Politics Of Everyday Noise: Fresco Sommer

Audio Essay

At Klang Moor Schopfe 2021, Philipp Rhensius created 12 experimental audio essays. Listen to a podcast inspired by the sound installation of Fresco Sommer.

Recording, additional composition and script by Philipp Rhensius aka Alienationist.

These experimental audio essay podcasts were created by Norient curator and sound artist Philipp Rhensius aka Alienationist in autumn 2021 as part of a residency at Klang Moor Schopfe 2021. Each piece refers to one sound installation exhibited there while going beyond it, merging Rhensius’ own sound art, poetry, interviews, and musical compositions.

Biography

Philipp Rhensius is an editor for Norient, writer, musician, sound artist, sociologist & musicologist, and curator from Berlin. His work investigates the connections between the micro- and macro-political and is driven by the idea that «feeling the chains» is the moment when emancipation begins. His music and sound art projects (Kl.ne, aphtc, Alienationst) merge sonic fiction with sardonic poetry and visceral sound. His texts are published in i.e. Taz, Spex, FAZ, Neue Zürcher Zeitung, WOZ and several book volumes. He runs the music label Arcane Patterns and hosts a monthly podcast on Noods Radio. Follow him on Instagram, his Website, or LinkedIn.

Biography

Inspiriert von Geschichten oder Bildern erschaffen die beiden Zürcher Musiker Jordi Fresco und Roger Sommer, alias Fresco Sommer, improvisierte musikalische Fragmente, die sie zu Kompositionen arrangieren. Fresco/Sommer konzipieren ortsspezifische Klanginstallationen in Zusammenarbeit mit Künstler*innen und setzen sich anhand von Listening-Events für das vertiefte Zuhören von Musik ein (Deep Listening). Beide organisieren regelmässig Konzerte und hosten eine Radiosendung im Umfeld des Plattenladens OOR Records auf Radio LoRa.

Published on November 19, 2021

Last updated on March 26, 2024

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Sonic Natureculture

Filmstill: The African Cypher (Bryan Little, South Africa, 2018)

Dancing with Cars

Review

by Eric Mandel

Bryan Littles’ documentary The African Cypher portrays a huge variety of dance subcultures in South Africa. Mostly they perform on streets, though some dancers indulge in dangerous rituals: they dance with cars passing by. Here, Eric Mandel examines if this is a symbol of man and machine.

Glossy race cars are drawing rubber circles on an empty parking lot somewhere in Cape Town, South Africa. In between the smoke of the tires, B-Boys spin in a fluid countermovement to the cars. They seem unimpressed as the cars come dangerously close to their bodies. This powerful image of man and machine is the beginning of Bryan Littles’ documentary The African Cypher. It reoccurs every time the protagonists go eye to eye with a car. When the dance crews come out to rehearse in public and their gathering fan crowds form roadblocks, dancers engage with passing vehicles in comical moves of confrontation and empowerment. Their dances range from the US-imported Breakdance and Krumping to local dance creations such as Pantsula, Sbhujwa and the confusingly aggressive Kathan.

Man Versus Machine

The image of man and machine also symbolizes the struggle of the portrayed dancers. As the film shows, most of them are thrown into a merciless economy and dancing offers them a temporary relief. The cars are a metaphor of the urban reality in the post-Apartheid society: an industrially produced, potentially dangerous agent of capitalism, but also a sign of success and social mobility. In fact, the drivers in the race car sequence turn out to be B-Boy veterans themselves who talk in length about prejudice and injustice they suffered as people of colour, and as dancers.

In this movie, a car is depicted not as an obstacle or a trophy, but rather as a means to the dancers’ end; for example, Pantsula dancer Mada, partner of the movie’s tragic hero Prince, uses a battered vehicle to bring home some chickens in order to slaughter them and prepare them for consumption. The small time business enables him to stay true to his passion. In fact, he and Prince will make it to the film’s showdown, a dance battle hosted by a notoriously mighty drink company. But what could have been a grand finale for this beautifully filmed excursion into South African street culture is overshadowed by the tragic epilogue. The last car we see in the film serves as a hearse.

Trailer

Biography

Eric Mandel was born in Berlin and stuck there ever since. He is writing on music & film for magazines as Jazzthetik, kunstundfilm.de, Berlin Bazzar and norient.com while running the bi-weekly FreakOuternational Radio Show on multicult.fm. He is DJing, producing and playing music as Freak Ass E and Sun Ra Bullock in bands as X.A.Cute, Stumpf, and Atomvulkan Britz. In 2019, he has co-founded the weblabel edelfaul recordings (with Ilia Gorovitz).

Published on December 29, 2018

Last updated on April 10, 2024

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Counter-Culture

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Norient Musikfilm Festival NMFF 9 (2019)

Norient Festival