Thursday, November 4, 2021

MICHELLE LUONG - "june 16th, 2019" (FS002 Foreign Soil Field Recordings)

We are suddenly in Michelle's bedroom, which is more than a physical space. It is a mindspace where her poetic reflections are augmented by guzheng, a chinese zither plucked (and also presumably bowed). Her poetry is a casual-yet-important snapshot of perhaps her experience as an asian american not-man in an american landscape- a landscape overrun with disconnection, toxicity, illness, and colonialism, where the digital selfie is considered currency. Michelle's work on this tape has us transcending this type of currency and keeps us "current", in the moment; abiding within this expansive moment through droning strings and plucked tonal flurries that swarm and envelope her poetry in and out and all around like clouds on a mountaintop. A cat's meow punctuates the plastic satori while her music lets us let our guard down; meanwhile her poetry slices deep into the peachflesh state of experienced reality, both individual and collective. These incisions release bursts of guzheng radiations, stringy clouds comprised of bliss, frustration, pause, reflection, observation; things Michelle conveys in such beautifully direct ways. Foreign Soil Field Recordings is the collection of Katie Shlon (former baltimorean and eternal member of the immortal free music collective MEMS, which also includes Michelle in its roster of personel) and features mostly recordings poetry and experimental tendencies from in and around the baltimore area. Treat yourself to these amazing "field recordings of all things growing."

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