CD – Futura Resistenza

The motivation behind this release from Nika Son was to support the director Helena Wittmann, who for her film Drift (released in 2017) needed a musical concept that was consistent with a wide range of narrative styles already displayed in the complex screenplay. The album is a collection of field recordings from the North Sea, across the Atlantic Ocean, to the Caribbean and then the Azores. In total, there are fifteen tracks, thirteen from the original soundtrack and two more that were created for an audio-visual installation, Wildness of Waves. Nika Son lets the water itself tell a story and listeners cannot help but be receptive to its resonant body and viscerally changing movements, physical, but also the result of the emotions generated by the experience and therefore imaginary – transformations that emerge in a distinct and tangible space. The sea, therefore, is not only a sound element but becomes the means through which Nika Son builds an immersive and multisensory environment. The reverberations of the waves, the whistle of the wind, the oscillations of the currents find a dimension that is intimate and passionate, bringing the listener into a deeply meditative experience. The compositions do not follow canonical structures but develop as continuous flows, trying to capture the unpredictability of the sea. The sound language is minimalist but also rich in details, with particular attention to empty spaces and moments of suspension. Every sound seems to emerge slowly, almost like an apparition, and then fade away delicately, in a constant dance between presence and absence, where the tracks imprint themselves like slow tidal movements, fertile with pauses and silences, with ambient noises becoming just as important as the more obvious sounds. The repetition and constant variation of sound motifs suggest a perpetual motion and despite the strong ambient nature of the recordings, the whole is never static: there is always, in fact, a continuous tension between movement and stillness, between the relentless force of the water and its more placid moments. Nika Son manages to evoke images and sensations that transcend listening, taking anyone who immerses themselves in Drift on a hypnotic journey, where the boundary between real sound and imagination blurs. The visual and cinematic component of her music is palpable, and it is this fusion between sound and vision that allows the work to engage the listener in a deeply moving way.

 

Nika Son – Drift