Review

Audible 3 Baby Planet Nuclei AUD3 CD By Brian Marley/THE WIRE MAGAZINE Feb 2007 The latest offering from maverick Auckland based electro-improvisors Audible 3 contains a 48-minute, slightly edited version of their performance of “Baby Planet Nuclei” at Static Mansion, an audio event held in Christchurch, NZ, on 7 November 2004. Four lengthy studio fragments from the group’s rehearsal for the piece round out the CD. Although their material is largely improvised, each piece they work on contains a fixed element of some kind – a sound, an object or a game. In this case it’s a particular electronic audio filter, the first use of which was heard on “Baby Planet”, a track on the group’s first CD (The Wire 250). The reason I call them maverick is because, although they mainly use instrumentation and techniques that are commonplace in the worlds of EAI, soundscaping and electronica, they follow their own idiosyncratic star rather than fashion and sound like no-one but themselves. Since the group’s inception, Audible 3 has consisted of Marc Chesterman (sampler), Paul Winstanley (turntable, effects processor, electric bass) and John Kennedy (drum machine, percussion, CD players). On the fifth and final part of the performance version of “Baby Planet Nuclei” they’re joined by Kennedy’s old sparring partner Greg Malcolm (guitar), though prior to a few delicately picked notes during the lengthy fade-out the few recognisable elements of guitar that creep into the mix sound more like a kalimba or someone randomly playing the spokes of a bicycle wheel. The rehearsal extracts provide valuable insight into the sonics and processes that make up “Baby Planet Nuclei”, especially the rhythmic and percussive elements which constitute rather than merely underpin the sound events. In themselves, the rehearsal extracts are very good, but they hardly prepare the listener for the scale and scope of the performance version, which is a remarkable piece of work. Audible 3: Audible 3 By Ania Glowacz (NZ Musician Magazine) Audible 3 is a trio comprising Paul Winstanley, John Kennedy and Marc Chesterman (who composed the Woodenhead movie soundtrack). They have been playing together since 1999, but have only now put their open-ended musical explorations onto disc. It's an evocative affair in the ambient experimental vein - improvised electronic music built on the loose foundation of some organised sounds and musical processes - but only as starting points. The interaction and reaction to each other and the sounds really count - hence its slightly wandering nature. Rather than annoy with its esoteric aims, this independent album actually makes for an engaging exploration of soundscapes and spatial manipulations, with only minimal (and subtle) menace to interrupt the flow. It's the organic elements amongst the pulses, drones, clicks and throbs that give the character - in the absence of melody or set structure, and this intuitive method of working together has generated some interesting results. Blenheim-based musician Clinton Williams (otherwise known as Omit) provided many of the pre-recorded sounds and would have to be regarded as the fourth member. For all its randomness this is an earthy, well constructed affair that makes for a wakeful listen. Slow Time By Ben Murtagh (Version Magazine) Audible3 are Paul Winstanly, Marc Chesterman and John Kennedy, chaps who keep busy running music improv nights, designing film soundtracks and managing record labels respectively. When they get together to actually play music its something of a momentous ocasion and in fact most of their time together as a band is spent workshopping, mulling over their next jam, talking frameworks and processes. There’s definitely a conceptual and thought out basis that underpins the very live recordings, something apparent through listening. This, their self-titled debut Audible3 is a timepiece of an album - all the eight tracks being the best of their live and rehearsed experiments right from their first gig in 1999. The live element of this album makes it fascinating. Although performance, improv and deviations in prediscussed direction are par for course, in the final product there’s zero cut and paste and and an absence of computerisation.The multiple percussive layers are a feature within Audible3 most probably influenced by Marc and John’s past lives as drummers. The album opens with ‘Crater’ in which drones and rythmic bass patterns emerge, then to aquatic experiments, in ‘Transition Place’. Throughout the record, ghostly vocals and machine-like whirrs and distant thumps recur - building, then deconstructing beautiful ambient soundscapes. There’s an overall feeling of play and of darkness in an album that patiently progresses. You sense these guys aren’t in much of a hurry - which is the best way to approach this album. Its better dwelt upon, custom-made for quiet night owls. Ben Murtagh Audible3 is available via audible3.net. File under electro-acoustic. AUDIBLE 3 Aud3-001 By Dan Warburton Dec 04 www.paristransatlantic.com Quite why New Zealand has produced so much drone-based music - of such consistently high quality - is a mystery, but here's some more: Auckland-based Audible 3, aka Paul Winstanley, John Kennedy and Marc Chesterman (one should also mention Omit's Clinton Williams, who recorded sounds specially for the group to use) specialise in slow moving but rhythmically identifiable eai [electro acoustic improvisation], the kind of stuff that might be branded as "ambient" if the pulses were a little more regular and upfront and the melodic profile higher. "Transition Place" wouldn't be out of place on an em:t compilation, whereas the opening "Crater", with its integration of strange abstract samples into a predominantly stable harmonic context of has more in common with Michael Schumacher (see elsewhere this issue). Sometimes lugubrious ("Worm"), sometimes playful ("All Saints" - any Eno connection, I wonder? - seems to be trying to break out into a beat) but constantly atmospheric and accessible, it's is a well-crafted and enjoyable debut. audible 3: s/t CD By JR www.xs4all.nl/~phosphor