“We always think of the imagination as the faculty that forms images. On the contrary, it deforms what we perceive; it is, above all, the faculty that frees us from immediate images and changes them. If there is no change, there is no imaginative act. If the image that is present does not make us think of one that is absent, if an image does not determine an abundance — an explosion — of unusual images, then there is no imagination.”

Gaston Bachelard “Air and Dreams: An Essay on the Imagination of Movement”

 

Ao contrário do Sr. Brian Eno, (ok! também já militei nas hostes de um certo glam rock tardio) nunca fui alvo de nenhuma hierofania, ou insight ocorrido naqueles impessoais não lugares que são os aeroportos. Todavia, desde o final da década de 70 do século passado com o baptismo de voo realizado através do trajecto Croca /Santa Marta/ Düsseldorf (também aportuguesada na forma de Dusseldórfia  :-) , que sinto uma necessidade de viajar impossível de satisfazer… de preferência par avion.

Sempre que tenho essa possibilidade, gosto de me fazer acompanhar dos seguintes disquinhos que me ajudam a usufruir da viagem e a esquecer o linguajar babelizante da crew e demais passageiros entrecortados por publicidade a produtos, alimentos e bebidas escandalosamente exorbitantes.

Esses disquinhos são, por esta ordem, o seminal e intemporal “Ambient 1: Music for Airports” do já anteriormente referenciado ex - Roxy Music.

Reza a lenda que: “The music was designed to be continuously looped as a sound installation, with the intent to defuse the tense, anxious atmosphere of an airport terminal. Eno conceived this idea while being stuck at Cologne Bonn Airport in Germany in the mid 70s. He had to spend several hours there and was extremely annoyed by the uninspired sound atmosphere.”

Depois temos, e saído da genialidade dos Zoviet France, “Skandinavien” creditado ao projecto de seu nome Penumbra. Este é o disco que mais gosto de ouvir, sempre que me desloco a latitudes mais boreais.

Eis uma excelente review publicada na Judas Kiss:

“Consisting of field recordings and sampled sounds recorded during regular visits to Scandinavia whilst performing as Zoviet France, Penumbra has intermingled lavishly dark and powerfully hypnotic soundscapes with them to create a surreal dream like ambience, in which you could almost drown in its depth and stirringly compelling cold beauty, that conjures up the strikingly beautiful and remote landscapes which make up the majority of this still relatively unexplored and mysterious collection of Countries, with the two opening tracks personifying this sheer beauty. Gliding gracefully from the hypnotic female vocal samples that accompany the extremely emotive dark ambient structures of ‘Deep Listening’, the album slowly moves away from this area and introduces more beat driven sounds and rhythms that intermingle subtly with the lighter soundscapes that still work as a backing to the majority of the album, creating a more chilled out atmosphere as apposed to the hauntingly captivating aura that the two opening tracks created, which isn’t to say that the rest of the tracks are dislikeable, on the contrary, it’s just that they take on a different form and move in slightly different directions whilst shedding the beauty the opening tracks created. After assuming a more minimal techno approach the album carries on with the constant play offs between beats, electronic sounds and drones, samples and ambient sculptures until a natural climax is reached and this magical journey to Scandinavia is finished…”

E por último “Above Air” (2007) álbum da autoria de CoH e que marca o fim da saudosa e mítica editora Eskaton. E com ele vos deixo enquanto vou ali a Madrid e já volto!

CoH “between heaven and earth”