Attilio Novellino - A drone whirlwind from the deep South

It might sound obvious, but it could still come as a surprise to see an Italian electronic experimenter, all the more so one coming from the deep South of the peninsula. How do you experience your geographical position? Do you think your environment of origin has influenced your approach to music?

Calabria is a region that's particularly wary of artistic proposals that aren't rooted in cultural traditions well established in the area, and that require a certain openness to contemporary languages in order to be appreciated.

Anyone around here who intends to move within the territories of experimentation is aware of having very few people to talk to - I mean like-minded artists, attentive cultural operators, and an audience potentially interested in proposals that diverge from mainstream models. Opportunities to take part in artistically stimulating events are scarce, especially in music. In my city, aside from "Diagonal Jazz", a music series straddling jazz and experimentation that Riccardo Mottola has been stubbornly running for eighteen years with competence, taste and considerable courage, there's no venue interested in embracing innovative sonic ideas and presenting them to the public.

All this, combined with a peripheral geographical position, makes me feel an isolation that's perhaps even more pronounced than that of someone living in an equally small town but located in central-northern Italy, although the recent opening of a museum devoted to contemporary art in the city, along with initiatives by some foundations, makes me think something is starting to change.

The environment where I live and grew up has undoubtedly influenced my life, so it's likely it also played a role in my approach to music, albeit indirectly. I've always thought that my generation had very few chances to develop contemporary taste and sensibility, because of the questionable choices made by those in charge of musical programming in the city, and that we seriously risked absorbing, almost passively, the models that this stagnant, self-referential environment has stubbornly pushed over the years with superficiality and carelessness.

The internet was a decisive way out for me - it gave me the tools I needed to overcome the prejudices and limitations typical of this context, allowing me to develop my musical sensibility in complete independence. I could hardly have done it without the possibilities offered by the web.

Three years have passed between your debut "Anonymous Said" and "Through Glass", your first record released under your own name, and the channels through which you distribute your work have also changed. Can you tell us how you spent this period of time and what stages your artistic inspiration went through?

I spent this period working on a series of projects that took up most of my free time - I kept going non-stop for almost two and a half years, until, completely drained, I was forced to stop and recharge. It was a truly intense period, full of stimuli, that I can only reconstruct in broad strokes.

Right after releasing "Anonymous Said", together with Enrico Coniglio I put together a compilation of Italian artists devoted to the element of water. "Underwater Noises" was the starting point for a broader collaboration with some of the artists involved, which continued over time and branched out into further initiatives, such as "Loud Listening", released on May 1st via Crónica Electronica, a work centered on field recordings made at four different Italian industrial sites, together with a series of remixes of these sounds by international artists including Lawrence English, Campbell Kneale (Our Love Will Destroy The World) and Mathias Delplanque.

I then shared many experiences with my friend Saverio Rosi (Leastupperbound).

Over the past few years, between studio projects and live sets, we also managed to put together a trio, Sentimental Machines, alongside Gianfranco Candeliere, another friend and fellow musician from Calabria. "The Silent Bride" was the group's first (and so far only) record, released in 2010, since last year's Japanese tsunami, combined with a few "diplomatic incidents", also swept away our plans: a record for the Japanese label Slow-Flow and a tour of the Land of the Rising Sun for which dates had already been set.

Throughout all this time I kept coming back to "Through Glass"; it took two full years to give concrete shape to the ideas I'd scattered around right after the release of "Anonymous Said". Finishing the work felt like finding the way home after a long journey.

Beyond your solo work, you've already taken part in various collaborations and international contacts: what did you take away from those experiences? Is there an artist you'd like to work with in the future?

Over the past few years I've dedicated a lot of space to collaborations, because I believe in the importance of human and artistic relationships.

I have relationships with Italian and foreign artists whom I admire and feel close to; with some of them I've already had the chance to work, while with others there's a shared intention to do so in the future.

All the collaborations I've pursued so far have definitely enriched me, letting me perceive sound through fresh, unusual perspectives, or ones slightly different from my own, adding new shades to my music every time. They've been an important opportunity for growth.

You also have to reckon with difficulties, misunderstandings and clashes due to the different sensibilities of the people involved, who, however similar, are never completely aligned. But I think these kinds of hiccups are part of the physiology of any human relationship, and should be accepted as such.

Rather than naming specific artists I'd like to collaborate with, I think that in the future I'd like to be able to make music with people who are truly my friends. That would be a wonderful thing.

Tell us specifically about the "argonauts" who accompanied you on the journey summed up in "Through Glass", artists who are anything but strangers to an ever-expanding electronic world.

On the album I had the pleasure of hosting three artists I admire greatly: Enrico Coniglio, Ennio Mazzon and Alessio Ballerini.

All three have released excellent albums in recent years that stand out for their research and stylistic taste, as well as having launched groups, labels and initiatives that help fuel a scene which, in my view, has nothing to envy in the more celebrated and better-supported scenes found in other countries.

