I TRENI INERTI – Luz Azul

Flexion

Similarly to an old work by Cremaster – 32,41 n/m² on Absurd – Luz Azul comes lodged in a folded sandpaper sheet. And, just like the duo of Alfredo Costa Monteiro and Ruth Barberán (respectively accordion and trumpet, both augmented by unspecified objects), it is named with a palindrome, also the case of their 2004 CD Aérea on Creative Sources. The newest release is indeed very welcome: not only because I have always admired the compelling modesty of the Iberian characters but also for the background chosen, involuntarily connected with my own past. As already mentioned in other writeups, an incalculable number of afternoons and nights during the early times of this writer’s life were accompanied by the remote rolling noise of carriages and wagons. A reverberation that still rings inside the memory: whenever someone decides to use it as a sonic shade, a nostalgic sigh comes out. The pair chose an olive orchard near a railway junction as a setting for their musical performance, which remains pretty much confined within the realm of long exhalations of tones enhanced by assorted kinds of metallic vibration. The freight trains running along the instrumental activity complement – occasionally, overwhelm – the now warm, now raspy subtlety of the pitches. In the quieter sections, the whooshing mildness of that September night wraps the environment, thus adding further layers of impermanence to an evocative wholeness. One wonders if the train operators were able to take a look at what was happening in that field, probably remaining puzzled after having being testimonies to a curious nocturnal perspective.