Noémi Büchi’s Transformation
Through-composed sound design
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Dense, thick, ever-shifting, “Liquefaction” is Noémi Büchi at work in a zone that is at once maximalist and minimalist: packed with ideas and source material, yet also singular and focused. If you listen to “In the Heat,” the first track off her Liquid Bones EP, you’ll hear the basis of this live version, which is twice the original’s length. This one takes longer to get to the pizzicato plucking — and sublimates it noticeably — and gets even more deeply orchestral as it proceeds. There is a growing terrain of music out there that I think of as through-composed sound design, and this majestic performance, recorded last October in Zürich, is a fine example.
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Fine Wave Form
Courtesy of Otsubo Kazuhisa
A sweet little drone performance using, in particular, a module I was previously unfamiliar with, the Grone Wave. It appears to include among its functions a variation on the now classic Clouds module (from Mutable Instruments), or more to the point a firmware offshoot, Parasites, of the original Clouds. All of which means, yes, the music has a light, miasma-like quality to it, amid which tones akin to soft mallets hitting metal intone. It’s a little ritual of mysterious but presumably constructive intent. The performance is by Otsubo Kazuhisa, who’s based in Japan.
When Is Techno Not Techno?
Straight outta Rennes, France
When is techno not techno — or barely techno, or so ambient as to maybe not quite be ambient techno? When with each hint of a beat it declines to push things particularly forward, when it maintains its pace like a heartbeat, which is to say: a steady double thump, so human that you think of it less as a beat and more as a necessary presence, natural despite, here, its machine origins. When additional lonesome sounds appear akin to cloud formations, and other instances of the weather, not tethered to any rhythm, low level as that rhythm may be. When you have difficulty tapping at a pace to gauge the BPM, and find yourself double- and quadruple-timing just to make sense of what is happening. This is “Ballade,” a wonderfully understated track by Nay Seven, who is based in Rennes, France. I’d file this under what I’ve been coming to think of as “sound design techno,” at its more atmospheric extreme. (Track found thanks to a repost by Petrus Major.)
Disquiet Junto Project 0713: Airwave Workout
The Assignment: Record exercise music for an imaginary broadcast.
Each Thursday in the Disquiet Junto music community, a new compositional challenge is set before the group’s members, who then have five days to record and upload a track in response to the project instructions.
Membership in the Junto is open: just join and participate. (A SoundCloud account is helpful but not required.) There’s no pressure to do every project. The Junto is weekly so that you know it’s there, every Thursday through Monday, when your time and interest align.
Tracks are added to the SoundCloud playlist for the duration of the project. Additional (non-SoundCloud) tracks also generally appear in the lllllll.co discussion thread.
Disquiet Junto Project 0713: Airwave Workout
The Assignment: Record exercise music for an imaginary broadcast.
Many thanks to Junto member Atom Raiff for having proposed this very fun project.
Step 1: Radio exercises are a century-old type of broadcast programming. The concept is self-explanatory, but do read up if it’s unfamiliar. In Japan, they’re known as Radio Taisō.
Step 2: Record a piece of music with the intent of other people performing radio calisthenics to it. While there are various potential paces to radio exercise programs, keep your recording to 70 bpm.
Tasks Upon Completion:
Label: Include “disquiet0713” (no spaces/quotes) in the name of your track.
Upload: Post your track to a public account (SoundCloud preferred but by no means required). It’s best to focus on one track, but if you post more than one, clarify which is the “main” rendition.
Share: Post your track and a description/explanation at https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0713-airwave-workout/
Discuss: Listen to and comment on the other tracks.
Additional Details:
Length: The length is up to you. How do you rate your stamina?
Deadline: Monday, September 1, 2025, 11:59pm (that is: just before midnight) wherever you are.
About: https://disquiet.com/junto/
Newsletter: https://juntoletter.disquiet.com/
License: It’s preferred (but not required) to set your track as downloadable and allowing for attributed remixing (i.e., an attribution Creative Commons license).
Please Include When Posting Your Track:
More on the 713th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Airwave Workout — The Assignment: Record exercise music for an imaginary broadcast — at https://disquiet.com/0713/.