Their contribution to the record was very important, and it undoubtedly enriched my work. I'll take this opportunity to thank them once again.

I'm also working with them on other projects that, hopefully, will see the light of day soon.

I'd also like to mention Peter Kutin, an Austrian artist who handled the album's mastering, lending a certain analogue warmth to my sound, and Bartholomew Owl of the Scottish band Eagleowl, who was extremely kind and generous in allowing me to manipulate a sample taken from one of his band's tracks.

Beyond the explicit collaborations, what kind of recognition have you received from abroad?

I have to say that “Through Glass” was very well received by the international press — numerous foreign magazines and webzines that reviewed the record appreciated it, and they zeroed in on its essential qualities. I keep getting, with great pleasure, praise from artists I admire or simply from listeners abroad. I was invited to take part in a few compilations for foreign labels, including Basses Frequences and Futuresequence. I was also invited to play a live set at the “Rhiz” in Vienna for Valeot's fourth anniversary — it was a great experience and I got a very warm reception, and I hope to have other opportunities like that in the future.

In the vast universe mapped out by your sound-writing, there's a corner inhabited by Sentimental Machines. Could you take a moment to describe what that wonderful episode known as “The Silent Bride” was?

“The Silent Bride” is an album by Sentimental Machines, the band I'm part of alongside fellow Calabrian artists Saverio Rosi and Gianfranco Candeliere. It was released about a year ago by Laverna net-label, and there's also a full CD-R edition with two bonus tracks (Discreet Records). That record brought our artistic sensibility into contact with that of Emanuele Tonon, a writer from Gorizia and author of a formidable novel called “Il Nemico”, published by Isbn.

I remember the day Saverio handed me his book, and the emotions I felt reading such a harsh, sharp, desperate text. It was immediately clear to all three of us that our music and his words moved within similar landscapes. We asked him for some readings of passages from his book and put together a concept album based on the second part of his novel, titled “La sposa muta”.

For that record we acted almost like a rock band, with full-on improvisation and studio recording sessions — we wanted to try out solutions different from our usual approach.

I remember the hard work of editing and mixing we did with Saverio in his small studio, trying to find the right balance for those tracks, and the excitement of having Emanuele's vocal tracks in our hands.

Just a few days ago I listened back to that record after about a year. It's definitely an extremely dark production, deeply felt and naively true.

Let's get back to pure sound and its components: field recording — you make good use of it

I see it as one of the possible elements to use when I write my tracks. I think that in some cases manipulating field recordings and blending them with other sounds can produce very interesting results.

The ambient recordings I've included on the record all have a precise meaning and are tied to particular experiences I had while recording them. For example, “Amber Alert” contains a recording of a choir I captured in a church in my hometown, trying to capture the austere sacredness that seemed to emanate from those resigned, ritualistic, severe prayers. I built the whole track starting from those recordings. More often, though, I add field recordings only at a later stage, as I did in “Sirens”. In that track I played with blurring the children's screams heard in the second part with the reverbs of the sound as it passes through a particular equalizer — I really like the contrast that creates.

Are the software tools you use to shape your music merely a “technical” support for you, or do they also affect the creative process itself?

Software is definitely an important creative tool for me. My tracks can start equally from an analog instrument or from manipulating some software. I don't draw a sharp line between the stages that lead me to have the various tracks in my sequencer. The moment that excites me most is definitely mixing the various tracks — I think it's the most important act in my composition process, as well as the one I enjoy the most. Unfortunately the road to get there is often long and not always easy to travel, as I already explained earlier.

On your website you describe your music as “drone-gaze”: what elements do you think you've drawn from the two terms in that definition? And who are your favorite references in each of those areas?

Honestly I used that term a bit ironically, but I think it sums up the traits of my current sound pretty well.

From shoegaze I think I've taken the tendency to build a wall of sound made of melodic layers, the “reckless” use of reverb and distortion, a passion for saturated sounds and distant, impalpable, ethereal vocals, and a certain hazy underlying melancholy. But unlike the classic bands of that genre, I don't present these elements within songs that have a pop-rock structure and a catchy melody — instead I fold them into compositions that unfold horizontally, layering up and gradually gaining density, which pushes the whole thing toward dynamics closer to drone.

When it comes to shoegaze, I've always loved two historic bands like Slowdive and My Bloody Valentine, and I'd add a modern “shoegazer” like Christian Fennesz. As for drone, I could mention Campbell Kneale with his old project Birchville Cat Motel, Lawrence English, Jefre Cantu-Ledesma and Tim Hecker — each of them has produced splendid works that could in some ways be filed under drone music.

How much weight do you give to the conceptual and visual side of things when shaping and presenting your work?

I think it's important for a record to be backed by a conceptual framework with a certain depth, one that makes an artist's intentions and aims clear and helps people grasp the scope of the work. But I'm very careful to avoid slipping into the kind of academic, lecture-hall posturing that's easy to fall into when you try to give your music a theoretical justification.

