CM von Hausswolff - There are no crows flying around the Hancock Building

Lampo
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At the request of Lampo, Swedish sound artist von Hausswolff journeyed to Chicago and brought himself to the top of the John Hancock Building where, presumably, he found no crows but recorded every other sound he could, natural and man-made, returning to his studio to construct the present recording.

It’s a 40 minute piece that I find myself mentally slicing into three sections: opening and closing slabs that, in one sense or another strike me as rather prosaic bracketing a rich and fascinating central core. It begins with a pulse of static that at first contains a small, high-pitched whine but soon modulates through some thicker, lower areas and gradually includes counter-rhythmic burbles and splats. Although it’s quite possible von Hausswolff is simply working with the rhythms he happened upon atop the skyscraper and that the rather numbing effect of same is what was intended, this throb grew a bit aggravating over time. It’s not that this sort of Lynchian, industrially dystopic point of view isn’t effectively portrayed; more that one gets the point after a minute or so. It needn’t be insisted upon for another twelve. Interestingly, in the edition of photographs that the good folk at Lampo were kind enough to send along (“Red Empty (Chicago 2003)”), von Hausswolff makes his case more strongly in a series of images of non-descript Chicago buildings red-lit at night. This is worth a look-see.

However, about a third of the way into the recording, the beats subside as a predominant element and a gorgeous wash of ambient sound takes over—the hum of a large space, traffic sounds, children arguing, etc. There’s a wonderful feeling of freedom when the throb fully ceases, replaced by…not sure, maybe altered air and wind sounds, maybe abstracted crowd noise. A much lower pulse makes itself felt, initially in a sporadic manner, then more consistently, but woven in perfectly with the general wash. It’s still ominous enough that when the kids show up you’re torn between appreciating how great it *sounds* and worrying about their safety in such an environment. A fine, expansive segment, this.

I’m guessing von Hausswolff structured the piece in thirds with some precision, as the soundscape changes pretty definitively right around each 13-minute increment. At this last juncture, the atmospherics evaporate leaving only that dark pulse which now includes a bleating cycle every eight beats. The rhythm remains constant while the sounds morph into various guises, none of them especially compelling. The piece fades out almost entirely a couple of times, reappearing as though you’ve driven back into its broadcast range, a nice enough effect but, as with the first section, I didn’t find what I was hearing inherently very interesting, resulting in a mixed opinion of the project as a whole. I can imagine it working better as an installation piece, though, where one might be able to refocus on other aspects of the environment when the soundtrack becomes tiring.

http://www.lampo.org/hausswolff/