William Basinski: Video Collaboration & European Tour
American composer William Basinski has announced a fresh collaboration with his longtime creative partner James Elaine as well as a prospective European tour next year in a recent interview for flasher.com. Talking about the work with Elaine, Basinski announced the tentative title for their new installation, “Blue Prints”, as well as first images of water lillies in a winter pond. Again centring around the theme of decay (a returning theme in Basinski’s oeuvre, which was brought to mainstream attention thanks to his “Disintegration Loops” cycle, as well as favourable articles in “The Wire” and “Pitchfork Media”), “Blue Prints” follows in the footsteps of previous Basinski/Elaine productions, such as films accompanying albums like “Melancholia” and “Variations: A Movement in Chrome Primitive”.
In the extensive interview, which takes us back to Basinski’s early days, his inspirations, doubts and the succesful search for a voice of his own, James Elaine is credited for bringing out the musician in him. Despite his musical education (“Every parent should make their children study music”), Basinski had never really thought about composing, before meeting Elaine and listening to albums such as Brian Eno’s “Music for Airports” or “Music for 18 Musicians” by Steve Reich. Already then, he was considering basing his work on loops, but remained unsure for years, whether he could get away with it. It was only while watching and listening to some of his initial taped Voyetra experiments destroy themselves on his mixing deck that he knew the material was strong enough to stand on its own.
William Basinski currently operates from New York, but has gathered a strong following in Europe, which is why he has always enjoyed travelling there for live dates. He mentioned that this could well be the case again soon, as he prepared for having all of his 2007 releases finished for production, enabling him to hit the road for some time. This would mean that the publication of “El Camino Real” and the reissue of “The River” could go ahead as planned for July and fall of this year respectively.
Homepage: William Basinski Interview on Flasher.com
Homepage: William Basinski
Homepage: William Basinski at MySpace
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