Machine Dreams - album out now!
by Caitlin Rowley
Today sees the release of our first album consisting entirely of Cyborg Soloists-commissioned pieces - Machine Dreams, by Zubin Kanga on the Nonclassical label, is out now in download, CD and streaming formats.
Inspired by cyborgs and other sci-fi themes, this ten-track album features music from a host of internationally acclaimed experimental and cutting-edge composers. Machine Dreams draws together classic synthesizers and pioneering sensor technology, unlocking new possibilities in music-making through interactions with AI and machine learning; interactive visuals; motion and biosensors; and new hybrid instruments.
The album's ten tracks feature works by Alex Paxton, Tansy Davies, Alex Groves, Nwando Ebizie, Robin Haigh, Jasmin Kent Rodgman, CHAINES, Amble Skuse, Ben Nobuto and Zubin himself. The technologies used produce an array of unique sounds and textures:
Alex Paxton's joyful and manic Car-Pig, combines three sampler keyboards packed with different sounds from choirs, to bagpipes to animal noises.
Tansy Davies’ Star-Way is a walk across a sacred mountain top, a plateau, at night, gazing up at the canopy of the heavens far above. Davies uses arpeggiators and delays to create waves of pulsing sounds across the instrument.
Alex Groves’ Single Form (Swell) is a sensuous ocean of sound, building gradually shifting loops into mesmerising textures that are morphed and shaped using ROLI's LUMI keyboards.
Nwando Ebizie’s I Will Fix Myself (Just Circles) explores Kanga’s relationship to the piano, combining interview materials and AI-generated speech with a Moog synth and complex Afrofuturist electronic textures in an exploration of the performer’s body and technique.
Robin Haigh’s Morrow uses a TouchKeys keyboard from Augmented Instruments Lab to create a virtual piano that rethinks the instrument's approach to touch, varying the speed and volume of repeating piano samples in response to the slightest changes of position on the key.
Jasmin Kent Rodgman combines MiMU motion-sensing gloves, table objects, tape players and modular synths with light sensors in one hundred random demons, a work inspired by Japanese folklore where tools and manmade objects have acquired a kami or spirit, becoming tsukumogami.
CHAINES moulds masses of sound in Escape TERF Island, using ROLI LUMI keyboards and Lightblocks and samples that range from gross bodily sounds to ethereal heavenly electronics.
Amble Skuse’s Interiterations uses MiMU sensor gloves to shape electronics through gestures in the air. Skuse has developed a sophisticated practice using the MiMU gloves as a disabled artist, using the gesture control in unique ways that allow the performer to spontaneously explore sonic spaces.
Zubin Kanga’s Metamemory is a dialogue between his real and artificial music memories. Loading AI-generated memories of his own past recordings from across the piano canon into a keyboard sampler, he combines this with an analogue synthesizer to explore the transformations of these works that are both monstrous and strangely beautiful.
Ben Nobuto uses a TouchKeys keyboard alongside other keyboards and Kanga’s voice in Bad Infinity, a playful rhythmic study in which speech rhythms combine with samplers to create a cyborg composite.
Machine Dreams pushes the boundaries of what is possible with just a piano and redefines what it means to be a performer through interactions with new technologies. Hear it now at Bandcamp or on your favourite streaming platform.
If you're in London, hear Zubin performing all the works on the album live at the album launch event on 21 April at Rich Mix in Shoreditch. This performance will also include a set by Zöllner-Roche duo which includes the premiere of Joe Snape's Cyborg-Soloists commissioned piece Signs of Life. Book your tickets here →