Though he probably received more recognition last year for his production work on Dean Roberts' breathtaking Be Mine Tonight,Valerio Tricoli was also busy creating one of the more substantialmusique concrète works I've heard in quite a while. The title aloneshould transmit the charm and the wayward beauty of this piece, itsquestions projecting both the violence of discovery and the resigned,rhetorical penance of shame and acceptance. Tricoli's music becomes themissing thought dots between these two inquisitives, a journey ofself-reflection and detachment. Revealingly, a three-dotted reply wasall that I, at least, could utter after sitting with the disc's40+ minutes (advertised as only 19, another of Tricoli's warpingtactics, anything but playful). The artist works outside of thehyper-lyrical or hyper-visceral styles that seem to dominate concrètepractice these days; his removed approach places the music withinmemory's shadowy domain, distanced but strangely present, like a déjàvu experience. This is not audio-surrealism per say, but something moresomber and gratingly nostalgic. The disc's first section could begin inthe room of some shaky continental hotel, slowly and secretly coloredin with disembodied hallway voices and the abrupt activity of antiquedoor latches. The voices will continue throughout the piece,contributing more to a regenerating wave of commotion than any kind offoundation, thematic or at all grounding. The music rides this wave asaboard a virtual history of meaningless conversation, essential whitenoise against which all that is individual or discernable in the piecemust be measured. There is certainly an individual, very human presencein this work, but one that seems always hidden, revealing itselfgingerly though the segmented, even lush sounds of rustling and lightknocking spaced across the whole. Tricoli also attaches some of hisinventive melodic hesitations at points during the disc, via bell tonesand steady, thin drones, shifting certain moments into sudden dramaticrelief, as if caught in a cinematic lens. Did They? Did I?stays very much outside the listening space; this music enacts a quietand impossible ambiance, capturing those subtle, telling degrees bywhich our memory is bound. It rises to shock only when cool anddeceptive recovery is within reach and reveals only for secondsanything that could be called recognizable. Read More
