Ukrainian electronic artist Zavoloka produced an experimental sound piece accompanied by selected speech fragments from Olimpia Splendid, Ali Gul Pir, Ethiopian Records, Graeme Miller and Leila who expressed their thoughts on the subject of loneliness. What we hear is an acoustically rich dynamic minimalism of narrative soundscapes. Strong beats which turns text into meditation, powerful bass which converts speech into contemporary mantra. From the Norient exhibition Seismographic Sounds.

Loneliness (Introduction from Seismographic Sounds)

Loneliness: the stereotypical topic when western societies are being discussed. Around the clock we are sitting alone in front of computer screens, or we are rushing through the city center carrying headphones. Now everyone is an artist, an individual, someone great; within online social networks this self-staging is taken to the extreme and many of us are suffering from burnout. Despite all of this, the phenomenon of loneliness remains ambiguous: sometimes it stands for separation and is considered dangerous, and other times it is an escape from the chaos of everyday life. In music, orchestras face economizing and festivals prefer to book DJs and solo entertainers instead of bands with a large number of members. The world’s musical hits and trends are often created in bedrooms and living rooms, where musicians exchange files online without meeting and jamming together. Music videos continue to periodically write the great master narrative of European loneliness. At the psychologist’s office, in the supermarket, or in a rainy downtown city we encounter lonely and lost people everywhere. But in this chapter, we also learn about musicians’ (successful) strategies for alleviating loneliness: by touring in American DIY communities or – paradoxically – on the Internet.