Frånvarande by Mattias Gustafsson

Frånvarande acts as both the prelude and epilogue to Mattias Gustafsson’s 2017 record Nattmusik, forming a temporal cradle around his B.A.A.D.M. debut. Side A was recorded back in 2012 and originally released under his Ornaments alias, manifesting as the withered, rain-eroded memory of a majestic orchestral lament, with bowed cymbals singing through layers of rust and the sound of children floating in through an open window. It was this 20-minute piece that inspired us to present Gustafsson with the conceptual framework for Nattmusik, through which he explored the cyclical symbiosis of humanity and nature. The four movements of side B were captured in winter 2018 as an elaboration on these themes, with pianos and loops tumbling into thickets of crumpled, perishing cassette. As a collection, these pieces frame Nattmusik as an absent point of origin; its reverberations are smeared across both the future and the past, yet the source sound is palpably missing. Just as the process of decay strands the object between the pre-degraded form and the eventual dissipation into the void, Frånvarande is a record that both clasps at moments passed and those yet to manifest, rendered nomadic and thirsting by the absence of its conceptual centre.
credits
released January 29, 2019

Music composed and recorded by Mattias Gustafsson. Photograph by Michiel De Cleene. Album design by Mathieu Serruys & Joris Verdoodt. Frånvarande was commissioned by B.A.A.D.M. and released in 2019. Edition of 300 copies with download code.

Mattias Gustafsson (born 1978) is a sound artist from Mjölby, Sweden that has been releasing music as Altar Of Flies and his given name since 2006. He mostly works with magnetic tape and various instruments & electronics. His music is influenced by the electroacoustic music of the 1900´s and the millennium noise underground. He has released records on labels like iDEAL,B.A.A.D.M., Järtecknet etc.

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