Skip to main content

Listening Report 9 John Oswald Plunderphonic Plexure

 

Maria Alighourchi

7489718

The Future of American Music

 

Listening Report 9

John Oswald

Plunderphonic Plexure

 

John Oswald’s Album “Plunderphonic Plexure” is a mixture, or even a sort of a mixtape of many different artists, mostly pop and hip/hop. To me, this sort of music composing is utterly new but in the same way fascinating. Oswald deliberately redefined the meaning of composing music. He took it literally and actually composed music that already existed in his own unique way.

First and foremost, the title should be taken into account. “Plunderphonic” already presents us a hint to what we are about to listen to – a composed pile of phonetic plunder. Even though, plunder is generally associated with something that is left over or useless parts, Oswald changes this definition too by exhibiting the usefulness of this sort of “musical plunder”. Astonishingly, the snippets of the several songs, composed and changed, clustered together, does sound like completely new music.

The album is, like most albums parted into several different songs. Surprisingly, every song on this album does sounds different, conveys different atmospheres and feelings. At first, I was unsure to clearly identify when a song ends and another begins but the cut is easily hearable since the next composition always fairly differs from the last.

The first song is quite chaotic, and creates an anxiety driven atmosphere since a lot of loud voices, more rap than flowing melody, are mixed. It starts with the sound of rewinding tape which is an antithesis in itself – as if starting the whole album anew, already listened to. In a sense, we already did listen to the album if one recognizes the pieces of the original artists. Very clever. Moreover, the different snippets of tape also differ in speed, some are played very quickly and some in almost slow motion, as well as normal speed. With the overlap of all these multiple spaces of sound, words, tunes I got the feeling of standing in a very crowded, claustrophobic room. It also reminded me of the scenario to turn and skip through radio channels, searching for your favorite one. However, I do recognize that the chosen tapes fit very well with each other, being from the rap gerne and containing almost only male voices. Thus, it clearly can be categorized into the rap gerne (not sure if it has to be put into the box of gerne, but still).

Contrastingly, the second song on the album is quite slow (at least in the beginning) and carries a more harmonic feeling with it. This lays in the usage of comforting instruments and melodies, as well as women’s ballade voices. The mixed tapes are longer snippets and do not interfere with each other as much as in the first song, but flow almost perfectly into each other like waves clashing on the beach. In the middle and end part of the second composition, the tapes do overlap, change in speed, and contain squeaking sounds. Nevertheless, it never loses the calming atmosphere until the end, keeping the feeling of one coherent song (which it is, literally taken). Concludingly, I find it fascinating, how Oswald manages to pick certain artists, who are completely different but the voice or melody have a connecting factor, and puzzle them together, like mosaic, never really melted but functioning and fitting, complementing each other.

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

William Basinski – The Disintegration Loops III

  The Disintegration Loops is a quartet of albums published in 2002 and 2003 by American avant-garde composer William Basinski. The pieces are made up of tape loop recordings that were played over time, with noise and crackles rising as the tape deteriorated. Basinski noticed this effect when attempting to convert his older recordings to digital format. The completion of the recordings coincided with the September 11, 2001 events, which Basinski witnessed and adds a deeper meaning to the composition. The composition is fascinating in many ways and makes the listener lose track of time. The tape loop recording had a very calming effect on me and put me in a trance-like state when I listened to it in its entirety. The tape loop is really soothing, so much so that I didn't even notice the loss of quality when I first listened to it. It makes you forget about time and allows you to really get into the piece capturing the calmness it exudes. You forget or don't really notice how i...
Post a Comment
Read more

Pauline Oliveros – The Goddard in the Dan Harpole Cistern

  After watching Dan Harpole's film of Goddard in the Cistern, one is struck by how creepy the location appears and feels. In the light, you can just make out a lengthy ladder leading down into a concrete-walled area. It's absolutely dark, with only the top hatch and a small lamp providing lighting. This sequence accounts for a significant portion of the plot. Three persons are seen climbing up and down the ladder, which might be regarded the music piece's official start. Additionally, while the name "Dan Harpole Cistern" suggests a vast space, it appears to be a homemade video. A hum and other vocal noises travel across the room, bouncing off the walls. The women's voices generate a hum that contributes to the room's unique feel. The beautiful singing is interrupted by metal fragments falling on the floor. One would ask how much thought went into the sounds, given that the majority of them appear to be chosen at random. The emphasis is not on making sound...
Post a Comment
Read more

John Oswald – Plexure (Full Album)

  Jon Oswald was known for his Plunderphonics music pieces, where he created new pieces from already existing music recordings of famous artists and reworked them. Artists like Michael Jackson, who was also part of the cover on Plunderphonic, The Beatles, James Brown, Bing Crosby but also classical musicians like Beethoven and Bach were part of his pieces.   The first minute and a half of his album consists of a wild mix of R&B and hip-hop songs. They are single, very short sequences, about 2-3 seconds long, which were cut together. The first song was introduced with a sound that reminded me of Michael Jackson's Thriller. From minute five to about minute seven, the use of rock & roll music was recognizable. At the end, I recognized Madonna, Nirvana and again Michael Jackson, among others. Personally, I can hardly identify with this kind of music, because listening to the album, I felt the compilation was relatively arbitrary and not balanced with each other. I recogniz...
Post a Comment
Read more