FLD RCDR by NYZ

Real and imaginary field recordings, compiled and synthesized in the 21st Century by David Burraston at Noyzelab. The pieces on this album have been formulated over a period of around five years. The main idea for this album was to make sound pieces that would appear to be a collection or mix of ‘live’ recordings.

FLD RCRDST::On Walden Snow and FLD RCRDST::FM80PcellorgNSW are both real field recordings which also mix studio recordings of Cellular Automata playing and sequencing synthesizers/effects units. CPM DRNL is a completely artificial simulation of an imaginary space, again with Cellular Automata taking on the duties of synth-playing and effects modification. Lindisfarne Refuge Hut is a complete, real field recording with nothing added, the only one on this album.

Mastered by Jacques Beloeil

Originally released as Entr'acte E219 on 19th August 2017
http://entracte.co.uk/projects/nyz-e219e220/
Limited edition of 200 copies each, including a special black embossed Boomkat Edition of 50 copies
Out of print

Special thanks:
Chris Watson for taking me to the Lindisfarne Refuge Hut.
John Brien at Important Records for excellent hospitality during my field trip to Walden Pond.
Sarah Last at The Wired Lab for everything!

Reviews
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Previous releases by the sound artist and scientist David Burraston have pendulum swung in one direction between cassettes of frenzied acid beats with gibbery 1950s dialogue (eg, last year’s excellent “Creativalizationistizm Unhinged” from his ALG 118B album) to gently burbling rivers, designed to be listened to mindfully (his field recordings of Australia’s Box Gum Grassy Woodlands on SoundCloud could soothe the most frayed of nerves). These two latest CDs, available through Antwerp label Entr’acte, cover both ends of the spectrum — with psyche-troubling digital compositions on MCRTNL and noises from nature on FLD RCDR.
FLD RCDR opens with the sound of boots crunching down on snow, and builds into an uneasy mix of twanging synthesizers, playing patterns created by cellular automata, which Burraston wrote a PhD thesis on in 2006. By contrast, “Lindisfarne Refuge Hut” is a straight recording with nothing added, so there’s little to distract from the sparse sounds of passing traffic and chirped bird song.
“FLD RCRDST::FM80PcellorgNSW” is the standout track, a faraway thunderstorm broken up by cyber bleeps and the noise of rain hitting a tin roof, where it becomes hard to tell which sounds are avian, mechanical or insect. NYZ’s composition and manipulation are even more audible on MCRTNL, where he plays around with demented piano ditties, warped and bendy melodies, and mathematical rhythms. Burraston (who also records as Dave Noyze, Noyzelab and Bryen Telko) combines the curious sonic patterning and tireless love of invention of Éliane Radigue with a sharp ear for odd sounds comparable to Chris Watson’s. Mesmerising, bizarre, soothing and sometimes troubling.

Claire Sawers in The Wire
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If you’ve ever wondered what Google streetcar’s dreams sound like, we implore you to check David Burraston’s beguiling FLD RCDR, the first of two remarkable new NYZ albums for Entr’acte.

As Dave Noyze, Noyzelab or just NYZ, the award-winning sound artist/scientist is regarded among the most inquisitive minds working with algorithmic music and electronics right now. He’s perhaps best known for the remarkably in-depth Syrobonkers! interview with Aphex Twin, whilst in recent years a brilliant glut of his material has turned up on tapes and download for Computer Club, Meds and Gamma Mine that rank among the strangest releases we’ve heard this decade. To put it plainly, if you’ve ever been wowed by music from Roland Kayn to Autechre, AFX or Lee Gamble, you really need to hear FLD RCDR!

Collated over five years, the research documented on FLD RCDR is typically varied, combining many strands of Burraston’s praxis - sound installations, self-built synthesisers, and interests in chaos/complexity theory - in four varying degrees of flux. Blending real location recordings with studio recordings of his Cellular Automata - an algorithmic system used to trigger and modulate FX - Burraston subconsciously breaks down distinctions between artificial and actual, hypothetical and hyperstitional with a genuine sort of electro-acoustic alchemy in three algorithmic parts, plus a fourth cut of hyperreal, yet untreated, field recordings making for comparably stark contrast.

On two parts, FLD RCRDST::On Walden Snow and the 20 minute FLD RCRDST::FM80PcellorgNSW he mixes location recordings with studio recordings of Cellular Automata playing and sequencing his synths and FX, whereas CPM DRNL is a completely artificial simulation of imaginary space brought to life by his Cellular Automata, and for a strong, if subtle contrast, Lindisfarne Refuge Hut presents real, untreated recordings containing no additives - just the uncannily hyperreal sound of birds, vehicles and the North Sea.

In concept, the recordings live somewhere between Burraston’s unprocessed telephone wire recordings, made with Alan Lamb in his native NSW region for Taiga Records, and the sort of playfully curdled algorithmic results found on his ALG 118B tape; effectively activating his panoramic screen grabs with a sort of rudimentary artificial intelligence so they end up crawling with strange, plasmic figures and fractals in a way that recalls a synaesthetic allegory to Google’s deep dream images. Especially when held up against the vividly textured audness of the untreated third track, it all makes for some of the most compelling, beguiling music we’ve heard this decade.

These are sounds much lesser heard or seen, vividly describing and bringing to life a series of spaces and places with the sense of wonder that we’d imagine was experienced by, and drove, important tonal explorers such as Stockhausen, Gottfried Michael Koenig or Roland Kayn in their respective days, right thru to their modern antecedents in Chris Watson, Autechre or Russell Haswell.

Highly recommended!

https://boomkat.com/products/fld-rcdr

Tracklist

1.	FLD RCRDST::On Walden Snow	4:38

2.	CPM DRNL	12:00

3.	Lindisfarne Refuge Hut	6:06

4.	FLD RCRDST::FM80PcellorgNSW	20:20

Credits

released September 8, 2017

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