Field Recordings

As in the reverberating cave chambers across the globe where many of the ancient drawings were found, in our contemporary environment, there are such locations where sound blends and resonates; so much that it becomes almost like an abstract fantasy. Individual sound dissolves into the general and what remains audible is an abstract, and often emotional revolution of time.  I make field recordings because I believe that the practice of listening into these abstract patterns of time has the potential to open up a more productive relation with the world*.

My field recordings are made in places where roads converge or diverge, in between places where people gather, or pass by, places such as parks, a rooftop of an apartment building complex overlooking layers of highway overpasses, a traditional marketplace in an over-developed city, its major bus and train stations, and etc.

The title, “Dragon Mountain” is a literal translation of the Chinese characters from the place named Yongsan. It is a place that has gone through particularly extreme changes due to national and international power conflicts. The recordings were made in an abandoned pipe structure on the ground near US army base, next to the train tracks (one of the major train stations in the country is located nearby). It was also underneath the busy highway over-pass, as well as near one of the most expensive apartment jungles on one side, and near one of the poorest neighborhoods on the other. 

The album was recorded over six-month period between late 2014 and early 2015.

After the recording session, I trim the aural experience of the place into a shape, in order to make it a thing that can be observed from a distance. I sometimes use an object such as a ceramic pot or metal pipe as reverberating noise chamber. It defamiliarizes the recognizable sound.

Noise is imbued with the general emotions of the place, the people and their time.

*Greg Hainge