Maurizio Bianchi is one of the leader of the Italian noise and experimental scene. He first appeared in 1979, and in the first five years of his career, he released a considerable amount of work on a variety of labels before retiring from the music scene completely. For the next thirteen years, he remained silent, but he resumed his relentless work pace. His latest project is a collaboration with Emanuela De Angelis Twenty years his junior, De Angelis has nevertheless an already impressive body of work behind her, as a member of various formations and, in recent years, as a solo artist. As MD+EDA, the pair have, for a moment, left behind their respective noise remit to investigate a much quieter realm, developed over the whole length of their first album together. Robert Rowlands caught up with the pair to discuss age difference, the pros and cons of working on a collaborative project and how their calm soundscapes are much noisier than it seems.

How did the two of you end up collaborating?

Maurizio Bianchi: I’ve been in touch with Emanuela since 2004 and I was fascinated because she was the only woman in Italy who is involved in the experimental field; I decided to propose a collaboration between us, and she accepted. I sent her some basic sounds, she added her treatments and sent back everything to me for me to do the final loops treatment.

Emanuela De Angelis: We got in touch by e-mail. Maurizio sent me some of his tapes. I sampled and “played” with them and sent him a CD with some tracks that he manipulated and remixed.

One of you is twenty years younger than the other. How easy or difficult is it for two people of different musical generations to work together?

MB: No difficulties at all when you have the same intentions and the same feelings.

EDA: I didn’t feel uncomfortable at all about our age or musical experience difference. Maurizio is such a respectful and easy going person!

What have you both learnt about each other from working together?

MB: I learnt that with honesty, loyalty and perseverance you can be successful.

EDA: Maurizio worked a lot for this record, he was constantly giving me strength and positive vibes about Regolelettroniche and that helped me feeling more confident about what I do with sound. He’s a very human and supporting person. Although we never met in person I immediately felt that this experience was more like ‘two human beings joining and playing with sound’ instead of being a matter of ‘two self-centred musicians trying to make some cool music’.

Has it changed your views on certain ideas or artists?

MB: It has increased my respect for them.

EDA: I think this is the kind of collaboration I like. When it works like that it’s just perfect to me.

If each of you were to describe the other’s personality, what would you say?

MB: I can perceive her from her musicality that Emanuela is very humble but determinate.

EDA: Like I said before I think that Maurizio is a very kind and respectful man, warm, honest, enthusiastic and positive.

The album seems very carefully put together. Are you both perfectionists in the studio?

MB: Usually not, but for this project I tried to be more precise, but not at an exasperated level.

EDA: I wish I could be a perfectionist! Actually I end up being instinctive and often I have to go back and correct my mistakes.

Does working in a collaboration make it easier or harder to produce an album?

MB: It’s not harder, just a little bit more longer.

EDA: I think that it’s easier because you have another point of view on the music and it is something very intriguing to see how different sounds and influences could blend together. Personally I enjoy working with other musicians’ sound sources because I tend to get stuck on the same samples I create. It could get difficult when it comes to compromise about something, but this happens in everyday life too, not only in a creative process, so it’s not a major problem.

I understand you came up with some rules before beginning this project. What were they, and why were they so important?

EDA: That was not set before of beginning this project. Maybe Maurizio could explain better than me…

MB: Because our whole existence is regulated by rules, without them there is only anarchy and a chaotic orgy.

Some people would prefer to improvise as they go along. Is it important to have a firm set of rules before making an album?

MB: The improvisation for me is the normality, but sometimes we need to regulate ourselves to be more conscious of our limits.

Is this an album that you could easily replicate in a live performance?

EDA: I don’t think so, and I think that if we ever perform live we won’t choose to replicate it exactly as it is. I guess it would be the same mood, but constructed differently.

I expected the album to be a lot noisier coming from two so-called noise artists. Why is the album so peaceful?

EDA: I think it’s quite noisy, actually. But I can see why you think it’s peaceful: the mood is peaceful, and it develops very slowly. It is probably because we both are fascinated by long cycles, like the one you have in nature.

There is a lot of repetition on the album. How important is that to your music?

MB: Repetition is all around us, starting from sunrise and sunset. Transposed to the music, repetition reminds us our need of eternity.

EDA: Well, music is about repetition (I think someone said this before me), so I think it is important in every kind of music: rock and roll, folk, electronic… I like to get lost in repetition when it seems like every loop has its own ‘weight’ and ‘meaning’ to the track structure. I’m often inspired by organic textures which are based on repetition.

How have people been reacting to this album?

MB: Very positively, I think.

EDA: Quite good I think. My dad said that it is music for films!

Will there be more collaborations between you?

EDA: We have been talking about it, so hopefully yes we will.

MB: Probably in the near future.

If you were to describe this record, what was the sound you were looking for?

MB: Meditative sounds for diligent people.

In terms of contemporaries, who are the artists you most admire and respect?

MB: All the artists who like to express their feelings without pressures.

EDA: Of course I admire K.H. Stockhausen, Steve Reich, David Toop and other big names… but this is a bit obvious, isn’t it? So I would like to mention a few ‘families’ of artist who are good musicians and very nice people: Baskaru, Highpoint Lowlife, Slow Sound System, Stasisfield, Active Suspension, 12k -Line. I always keep an eye on them and I recommend their music.

What about the state of modern music? Does it depress or excite you?

MB: It gives to me a sense of empty.

