HelgeA - None Of That

I first got into noise in the mid 90s, through the first Rachels' album and Gastr del Sol. Mixed with classical instruments, the noise on The Rachels' record is mostly atmospheric and analogue. I even sampled some of this noise for one of the songs on the first Fastened Bulbous album. Gastr del Sol's noise is also for most part analogue and mixed with instruments. Later, because of a mutual interest in all films weird, I struck a friendship with Lasse Marhaug, which expanded my noise-interest into the digital domain, and into music that consists entirely of noise. This interest can, for instance, be heard on the second and third Fastened Bulbous releases, and on this song, made in June 2000. I seldom make things without any instruments though, and the source of the processed noise is almost always the guitar or a drumloop.

Like the first solo-song posted, this song was born through sheer experimentation, in trying out my computer's capabilities for sampling, looping and general noise-making. Actually, the song started by watching Cedric Klapisch' film Chacun Cherche son Chat on VHS. In one scene, some distant drumming is heard. I liked the sound of those drums and decided to sample them. If I'm not mistaken, I stopped the movie right there and then, hooked the VCR to the computer, and captured the drums, before proceeding to watch the movie (this does not indicate that the movie is boring, in fact is is highly recommended, just that the drum sound was so captivating).

Because of the surrounding sounds belonging to the movie (street noise, dialogue etc) that I did not want to grab, the drum sample was fairly small. The rhythmic figure therefore turned out quite strange (5, or even 5 1/2, over 4, or something), but I liked that, and rather than cutting it down to 4/4, I kept it like it was, and built some guitar and bass around the loop. Both instruments are themselves looped (once I got them fairly right in terms of rhythm, not that easy!).

I have made other pieces with much more digital noise (and some of them might turn up here eventually), which in almost all cases is made from manipulating sounds stemming from the guitar. Apart from some synth-noise, all the processed noise in this song, however, is generated from the drum track. There's also some good old-fashioned non-manipulated guitar clinks and noise.