Adern X

Summer Twilight Autumn Dawn

Originally conceived for a radio diffusion in 2013, the track is based around three distinct development lines (a bunch of loops, some field recordings and layered samples) as a form of dialectic between memory, time and change. While reworking the audio spectrum and editing the track, I became aware of how memory is essentially an aesthetical rewriting of facts and editing is the grammar of it. So, if history is a description then memory is an interpretation.

Summer Twilight Autumn Dawn

“When summer ends there’s a distinct sense of loss”, writes Andrea Piran (alias Adern X) to introduce the grounds of his newest release. Right on target: the choking hurt he’s referring to is the same that affects your thumbsucking host during selected late afternoons, ever since he was a naive puppy. These things are laughable for those who seek brainless amusement at all costs, but upsettingly obvious to people not captivated by ordinary social activities designed to escape from the clutch of authentic recognition. That which is dangerous.

The above quoted “distinct sense of loss” is (preposterously, but not too much) rendered by Adern X via sonic amorphousness and insubstantial mnemonic imagery. Through confluences of samples, field recordings and loops, Piran dissolves the core of a “what next?” frame of mind not deprived of consternation. There are no established contours or immediately recognizable references in his poetics, in spite of some reiterative passages remindful of William Basinski’s balladry of decay. It’s not mere emulation: just a compositional shade, soon encircled and assimilated by the disfigured essence of other appearances.

Thus don’t be surprised to find several flashes closely recalling the indiscernible, yet unambiguous acoustic ghosts perceived as we’re lying on a beach; the screaming voices of children at play are a classic in that regard. Most of all – and with a degree of relief on behalf of the reviewer – Adern X eschews the mellifluousness of phoney romanticism. He simply puts the fruits of long moments of rumination into a mechanism that triturates any association one may attempt to recycle. Although the logic underneath is extremely clear this music is not so easy to empathize with, should anyone expect a so-called “linearity”. However, the vulnerability of a sensitive being does not need that. It’s a fragile gift reserved to chosen addressees, hopefully not destined to be sold for opportunistic aspirations in the only life we were given. By pure chance, bad calculation, or out-and-out misfortune.

Review by: Massimo Ricci (https://touchingextremes.wordpress.com/2018/02/12/adern-x-summer-twilight-autumn-dawn/)