Recent-era sampler collages of a top-notch sort highlighted by two tracks of virtual audio–one for headphones, the other for speakers–that place the works in a physical sphere of sound all around you and even through you. Exact speaker placement and seating arrangement are necessary. With a sampler, Gwiazda captures the sounds of everyday life: a man eating chips, an airplane flying overhead, birds chirping, etc. and combines them at various times with guitar, violin, flute, etc. into “warmly familiar” heavy-duty napkins of sonic abstraction. “Gwiazda himself likes to point out that his sounds aren’t ‘environmental.’ Today, we hear muzak in the environment around us, while Gwiazda takes sounds we no longer hear and serves them back as music, as though noise and music had changed places. It’s clear that in Gwiazda’s sound-world, noises are just noises, arranged for their sonic value. If his music reminds you of anyone else at all, it might be that architect of sonic abstractions Edgard Varèse. But, while Varèse’s components are cold, harsh, machine-like; Gwiazda’s are so warmly familiar that they can’t help but set the listener’s imagination in motion. For all its surreality, this sound-world pulls you in and touches you—where you live.”—Kyle Gann

Label: Innova Catalog Number: innova 505 Format: CD Packaging: Jewel case Tracks: 8 Total Time: 63:31 Country: United States Released: 1996 Related Artists: Luc Ferrari, John Oswald, Pierre Schaeffer More: Official, Wikipedia