Audible 3 consists of Paul Winstanley (bass, synth, turntable, effects, processing), John Kennedy (drum machine, effects processing) and Marc Chesterman (sampler, synth, turntable, effects processing). This album is the first release from Auckland, New Zealand-based Audible 3. All of the tracks are drawn from concert, studio and rehearsal recordings made from 2000 to 2002 and includes pre-recorded drones from musician Clinton Williams (Omit). A very rustic and organic sound encapsulates the general atmosphere created on the first track on this album. Small sounds and irregular beats penetrate the soundscape and are almost constantly shrouded in a deep and powerful drone sensation. Unexpectedly the next track offers a slow beat driven piece using more electronic based sounds. Throughout the course of the album the rustic feel from the first track is integrated in bits and pieces with the electronics to build a combined world of environmental and electronic sounds. The whole album sounds like a very interesting live gig full of unexpected turns and thrills. Track 05 entitled All saints, starts off sounding like a very far off propeller airplane which after a minute and a half is joined by more and more intricate electronic arpeggiated sounds which take on the attributes of the still constant airplane drone. Manipulated vocal samples sneak in and out of the soundscape building in energy and dynamic. There is an interesting mix of powerful sounds and beats providing quite a unique accumulation of soundworlds between the concrete and electronic and the production is excellent. Audible 3 By The Hog Rip It Up Magazine Dec 04 (3 STARS) Marc Chesterman, Paul Winstanley and John Kennedy are audible 3, a spontaneous ambient noise collaboration that traverses the fine line between music and art. A hard style to get right, it can quickly veer off into self indulgence. Here though, the audible trio manage to hold the reins just tight enough to stop it from tipping over the edge. Helped by Clinton Williams-more commonly known as Omit, audible 3 create a soundtrack to a late night come down. A mixture of clicks and blips hung on a background of creeks and moans makes up this musical accompaniment to drift time, the moment between wide awake and fully asleep. While this could easily disappear up its own pretentiousness through its desire to be original it is its honesty that prevents it doing so. A hard genre to master but these guys are right at the point of perfecting it. Audible 3 By Simon Sweetman Staple Magazine Dec 04 Auckland based Audible 3 consists of Marc Chesterman, John Kennedy and Paul Winstanley, all talented electro-acoustic composers and improvisors. The three have been performing as audible 3 since 1999 and, after a handful of CD-R releases [from home recordings and live performances], this self-titles release is-in effect- their debut album-length project. It reaches back to incorporate ideas and arrangements from the band's beginnings and you get the sense listening to this album that they are very much a live, performance oriented vehicle. But this is a great album with a carefully structured unity. Similar to last years' The Lemon of Pink by The Books, Audible 3 seems to occupy whichever sonic space they please, stretching from Captain Beefheart to Stockhausen, filling plenty of gaps inbetween and naturally leaving plenty of space along the way. Programmed sequences of drum-tracks merge with filtered passages of dialog and previous band performances. From ambient textures [“Clack”] that suggest Eno's Discreet Music as attempted by Richard D. James, through to crushing waves of static and heavily processed rhythms, this is an ever-evolving modern ambient epic. The closing rush of “Baby Planet” sounds like Boards of Canada jamming with Kinski. Low key in aesthetic but very layered and focussed, this is a worthy addition to the collection of anyone interested in musical deconstruction, post-rock ambient stylings and the wider spectrum of free-jazz improvisation. Highly recommended. AUDIBLE 3 AUDIBLE 3 CD BY BRIAN MARLEY/THE WIRE MAGAZINE Dec 2004 What’s interesting about some of the best new electronic improvisation is how closely it hews to the genre-bound worlds of electronica and ambient music while retaining a freshness of conception and an openness of form. Audible 3 is no exception to this rule. If anything, the trio’s so-called splendid isolation in Auckland, New Zealand, has bestowed a charmed innocence on their enterprise. It’s not that they’re unaware of recent developments in electronic music, but its impact is at one remove, and often they’re ahead of the game anyway. The assertion that this is electronic music needs to be qualified. It's electronic in the sense that the sounds, no matter how they've been generated, are amplified and relayed through electronic equipment. But computers are notable by their absence. Almost all of the sounds are acoustic in origin, though often they're changed beyond recognition. Even so, the suggestion of strings, wood and drumskins remains, like ghosts of themselves. Two members of the group, Marc Chesterman and John Kennedy, were once full-time percussionists, and pulsed sounds, the nodal points of rhythm, still feature strongly in what they do. The third member, Paul Winstanley, triggers samples, often environmental in nature, with a bass guitar. Audible 3 has been gigging on the NZ scene for at least five years, yet this is the first CD they’ve made. They’ve been biding their time, refining the music - a strategy that’s paid off handsomely. What they play is most definitely a compound music, one in which a balance is struck between improvisation and predetermined structures or agreed zones of activity. There’s an appealing allusiveness to some of the tracks. “Clack”, for example, seems to link, however tenuously, Captain Beefheart’s rollicking train blues “Click Clack” with Pierre Schaeffer’s classic of musique concrète, “Etude aux Chemin de Fer”. It’s in the nature of experimentation that some things don’t work, or at least they’re supposed not to. Audible 3 successfully bucks the trend.