CD – Transacoustic Research

What role does spoken language play in the age of the pervasive electronic surveillance? Darkvoice is an album and collection of videos questioning this theme. Specifically, Jörg Piringer tries to focus on an electronic cipher, a language designed to elude electronic surveillance. The fundamental concept is that if nobody can understand, interception is useless. This language, also called Darkvoice, is an obfuscation of language and sensation, a code nobody understands, but it’s also a kind of self-censorship, a private language and an indecipherable message. That said, the sounds of this album, released by Transacoustic Research, are not incomprehensible. What you catch is simply a synthetic rhythm, which is quite saw-toothed, beating and pushing, reinforced by noise blows and other abrasive audio emergencies. It’s a kind of experimental techno, embellished by some deliberate, but nonetheless rhythmical malfunctions, with a structure created by manipulated vocal parts. The basic concept is actually not so far from the sound and visual poetry the historical avant-garde performed, but now it’s using a specific software program to generate real time unexpected elements and abstract #concatenations#. The voice is transformed through the use of real time of signal processors and samples, giving life to images animated by some abstract visual elements of the text. The atmosphere of the ten tracks is dark, synthetic and hypnotic; they seem derive from an industrial approach, although they are also the result of highly elaborated human vocalizations. Piringer, who is also the founder of the Vegetable Orchestra and the Institute For Transacoustic Research, is attracted to connections between science and art, daily life and experimentation, sound and noise, tone and light, acoustics and perception. All of these to comingle in this solo project.

 

Jörg Piringer – Darkvoice