I'm convinced that sound finds its own justification within itself, one that fully legitimizes its existence, makes any further inquiry superfluous, and goes beyond any words.

The visual side is also something very close to my heart, one I certainly couldn't ignore, since I tend to associate colors and graphic imagery with sounds. I believe it's called synesthesia.

Photographer Veronica Vallini helped shape the record's visual identity, curating the album's artwork with her beautiful photographic works and letting me use others on my website -unvorticedibassapressione.com-, while Cristina Buttignoni and Roberto Bressa, aka freccia&caburo, made a video for “Sirens” that I think works as the perfect visual counterpart to the track. I want to thank them again for their collaboration and for the extraordinary support they keep giving me.

I've worked with a few video artists in the past, but our collaborations ended up being one-off performances; I'd like to build more lasting relationships going forward.

Specifically, where does your fascination with glass come from, the material you actually dedicated “Through Glass” to? Do you feel the imagery tied to the album title and the track titles properly symbolizes its content?

It all started with a set of photographs of light filtered through glass, which I shot while playing a lot with the saturation of different color tones.

I thought about the surprising results you get by aiming a beam of light at a transparent body like glass, or by bringing it into contact with the bodily surface of marine organisms like jellyfish, which have similar qualities of transparency, and with certain deep-sea dwellers, creatures that live where light doesn't naturally exist. Glass and deep-sea fish thus turn from targets into sources of light. They trace abstract shapes made of layered reflections, cast silhouettes, reveal inlays of fluorescent colors and shadows, almost as if trying to assert their own presence in space, ceasing to be neutral matter thanks to their own "plastic-distorting" ability.

I imagined I could achieve a similar result by trying to guide the sound material I'm most familiar with along an analogous path, one in which sound takes the place of light while glass is replaced by audio signal filters, mainly delay, reverb, pitch shifter, spectral Eqs and digital distortions.

As for the titles, I can say they're never random, I choose them very carefully. Behind every title there's always a story, or even just an image or a feeling I want to tie to the music or that I express through the sound.

In some cases the tracks on the record fit into the "conceptual" narrative right from the start (“Sirens”, “Llyria”), in others they grow out of suggestions not directly tied to it (“Ex-butterfly”, “Her Red Shoes”, “Snapshot Of A Loss”).

Music like yours isn't always easy to present in a live setting; how are your live performances structured?

I've tried out different approaches in the sets I've played so far, in some cases using only a laptop and in others bringing in different instruments as well.

Things change depending on the context and, above all, on the presence of other people on stage. When I perform alongside others, the chance to interact with the people involved can push me toward improvised, out-of-control performances, as happened during the last live show I did with Leastupperbound and Ahleuchatistas in Catanzaro for the winter session of "Diagonal Jazz". In that performance I chose to generate the sound to be processed electronically by striking my guitar with a drumstick and using an e-bow to sustain the audio signal; the physical involvement was considerable, and the damage my guitar sustained - which, incidentally, is still waiting to be repaired - is tangible proof of that.

When I perform solo, on the other hand, I prefer to stay closer to my usual dimension,

basing my performances exclusively on the live management and manipulation of samples.

Right now, besides the laptop and a controller, I use a sampler and a series of pedal effects.

This approach lets me handle sounds and combine them as if I were working with a huge palette of colors. It seems to me the best way to present my music. I don't consider being visually choreographic a priority; what matters is that what comes out of the speakers is a sound that fully represents me.

What do you think of the current way music is consumed and distributed? And how do you think the possibilities offered by the Internet have influenced it?

The Internet makes an enormous amount of music available, accessible at any moment and often offered completely free of charge.

In my view, this has led to a trivialization of the act of listening.

Often people just listen distractedly to whatever the Internet serves up each day, jumping from one track to another without paying due attention to what they're actually listening to, forgetting that

this brief, distracted, rapid taste has nothing to do with the reflection, the repeated and attentive listening that an artist deserves if you really want to understand them in depth.

The ability to download music in digital format has led to a drastic drop in record sales and the shrinking of an already atrophied record industry, with a consequent reduction in investment by labels.

The ones paying the highest price are debut or little-known artists, since fewer and fewer labels are willing to invest in someone who, even if the label recognizes their artistic depth, can't guarantee a solid following in terms of sales and therefore a financial return.

Many labels are then forced to close down not long after starting out, even while putting out excellent music, because they can't even cover their costs with the income from record sales. That's very sad.

I have nothing against paid digital music distribution, and I'm a consumer of it myself, but I hope CDs and LPs will keep being pressed and sold in the future too.

Illegal downloading, on the other hand, while being a tool with no small potential even from a cultural standpoint, can't be fully accepted because of its terrible unfairness.

It is in fact damaging and potentially fatal both for labels and for independent artists. The sacrifices made to press a CD, and the investment in terms of money, effort and energy, undoubtedly deserve the few euros that buying the record requires.

(13/05/2012)

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