a softer focus (2021)
Claire Rousay
On the Bandcamp page of Texas artist, Claire Rousay, there are currently 22 projects that explore the most obscure areas of experimental music. All of these pieces of work contain a reverence for field recordings. Some of these albums have tracks that only contain fragments of recorded conversations. On a softer focus, her recent project distributed via DIY label American Dreams, Rousay finds the perfect intersection between subtle droning ambient synth tones and quotidian sounds, using unconventional methods to make her most realized work to date.
(Pictured Above,: Left: Claire Rousay and Right: Visual Artist Dani Toral; Photographer: Dani Toral)
Billed as a collaborative effort with childhood friend and visual artist, Dani Toral, a softer focus is an apt title for this album. On most of these tracks, it’s hard to put the label of ‘lead’ on any instrument or sound. Everything about this album is understated. Each composition has a warm and peaceful glow surrounding it, which is reflected in the bright mix of colors on Toral’s album art. In creating this record, Rousay intended for the entire project to mimic a meditative or dream-like state, and through the quiet web of components in each track, the record does play out like a dream. This isn’t ambient music to ignore or turn on as background music, it’s the opposite. Rousay uses sounds that border silence but the subtleties in them are also the most captivating parts of this record.
The first practical track on a softer focus, entitled, “Discreet (The Market)”, opens with the clicking of keys on a typewriter. The word “Discreet'' in the title is likely a nod to Brian Eno’s early ambient masterpiece, Discreet Music (1975), especially when considering the inclusion of the cello section paired with Rousay’s hushed piano. There is a decent amount of crossover between standard ambient and minimalist classical music on this album. Discreet Music is one of the first pieces of music to blur the lines between minimalist and ambient music, and several monumental recordings have used Eno’s foundation since. The defining attribute of Rousay’s “Discreet (The Market)” is the way she merges the subdued scratching sound from a field recording with this string arrangement. By combining this faint tone with an instrument, Claire stresses the difference that the quietest sounds can make.
a softer focus centers more on field recordings than it does on ambient music, even at the points in which the two subgenres crossover. The nine-minute centerpiece, “Peak Chroma”, which appears right in the middle of the six track album, is also the best example of Rousay’s biggest strengths in experimentation. This piece follows the quintessential ambient archetype revolving around patience and the gradual building of sound. The first two minutes of the track are primarily made up of Rousay alternating between two drawn out notes on a glowing synth. At the two minute mark, a cello appears, with notes sporadically playing close to each other, giving the track an unpredictable feel. “Peak Chroma” comes together around another perfectly placed field recording, this time condensed, as if it was recorded from the drain of a kitchen sink. There is a repetitive pressure to some of the field recordings on this record, and this isn’t the only time Rousay mirrors the sound one hears when their eardrums are immersed in water.
“Peak Chroma'' finds Rousay at her most accessible, when at the four and a half minute mark all sounds dip into silence, only to return with her own vocals for the first time on the record. In keeping up with the theme of experimentation, Rousay’s singing is definitely some form of a melody, but the pitch shifted effects on her voice are closer to Oneohtrix Point Never’s vocal work than pop music. Rousay does a good job clearly separating her vocals from any previously recorded conversational field elements on the track, although the underwater sound remains consistent throughout each portion of the song. While Rousay does separate all of the streams of sound combined on “Peak Chroma” they also sound cohesive when stepping back and listening to the song as one isolated composition.
One of the strongest uses of field recordings on a softer place appears as “Peak Chroma” transitions into “Diluted Dreams”. Where “Peak Chroma” ends with a snippet of an overheard conversation, “Diluted Dreams” opens with the sound of children playing outside, which makes this song sound like it belongs on the incredible 2017 PAN Records Mono No Aware compilation next to Yves Tumor’s “Limerence”. This composition incorporates the sensorial experience of listening to the world under water, which becomes a harmonic signifier by the end of the album.
One of the more well known modern ambient composers, William Basinski, has a pair of compositions entitled, Watermusic and Watermusic II. Classical minimalist Phillip Glass has written several pieces that mirror the sound of water. Using water as an instrument reinforces the calm aura that has become the definitive component of ambient music. There are countless other significant examples using the ‘sound of water’ as a thematic element of these niche subgenres and their overlap. When Claire Rousay uses water as a rhythm on this record, it gives the entire album a natural backbone, creating an underlying meditative energy across all 33 minutes of this record. On each piece, Rousay uses field recordings from quotidian situations, and connects human life to nature and a more languid flow of time through the repeated use of running water. a softer focus reaches beyond ambient music, placing a much needed emphasis on the overlooked, most peaceful sounds that exist around us everyday.
(Pictured Above: Claire Rousay)
©Total Trash Ltd, 2021
