An archive story / Paul’s recollections
Finding another language
I had just returned from a trip to Spain, bringing Manzanilla, Pacharán and cider from the Basque Country for Petter. We set everything up and opened the Manzanilla and some extremely dry cider.
Petter sat down in the middle of the floor and began figuring out the equipment. My job was to make sure the loops ended up in the right places.
It was more complicated than it sounds.
With Henry and his guitar, things are usually fairly straightforward. He has his pedals and a microphone close to the amplifier. Recording a saxophone in a cramped room with loud drums is another matter entirely, especially when the saxophonist also wants to put the instrument down, play a synthesizer, record loops and use a vocal microphone.
We wanted each source on its own channel so that I could work with the recordings afterwards. The Korg Modwave went through the Boss RC-505 looper and into the Soundcraft Ui24. There were cables everywhere. I was carrying a wiring diagram around in my head, connecting and reconnecting things until the signals ended up where they belonged.
The Modwave has an absurd number of possibilities. In some ways I find it less interesting than the unpredictable Neutron, which we had partly abandoned after my Arturia KeyStep broke. But Petter can make almost any instrument interesting. His understanding of music theory is extraordinary, and he approaches unfamiliar instruments without hesitation.
We had decided to try to find a musical language of our own, just the two of us, without guitar.
For me, it was also about changing how Happü sounds. Happü isn't defined by distortion or airy soundscapes. It can sound like anything. The truth lies somewhere else.
Life and safety
One way to move forward is to embrace the absurd.
I suggested that Petter take my work notebook, open it at random and simply speak-sing whatever he found into a loop.
Many of my notes are in English because they come from work involving Kristin in Sydney. Petter started going through the pages and became fascinated by the words “life and safety.”
He also found notes from a meeting with Business Region Göteborg, where we had been discussing emissions from working machines. Of all the things you might expect to become part of an improvised musical performance, that would probably not be high on the list.
That particular passage never made it into the released Tight Whale XII. But it opened something up.
Petter has a remarkable theatrical quality when he performs, even though he isn't theatrical as a person. He is an analytical giant, yet almost completely open to trying strange ideas. Something that starts as nonsense can, in his hands, acquire extraordinary depth.
And not everything that works has to be published. Some of the most important moments change what happens next, even if they never become part of the finished recording.
Precise and imprecise
By the time Petter found the melody that became Tight Whale XII, we had probably been recording for twenty minutes already.
I had settled into a very steady drum pattern. I liked it so much that I was enjoying listening to it while I played. There was something hypnotic about its repetition.
Then Petter began playing a fairly simple melody on the Modwave, deliberately a little crooked.
I was playing very tightly and clearly. Petter played the synthesizer almost like a percussion instrument, but his notes didn't land exactly with my drum strokes.
That relationship is what makes Tight Whale XII so peculiar to me.
It is precise and imprecise at the same time. Neither of us is simply following the other. The small differences between what we play become part of the music itself.
The result is almost dreamlike.
A whale through a keyhole
The title came later.
I make up the titles myself, and I want them to have an artistic life of their own. They don't necessarily have to explain the music.
I think Tight Whale felt a little like trying to squeeze a whale through a keyhole. Besides, a whale is pretty much the opposite of anything tight. Putting those two words together creates an absurdity, a little universe that didn't exist before.
The XII is more straightforward. It refers to the twelve mixes I made.
I'm not trained in mixing. Most of what I do comes from listening and turning the hundreds of knobs until I find something. Slowly, I'm learning.
The goal isn't necessarily to create something beautiful. It is to create something unique.
And Tight Whale XII is certainly that.
I still find it difficult to say what kind of music it is. I'm convinced we will never be able to reproduce it.
There simply isn't enough Manzanilla in the world.