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Knob twiddling explored. David Toop’s Haunted Weather is a journey into the arcane world of the Japanese knob twiddlers, European squat “happenings” and laptop techno experimentation that constitutes the avant garde... But the avant garde what, precisely? Music? Sound performance? Noise? Well, exploring these elusive definitions and their constraints is partially what this eclectic book is about.Part travelogue, part memoir, part academic investigation, it’s a wide ranging affair, as befits the ever increasing possibilities in the world of sound. Questions about the philosophical nature of silence, and the gains and losses of digital music (as opposed to the more human performative processes of traditional instruments), are offset by images of the author enjoying peace and quiet over a beer at home, or appreciating an airport soundscape. Though Toop can sometimes be frustratingly impenetrable and free associative in his musical descriptions (“rebellion, overload, bathos, fury, tension, immolation... Fred MacMurray’s raincoat... pink panties glimpsed in Shinjuku”), for the casual sonic tourist, Haunted Weather is ultimately well worth the ride. Haunted Weather: Music, Silence And Memory by David Toop is out now, published by Serpent’s Tail.
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