Chemin de fer is Magali Babin’s debut CD, though she is already well-known as one of the key players of improvised music and sound art in Montréal.
A prominent live artist, Magali has performed in Montréal (Casa del Popolo, Silophone, SuperMicMac…), Baltimore, New York, and Philadelphia,. She is a favorite of the respected Radio-Canada radioshow Le navire Night where her performances are regularly broadcast. Magali has played alongside Michel F Côté, Martin Tétreault, Alexandre St-Onge, Ian Nagoski (US), Jon Rose (UK), to name a few.
The 9 pieces on this CD were recorded in the studios of Radio-Canada with Mario Gauthier, executive producer and host of L’espace du son. Citing financial constraints, Radio-Canada cancelled the programme before the music could be heard on radio, but the recording was thankfully salvaged. It is now finally available on CD for everyone to hear.
Her methods are simple, but her music is exquisitely rich in detail and variation.
Michael Anton Parker, Bagatellen (USA)
Grattage de la surface rouillée pour lui redonner son éclat.
Bertrand Backeland, La Médiathèque (Belgium)
… a sonic metallurgist, warping surface alloys into soft, pliable mica.
Darren Bergstein, e|i magazine (USA)
… simple, yet seductive, the crisp recordings feature the magnified sounds of everyday objects placed within spacious soundfields.
Christopher Murphy, %Array (Ireland)
Impressive.
François Couture, All-Music Guide (USA)
… there are very few more original and thoughtfully-considered works than this one.
B Wildered, Desiderata (USA)
Magali Babin is active on the experimental music and improvisational music scenes since the 1980s. Her artistic work is based on the playful amplification, sonic interaction and manipulation of everyday objects. One result of ongoing research is her first solo CD, Chemin de fer (No Type) — a work comissionned by Mario Gauthier for the radio of Radio-Canada. → Full bio
June 3, 2007
a little trivia: how many albums does no type have? the answer? we think there were 133 in total (not counting the 21 on no type: annexe). that said, there are some that were deleted with time, others are CDs, and some have weird catalogue numbers. which means that the fact, today, that we are presenting album “number 100”, is perfectly arbitrary & symbolic. actually, we’ve had 100 releases for a bit now. but we’re happy to write that number anyway. 100, 100, 100, 100, 100. i’m not getting tired of it. aw yeah. → Continued…
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