EDA: There are plenty of good musicians out there. When you start looking for something on the web, for instance, you find that a lot of unsigned bands and solo musicians (basically boys and girls in their rooms) are producing good stuff. They make their own website and pretty good visual design as well. I find that very exciting. On the other hand I know that it gets difficult to become a ‘professional’ musician when you have a full time job or when you have to look after you children. Just a few of them are truly motivated and/or could afford the amount of work/expenses that it involves. Most of the mainstream basically tends to depress me, because I find that there’s nothing new. Most bands just sound like a horrible mixture of already heard stuff wrapped in a new shiny pack.

There is a lot of talk about the future of the music industry at the moment because of the decline of CD sales. How do you think this will affect the underground or avant-garde music scenes?

MB: With the rise of album downloads, the underground scene received a big finishing blow. Only the intelligent labels will survive.

EDA: I think it will have some kind of bad effect somehow, I’m afraid. Most of the people are getting used to download, even when it comes to underground or avant-garde. It is hard for a small independent label to survive, people must know that some owners have a second job to help them with expenses. They do this because they love music and this should be more than a good reason to support them by buying their records and downloading MP3 legally.

What about the Italian music scene – are you excited by some of the music coming out of the country at the moment? If so, who?

MB: I respect artists like NIMH, MDT, TH26, Claudio Rocchetti, Crìa Cuervos.

EDA: There is quite a good underground scene in Italy and it is well supported by music magazines and radios shows like the ones broadcasted by Rai Radio 3 (Italian National Radio). I appreciate Baskaru’s Italian artists, but there are many others like friend Globster, Stefano Tedesco, Wang-inc that I like.

The music on Regolelettroniche sounds very distant from the hustle and bustle of modern life. Is it trying to escape from the harshness and discord of modern life?

EDA: It was not meant to be like that, but personally I often tend to escape from the chaos and pressure of modern life. I like to imagine my own ideal landscape or soundscape, reading and looking at pictures I like, so I think it could be possible that it affected the sound on the record.

MB: It’s a sophisticated way to redeem the lost souls.

Just from what I have read about you, you appear to both be very studious and serious musicians. Is this an accurate judgement?

MB: I can only tell you about me: I take every experiment I do very seriously, because it it my life.

EDA: I’m not that serious and studious, honestly. I think it’s my glasses’ fault: they make me look geekier than I am.

And finally, what are your five favourite pieces of music at the moment?

EDA: At the moment I’m listening a lot of Tunng, Belle and Sebastian, Nick Drake, Neil Young… so you can pick randomly five tracks from their discographies, really. I’m lazy!

Emanuela De Angelis | Baskaru

M.B. + E.D.A.
Regolelettroniche
KARU8
Baskaru 2008
04 Tracks. 47mins24secs

Born in 1955, Maurizio Bianchi is a long-standing member of the Italian experimental music scene. He debuted in 1979, and, until 1984, he released a considerable amount of work, but then withdrew from the music business completely as he entered a deeply religious and spiritual part of his life. He came out of retirement in 1997 and has since resumed a very productive work pace, with a mix of new releases and re-issues being made available. Twenty years Bianchi’s junior, Emanuela De Angelis first emerged as lead singer and guitarist with noise formation Joyce Whore Not in the early nineties and later founded Mou, Lips!, an experimental electronic project, with Andrea Gabriele, and has been working as a solo artist for over four years.

For their first collaboration, Bianchi and De Angelis create long and expensive drone-like forms, developed over the four tracks and nearly fifty minutes of Regolelettroniche, which vaguely translates into ‘electronic rules’, and which informs the record and sets its the boundaries. Indeed, the pair focus on processed textural loops, layered into vast cyclic suites, the longest of which, Cosmic Norms, covers twenty five minutes. Built around what sounds half way between processed electric guitar distortions and a medical ventilator, this centre piece defines the austere aesthetic of this collaboration. Very little happens during the whole piece beside a slight change in the opening of the filter and almost imperceptible variations in consistency, but this almost static state, when contemplated from afar, hides a depth of tone which justifies the track title.

Albeit shorter by half, Universal Order works according to similar rules and defines a comparable spiritual space where the mind is free to reflect or wander without obstacles or distractions. As the dense layers move imperceptibly and change shape, frequency and rhythm, the hypnotic character of these two compositions becomes more apparent.

Bookending these are two shorter compositions, Earthly Principle, the shortest of the four tracks at just under three minutes, and the six minute closing track, Electronic Rules. With these two pieces, Bianchi and De Angelis tie their vast soundscapes and slow moving drones into bite-size vignettes which, whilst still retaining some of the motion stillness elements explored in the two core compositions, do away with the slow progressive approach. While this is especially true of the former, the dark atmospherics of the latter conjure images of desolate landscapes and, surprisingly for artists who come from a region where the sun plays such an important part in everyday life, eternal nights. Incidentally, Electronic Rules is also the point where M.B. + E.D.A. get closest to conventional ambient electronica, evoking in part Biosphere or Deathprod.

With Regolelettroniche, Maurizio Bianchi and Emanuela De Angelis have produced a much more serene record than what they respective work could have led to think, and this composed restraint, at times palpable, is possibly the greatest strength of this collaboration, as it actually carries the restricted scope and focus of the compositions and fuels their apparent immobility.

3.8/5

Emanuela De Angelis | Baskaru
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