeph Jerman (The Squid's Ear)

[...] Brume (still dated 2011), featuring a laptop-objects-drum duo called Diatribes. Although the tracks are not titled, this improvisatory sextet is said to evoke the mysterious sounds of a dark forest at night. While generally quiet and subtly mixed, it's a wide open canvas of pretty much any sound that can be made, including static and feedback. Todd McComb


The duo Diatribes (Cyril Bondi-bass drum. objects, cymbals and D'incise-objects/laptop) joined by Nuno Torres on alto sax, Ernesto Rodrigues on viola, Eduardo Chagas on trombone and Abdul Moimeme on prepared guitar. A sextet of seasoned improvisers using electronic and acoustic instruments to create carefully rendered soundscapes. A floating cloud of largely unidentifiable sound, pierced by the occasional familiarity of a definite string or horn. Soft buzzes and deep thumps travel with crackly static and metallic, sharp-edged tumblings. Breaths and rubbings and feedback that are quickly reined in, with something bouncing on guitar strings. Careful, careful, like a many-handed lab tech working with volatile compounds, these guys never spill a drop, and the concoction never boils over to extinguish the flame. Occasional recurring motifs underscore a succession of quickly morphing interjections.
I am reminded a bit of the late British improv group Morphogenesis, but these gentlemen seem altogether more considered in their sound selection and placement. Things don't so much sit alongside each other here as meld together, a mixture as opposed to a lamination. And while it's often a simple task to define many of the sounds and what instrument is making which, it's more fun to just listen to the unfolding. There is the odd bit of humor on display, often in fleeting interchanges, especially during the first few minutes of the second track. The lack of evocative titles for these pieces serves to underscore the importance of listening; one is given nothing to hang their mental machinations on. Jeph Jerman (The Squid's Ear)

Musician and sound artist. In the fields of improved and experimental music, I focus my research on the exploration of a wide scope of sound material, through the use of extended techniques over the alto saxophone. The radio has been a regular presence in my activity and I have been collaborating in different projects at the intersection of performative areas of visual arts and dance.

nunotorres.net