Radian

The Stazione Leopolda. Fabbrica Europa. A world of its own. Inside, the air is thick with culture. You feel a little different in there, a few hours of pure (e)stasis.

Sound installations, compositions hanging on the walls, (ex)travagant furnishings, corners, richly interesting rooms. Something other than out there.

The first installation, by a Japanese artist, is evocative, disorienting, perfect, different, engaging. Two quarter-cones positioned in convergence, images projected on both sides, an alien sound surrounds the air. People walk, happy, surprised, calm, without stopping. The two streams cross, collide, merge, overflow, escape. Small bags hanging from the ceiling, their shadows reflected on the floor, give a sense of depth. Our senses go haywire. The sound is like an inescapable outline. The loop remains an integral part of the whole. Minimal lapping sounds saturate the space, glitch clangs disturb the sight, noise fragments enchant. The purest perfection is right there, within reach. The peace of the senses converges in that moment. Sitting, watching, listening, in silence, religious muteness, obligatory quiet.

These Japanese artists are on another level, there's no comparison. It's impossible not to love them, unless it's a crime against art.

Another fusion of sound and image. This time it's a German artist of Berlin extraction taking up the challenge. A layer of fabric at half height. Images of suffering, violence, cruelty, brutality, war. Projected. Slammed. Brazen. Vicious. Horrendous. True.

A playful sound clashes, if not stands in outright opposition, with the visuals.

Electro pellets, dust motes, dents, errors, silences, noises, pauses, resumptions.

Standing still, watching, as if our whole life were in front of us. Our regrets. The past. The truth. The sound disturbs us, wants to distract us. But we're aware. And we don't give in.

Another masterpiece of artistic sensibility.

Now let's get to the heart of the evening. Radian. Austrians. Viennese. They passed under the wing of the deus-ex-machina of 90s indie rock: John McEntire. Versatile. Immense. Extraordinary. We liked "rec.extern", "Juxtaposition" leaves us baffled. Their performance captures us.

They walk on to the cheering applause of almost three hundred alternative-boy types. Too bad that, given the drift of the set, the aforementioned think it wise to chat, disturbing such perfect sound. You don't deserve this much.

It starts with a suite for drums-guitar-sampler, moving on to pleasant glitch-noise-rock compositions (come on, inventing labels has become a fad by now). Ghostly guitar, alien drums, cold instruments, white noise, saturation of the air. Their mastery of the genre is almost a limitation for them. They play too perfectly. But we're completists, so that's fine by us.

The sound generated by the real instruments is filtered by the person at the sampler to reach our ears delayed, and moreover disturbed and dismembered the way you'd handle fish entrails.

They barely move, looking like slabs of ice, robots programmed to complete a mission. Generating sounds. Sound generators, yes, that's what they are. A staggering mix of yearnings, whispers, edges, sweetnesses, rhythms, grooves, dents, screeches, puffs, stardust, steel shavings.

A short performance, essential, granite-like, crystalline, moving.

Music for automatons used to pragmatic perfection, with icy, glacial, immobile hearts. Here dwells an unyielding soul, utterly merciless. Errors are only permitted to the chosen ones. The guys on stage.

Ride the wave of great music

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