Out of the Box #10
Luminance Ratio / Steve Roden (2012)
Out of the Box is an irregular series focusing on seven inch records. It’s an excuse to engage with my collection in a new way, as well as to write about older records and genres we don’t often cover at ACL.
OUT OF THE BOX #10
Luminance Ratio, Steve Roden ~ Split (2012)
I first met Gianmaria Aprile and Luca Sigurtà of Luminance Ratio at the 2011 edition of TagoFest, a sadly defunct summer gathering that brought together weirdos from all over the Italian peninsula. At that time, the quartet was rounded out by Luca Mauri and Andrea Ferraris, the latter of whom left the group during the long hiatus between Honey Ant Dreaming (2016) and Uncanny Valley (2022). The band’s debut, Like Little Garrisons Besieged (2009), co-released by the great Boring Machines and Aprile’s own Fratto9 Under The Sky Records, was one of the first reviews we ever posted at ACL when we launched in early 2012, and Aprile later made a great mix for ACL to celebrate the release of their third LP.
I happily kept up with each of the three limited colored 7” records that made up Frattonove’s “Seven Inches series,” which paired the psychedelic Italian quarter with foreign guests, beginning with the American artist and experimentalist Steve Roden, followed by editions with Australian maestro Oren Ambarchi and Greek composer Yannis Kyriakides. Roden died last year (see my post here) and has been on my mind lately due to a posthumous show of his paintings, floating over the silent world, currently on view at Vielmetter Los Angeles. Roden was always in a state of development, as (un)comfortable making music with nothing but a microphone and a cheap delay pedal as he was diving deep into modular synthesis. He utilized often arbitrary and poetic processes to create his visual and sound art, but never fell into the trap of empty formalism or predictable outcomes. His art is deeply human and humble, his music was quiet and unassuming, all traits also shared with the artist. This quiet style of electro-acoustic compositions came to be known as “lowercase” sound, a philosophy and approach that continues to shape how many of us listen. So with that in mind I thought it would be a good time to revisit his split with Luminance Ratio, a record that brought together artists I admire from halfway around the world.
As the hometeam, Luminance Ratio get to go first, with the a-side “Reoccuring Dreams,” a lovely track which despite some high-pitch whistling early in the track mostly steers clear of abrasive sounds in favour of languid dreamy psychedelia. Aprile and Mauri’s guitars are treated with various effects but are clearly recognizable, while Ferraris and Sigurtà add additional textures that are harder to define, the former occasionally playing a cymbal traditionally enough to suggest a rhythm, while the latter relies on his usual self-proclaimed “electronic junk” to conjure drones and rhythms for the others to react against. Clocking in at about 4:20, the excursion feels somehow ever shorter, a jam fading out despite the ensemble clearly having much more juice left. And that’s something I like about this seven inch series, limited as they are to just a few minutes.
The b-side consists of Roden’s “Marvelous Is Flairs,” a background of small crinkles against which the conjures a deep soundscape of field-recordings and gentle drones, singing in a quiet falsetto in the way he often did. There’s a fair amount of looping and repetition, without ever coming close to anything resembling pop. It’s one of his modes of music making I find most endearing, and a track that is a pleasure to return to again and again.
