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MCRTNL

by NYZ

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MCRTE0 05:14
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LM__8101MT 05:02
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GRAYMATTA 05:24

about

A series of micro- and macrotonal generative compositions: recorded, compiled and synthesized in the 21st Century by David Burraston at Noyzelab. This is a collection of pieces designed to take you away from the world of 12-tone equal without getting bogged down in any deep, confusing theories about anything whatsoever.

A pure and simple intuitive exploration of mini sound worlds using a variety of different hardware synthesizers, encompassing technologies such as modulation synthesis (FM etc.) and sample playback (ancient ROMplers). Everything on this album has been sequenced using my Cellular Automata hardware systems for generating note and control data, as well as altering the tuning of individual notes or generating complete tuning tables in some cases.

Mastered by Jacques Beloeil

Originally released as Entr'acte E220 on 19th August 2017
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:

Richard D James and Warren Burt for extensive synth and microtuning natterings.
Sarah Last at The Wired Lab for everything!

Reviews


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


One of our favourite artists in the world right now, David Burraston aka NYZ presents the second of two CDs for Entr’acte, each revealing particular aspects of a sprawling practice knitting algorithms, sound installation and self-built synthesisers in some of the strangest recordings imaginable.


As you might have guessed from the title, MCRNTL - a contraction of micro- and macrotonal - catches Burraston divining new ways between the waves, stepping away from systems of 12-tone equal temperament into curdled smears of harmonic mulch and convolution that hold genuinely new and compelling sensations for the listener. 


Without, as the promo says, “getting bogged down in any deep, confusing theories about anything whatsoever”, Burraston/NYZ presents nine pieces, some forty minutes of music, all selected for the pure and frankly fucking weird, pleasure of it. Of course, if you need to look at it that way, there is a wealth of complex chain reactions and semi-organic systems at play in MCRTNL, but the glacial pace and somnolent atmospheres serve to reveal those processes in a manageably intuitive, enjoyable manner with broad appeal to listeners who’ve grown bored of so much harmonic convention in electronic and avant-garde music.


Forming a spellbinding exploration of NYZ’s infamous banks of FM synthesisers, each controlled thru his patented Cellular Automata hardware system for generating note and control data, the results range from succinct, rhythmic arabesques to gaseous drones and chattering machine voices that feel at once familiar yet deeply unheimlich at the same time, mostly thanks to the level of detail with which Dave Noyze can control the tuning of individual notes or “generate complete tuning tables in some cases”. 


In the cases of MTNAM_2::FM60PP3 and MCRTEO, it sounds like he’s zoomed in and expanded on mercurial moments of AFX or Autechre tracks, focussing in on their nasal drip tang and melted string zing with a delightfully perverse quality, whilst LM_8101MT sounds like a band of brass-touting mice conducted by David Lynch, and MTNAM_7_SRi::station=>MONO feels as though it’s performing otoacoustic origami on yer inner ear, whereas MTNAM_3:: XNOTNL and GRAYMATTA feel as though he’s alternately emulating a lonely ship at sea in your ear canal, and then slowly sealing it in with concrete.


Ultimately, this process allows NYZ to explore a finer range of sounds, and with it a finer spectrum of emotional analogues and the less distinct, more ambiguous spaces between the notes. It can be taken like a kinda counterintuitive form of jazz played by machines, or oblique abstract sketches rendered in colours imperceptible to the eye, but either way they’re some of the oddest, unsettling works in circulation.


Highly recommended!

boomkat.com/products/mcrtnl

credits

released September 8, 2017

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about

noyzelab Australia

NYZ | NOYZELAB | DAVE NOYZE | BRYEN TELKO | DAVID BURRASTON

field recording, landscape-scale sound art, algorithmic & generative systems, chaos/complexity, practice-based research, sound synthesis & electronic music

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