Amaurosis invites us into a deep dive inside the mind– while innovated and intuitive styles of listening are posed – as we re-discover the art of listening inside the heart of this 4D spatial sound score.
It’s a chilly Monday evening in Plymouth, as we head over to the planetarium to see what all the fuss is about, ‘spatial sound’, ‘bathing in an aural sea’, ‘let music be your emotional guide?’ Junkerry’s work poses lots of questions and tonight the planetarium is full to the brim and buzzing in anticipation of this new experience and journey into spatial sound.
The audience are asked to wear blindfolds and we sit back and relax, as we are bathed in an aural sea. The sounds begin as a trampling of footsteps comes towards us from one direction and a fusion of diverse sounds appear and disappear in all directions. The music has an organic, almost respiratory feel to it allowing flow and space. While each note reverberates and serves to add tension and dynamics to the composition. In the acoustics of the dome, the guitar swells in each note, as if being played in a cathedral. We are taken on a rollercoaster of new sounds that appear and disappear around us, orchestral parts have a distinct discord and resolution which adds colour and sparkle to this already rich tapestry.
Suddenly everyday sounds feature in the composition, from closing doors or a rattling, a humming or the sound of chimes. As the score evolves new vocal layers are introduced to the music, transcending and harmonized at once. The chanting has an almost Mayan quality, as if the audience is deep within a forest listening to a tribe. Sounds of clinking enter from one side of the room, a bleep on the other, a roaring swell of what might be the sea, to the cello or electric guitar – Junkerry has created a mixed-media canvas of sounds, which will take you out of your normal world in to a journey of the senses.
The audience are plunged inside this specially composed spatial sound and each individual gets to experience the music as if they have just discovered the joy of listening for the first time. In the darkness the sounds are intensified and our body melts into the auditorium, as we explore the music. With music as our emotional guide, we drift in this wonderfully auric swirl of sounds, we start to melt and everyday experiences come to the fore, what solutions did we find in the darkness? With the freedom to explore we find ideas and finely tuned, honed-in possibilities present themselves.
The darkness is our vehicle to take us away from the over-stimulated visual world, allowing us to relax and listen to the music on a deeper and more intense level. Sounds appear and disappear, a bleep from one part of the room surprises, a buzz and a hum in another. Spoken word elements are layered within the sounds and the lyrical content is inspired by 3000monks, who specialise in meditative art, posing questions around how the human mind perceives itself in the modern world.
Suddenly the sounds fade into the distance and audience members are instructed to remove their blindfolds. We are presented with evocative and abstract visuals. Organic and sensual 4D shapes and images move like passing clouds across the canvas, intertwined and intriguing. We are left to our own senses to interpret what they might be, perhaps the outline of a figure, a breath of air, or a cloud, a jellyfish, scenes of the earth unfolding, while the shapes breathe amorphously to the beats. While the music score is still very much part of the experience, as it morphs into more of a squelching sound, similar to the sounds you would expect to hear from an autonomous sensory meridian response. (ASMR)
These experimental and in many ways avant-garde sounds create a kind of musical poetry. Often joyous and at times haunting and dissonant. Amaurosis is both illuminating and inspiring at once, focusing our minds on the sounds and noises in the project. A joyful, intriguing and thought-provoking experience, it is a great way of getting out of your mind, taking a hiatus and leaving with a refreshing view. The lack of compressed audio makes for an experience that is powerful and expansive. While we get the feeling that all the sounds are heard in the score – as the artist vision intended, in this 4D spatial composition.
As you awake, there is a sense of community in the room, as we have taken a step into this immersive exploration into listening together. Eventually the house lights turn on and the cold light of the world we knew before engulfs us. This new form of avant-garde style contemporary pop created by Junkerry, will no doubt inspire listeners at future performances scheduled for Berlin, New York and London next year.
