The fifth of the six Islands discs Crude Rotation, by Dean Santomieri, explores techniques of musique concrète with it's five compositions.

"I view my sound collage work as a species of poetry," writes Santomieri. "It is made up of elements from the real world mixed with or processed by analog synthesizers. I have recorded many different sounds: trains, subways, footsteps in the snow, water, table lamps, museum exhibits, lectures, friends and family, and radio broadcasts, and I combine bits of these field recordings with my synthesizers, re-contextualizing them into a new arrangements. Once the sounds are freed from their prosaic confines, their poetic sense can be discovered. A piece is successful when it works on the listener like a poem."

These five tracks utilize a number of sources, suggesting any number of forgotten moments and lost daydreams. Gram mo phone explores the topology of the vinyl record, employing, among other devices, mechanical/analog skipping and its digital counterpart. In a lighter vein, Ears & Whiskers creates a playful space in which the impositions of time, narrative, counting, and learning to use the bathroom contrast the glorious haphazard clumsiness of infancy. Ati Noko, centered around a Santomieri penned poem, weaves a spell where a vocoder alternatively reshapes the sound of trains with voices and synthesizers. The fourth track, Rite of Springs, investigates the internal workings of the clock of history. Sound sources separated by thousands of miles and many years work together in Peach Skin Crayon to remind us of the wonders of radio, spirituality and pizza. "God's skin is 'peach' colored, because God is a blend of all races," the gospel according to a wise five year-old boy.

Dean Santomieri has been working with electronic music and musique concrete since 1971, as well as creating multi-image pieces, super-8 and 16mm films and videos. In recent years Santomieri formed the performing duo Donkey Boy (with Luther Bradfute in 1995) and the baroque performance group Theater of Memory (with Joyce Todd in 1996). Donkey Boy employed live electronic music, slides or video, story-telling, costumes, and props in their many Bay Area performances. In 1998 Santomieri formed a multi-media group with musicians Bruce Anderson, Karen Stackpole and David Kwan, for live performance of his short stories (narration accompanied by live music and video). This ensemble's first show, The Boy Beneath the Sea, was performed numerous times in the Bay Area, and has been recorded for CD release. Since 1997 Santomieri has also been performing with Malcolm Mooney and the Tenth Planets (Mooney was the original singer with the German progressive-rock group Can), providing electronics and guitar.

This CD is available through the following sources, as well as directly from the Archipelago; Amoeba Music (US), Aquarius Records (US), Drum Machine Museum (US), and CD Services (Scotland), with more outlets to be announced.

Coming soon...