embodying formlessness, by xu

embodying formlessness

by xu

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glumburger Gentle acoustic elements blend into electronic warbles, creating a beautiful lullaby of ambience. What a lovely thing to behold Favorite track: no mud no lotus.

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Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album
This special limited edition release is in a run of 100 copies, modelled around the classic gatefold vinyl LP. It includes printed front, rear and inner sleeves featuring photography from Peter Nejedly, along with a card sleeve which houses a printed vinyl-effect CDr.

Includes unlimited streaming of embodying formlessness via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.

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Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.

Purchasable with gift card

£7 GBP or more
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Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Water like mbira, floatings, petrologist's lens, First Beast, veils, floating world - reflections on 36 views of newland island, Missing The Crows, What Remains, and 175 more. , and , .

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1.	cloud hands (in) 03:55	buy track
2.	rain and leaves 05:24	buy track
3.	equipoise 06:13	buy track
4.	i plead birds 04:10	buy track
5.	no mud no lotus 06:35	buy track
6.	cloud hands (out) 05:08	buy track

about

With our next release we welcome back Nicola Fornasari who is one half of La Petite Vague, a project which we’ve almost exclusively supported across Whitelabrecs and our sister label Audio Gourmet. Nicola also records solo work as Xu, with material released through labels such as Eilean, Cathedral Transmissions and most recently, Manyfeetunder.

The next album in the Xu catalog is ‘Embodying Formlessness’, which Nicola created by recording improvisations performed on his daughter Nina’s toy ukulele and then setting these into non-synchronised loops. These were made by using various pedals by experimenting with ‘blind looping’, a technique used to create unpredictable variations of a certain loop. Additional sounds were layered into the compositions by adding minibrute parts which were also fed into effects pedals and these provide an array of high and low frequencies.
The resulting sound throughout the six tracks that encompass this album is one of a tactile minimalism and the sound itself is a representation of the concept.

In the period during which Embodying Formlessness was created, Nicola was studying the Two Truths, fundamental points developed by Buddhist philosopher Nāgārjuna. These consist of Relative Truth, which is the conventional way in which we perceive reality and Absolute Truth, which is the theory that objects and events have no intrinsic existence and no individual identity, except in our thoughts. Both perspectives are true and neither intellectual position is the correct one. So in summary, phenomena are both real and not real; things exist, yet nothing exists.
There is a sentence in the Heart Sutra which inspired the title for this album:
Form is no other than emptiness; emptiness no other than form. Form is exactly emptiness; emptiness exactly form.

Embodying Formlessness sets out a short collection of existential pieces, crafted from the random placement of melodic source material, adorned with subtle electronics. This provides an ideal backdrop to contemplate the theme of the Two Truths, as you try to separate the difference of what is real and what is perceived.

credits

released September 14, 2019

Written and produced by Nicola Fornasari
Mastered by Tim Diagram
Photography by Peter Nejedly
Packaging design by Harry Towell

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about

Whitelabrecs England, UK

Whitelabrecs is an experimental record label established in 2016, specialising in highly limited runs of vinyl-effect CDrs and occasional digital-only editions. The discography focuses on contemporary Ambient music, including Drone, Modern Classical and Electro Acoustic. ... more

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