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| AGP145 is another in
our occasional series of found avant-garde: sounds that are not
organized in modern art works but that I have for years listened to in
the same spirit as I listen to electracoustic music. This one is a 24-bit transcription of an LP on Hungaroton records (SLPX 19213), featuring sublime recordings of Hungarian steam locomotives. These are by far the best recordings I have ever heard of steam locomotives, and includes the sounds of the steam engines themselves, together with the clanking and squealing of metal on metal, birds, dogs, insects, and other ambient sounds. If you have doubts about this as legitimate avant-garde "composition", I refer you to Luciano Berio's definition of music as anything one listens to with the intention of listening to music, and to Luc Ferrari's classic electroacoustic work "Presque Rien No. 1", which is not categorically different in approach from these intriguing recordings. The LP is an excellent pressing in excellent condition, with negligible surface noise or tracking distortion. The installment includes a ZIP archive file with scans of the booklet that came with the LP, including images of all of the locomotives recorded, descriptions of their manufacturing history, and in some cases descriptions of the activities recorded. To download
AGP145 files, right-click on each of the following links and select
SAVE
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