KITCHER, MIKE - Processed Snippets: Congo Traditional 1952 & 1957
Mike Kitchers Processed Snippets falls firmly into the category of new exotica, a music created from a very specific location that becomes placeless through abstraction. Kitcher reworks moments recorded from the SWP Records re-mastered release of Congo Traditional 1952 & 1957 (SWP 046LP, 2014), a collection of recordings by Hugh Tracey. Tracey, a pioneering documenter of traditional music across the continent of Africa was notable for the extent of his travels and the breadth of his work, as well as his technique of live mixing multi-instrumental tracks with a hand-held microphone. This method produces tracks that focus on specific instruments with a shifting of foreground and background. In his work he, aimed to reflect the listening experience in the field. Kitchers album reflects on Traceys process by limiting each track to a limited sample and using basic EQ-ing alongside only one software processor: IRCAMs the scrub". He foreshortens the landscape, by zooming in onto moments of breath, the moment of the release of contact from the instrument, bursts of silence, or processed modifications that transform vocals into the echo of ivory horns. Within this magnified view, the richness of the original material is turned over and seen from an array of angles. Kitcher notes that "inflections, harmony, expression, and pulsing modulations all grab my attention, frequently expressed through voice, conical drums, luma pipes or lamellaphones, among other instruments." - Care of Editions.
After nearly a decade of false starts, multiple game plans veering off the rails, and a handful of shattered hopes and/or dreams, the odyssey is finally complete—the new Fusetron site is here.
This is the first phase of a multipart rollout that will span the next few months: the currently browsable stock includes miscellaneous new releases from the past 8+ months (we have a lot of catching up to do), plus approximately a third of our backstock. Note that we’ve reduced/slashed prices on many titles and will continue to do so in order to make room for new stock. We’ll also be expanding / tweaking / improving / debugging the site itself (for example, we still have work to do on the automated international postage system, not to mention the inevitable inventory discrepancies that come with transferring an ancient and massive database to a new system).
Over the next few months, as we take inventory, clean house, and delve into our storage, we will be uploading thousands of additional items, gradually, on a near-daily basis. This will include the majority of the LPs, as well as many titles, in all formats, once thought long-gone. Many currently “sold out” items are likely to resurface.
Finally, once our general backstock is up (probably in the next two or three months) we’ll begin making our extensive stockpile of rarities available online for the first time: tons of random out-of-print titles, "deadstock," warehouse finds, secondhand collectibles, etc., accumulated over the past few decades.
Frequent/returning customers will be getting early access to these items. Details to follow on how this will work (a priority mailing list? a 'frequent flyer'-like program?), but it will not be based on dollars spent. We want to reward those who consistently support us, especially in the discogs marketplace era (to those who show up trying to poach five copies of a one-off rarity, and nothing else, ever… ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ).
So—we suggest you take some time to dig through the site—even we’ve been surprised by what’s been turning up, and there’s much more to come.
