Bibio – Hedged In

We are delighted to announce that the artist most recently chosen by John Lambert to contribute to Relay is Bibio (aka Stephen Wilkinson), and his piece, in response to Pierre Bastien, has gone live to listen to and to download today.

Curator John Lambert writes :

This, the seventh piece in the Relay project is a particularly special one because as anyone who knows me will tell you, I’ve been harping on about Stephen Wilkinsons music non stop for years now, so having him participate in Relay was a real honour and the results are, as I expected stunning.

The piece titled Hedged in is a fascinating reflection on the cycles of birth and decay. In part it elaborates on the previous themes of scissors and cutting introduced by Polly Fibre in her piece Reconstructing the Incredible where we hear her cutting paper print outs of Hulks audio files. In Pierre Bastiens following piece we heard the sounds of his scissors player, acting as a metronome for his piece Play Scissors Play.

For Stephens piece he employs a fascinating array of tools including a razor blade, a splicing block, a chinagraph pencil, splicing tape and vintage 1/4″ reel to reel tape. So while previous pieces focused on the sounds of cutting, here the focus is on disintegrating the sound itself.

In Stephens words “I have a reel of tape in my collection which has passed its sell by date by a long shot, the magnetic oxide flakes off with very little friction”

After capturing the sounds of Pierres loops disintegrating, Bibio then reverses the sounds on a computer so what we are left with is these sounds coming to life rather than decaying to nothing. This is only part of the fascinating process that Bibio has applied and I urge you to explore his full writings on his process aswell as the visual montages he has kindly provided too:

http://www.modelart.ie/relay/bibio.html

Stephen states : “To get away from the confines of my studio and to exploit the drama of spring, I took various machines into my garden to recapture the recorded improvisation in a real environment. My set up was surrounded by hedges where birds and insects go about their daily lives, contributing to cycles of birth and decay.”

‘Hedged in’ is a truly organic experimental piece in the great tradition of sound art and leaves this musical conversation at a fascinating point. Thanks to Stephen for taking part and for documenting the process visually with two montages giving us a unique window into the artists process.

-John Lambert

Bibio is the recording name of the British music producer Stephen Wilkinson who hails from an area in central England often referred to as the Black Country. His musical identity was christened in honor of a fly his father had insisted on using during the fishing trips to Wales that were so influential in establishing his love of the sounds of nature. Focusing on location recording using cassettes, a half-broken sampler, dictaphones, and experimental ways of affecting sounds, Bibio has crafted a unequalled style that is as subtle as it is powerful. Bibio releases his fourth album ‘Ambivalent Avenue’ on Warp Records this summer. He has three previous albums out on Mush Records.