“Sound is vandalism,” is the thought that crippled me for a good couple of years. I hid inside a rented room, afraid to disturb the air with any kind of sound. All sound was wicked, a corruption. My heart jumped with every passing car, every idle conversation that drifted by my window, the city bus coming to a stop, compressed air. I was terrified to even leave the house; the creaking doorknob, my footsteps on the way to the car, the possibility of having to exchange words with a neighbor, the shutting of the driver’s side door, the starting of the engine, rubber on the road—all too much. I was mystified by what I perceived as the collective brashness of society. A belch, a booming greeting, the whooshing sound of runners’ arms waving in the wind. Really, everyone was going along as planned, but for me, the whole thing was a universal 24/7 disaster movie ride.
Not so for Julian Sartorius, it seems. The rhythmic sources, which Hidden Tracks: Basel - Genève is built on, were recorded on a ten-day hiking trip where Sartorius used a pair of drumsticks on anything he found along his 270 kilometer journey. Wow, what a difference, the artist at peace with the outdoors: trash, rocks, and silos. The ease of the rhythmic pace conveys comfort. Solitude under the public sky, breathing in the public air, a meet and greet in open space. The rented room is padlocked, but nobody is hiding behind the door. The tenant has gone fishin’. I admit, his vandalism is not so wicked. Sunlight on everything.
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