Apselutely FⱯKT

05/04/2024

Today, the soundtrack to «The Discoverer of the Discoverers» is out on Bandcamp!

https://shorturl.at/wzJSX

It was supposed to come out digitally on every music platform in the world (bar Russia). But we cocked it up, and for another week or so the EP will solely be available on Bandcamp. Which happens to be our favourite platform. Think of it as a ‘Bandcamp exclusive’!

This score is the backbone of the short documentary, and has been mixed anew, especially for this release.

The five pieces are built on skeletal samples of vintage wax cylinders, gramophones and early field recordings, fleshed out with additional synth overdubs and computer effects. The loops—sourced from historic recordings connected in some way or other to the places, people or times in the story—hold hidden references. Although you don’t need to get these to understand the film, they do add layers and detail. The aim was not to make this film worth watching once—difficult enough as that is—but to make repeated viewings increasingly rewarding.

There’s more about the soundtrack and its samples on the Bandcamp page, and yet more information on the film’s website:

https://www.apselutelyfakt.com/soundtrack

Although all of these pieces were made specifically for a film, hopefully they work as music on their own. Certainly, if you’re partial to old audio distorted through the lens of our current age—we’re talking deconstruction of the haughty products of Western civilisation here!—I daresay you’ll simply adore this.

5 track album

10/07/2023

16 July will see a special screening of «The Discoverer of the Discoverers» in Brazil—its first in the southern hemisphere.

Experimental Brasil is showing the short documentary to a select audience in an abandoned sugar cane mill in Campos dos Goytacazes, Rio de Janeiro State’s «capital of oil and sugar».

Not only is a screening in Brazil highly apposite for a film that deals, in part, with the expansionism of Europe in general and Portugal in particular; it is also very fitting that a documentary that looks at the origin story of the Atlantic slave trade and colonialism is being show in a space whose previous function was to produce plantation white sugar. The fact that the mill is abandoned—and yet to be gentrified or sponsored by some ministry of culture—only adds flavour to this no-budget film, which was made in a decidedly, defiantly «financially unviable» manner that’d make hardened capitalists and idealistic bureacurats alike shed salty discharges from their rational, utilitarian eyes.

Experimental Brasil is a new, unaffiliated festival with an uncompromising take on bringing films to audiences—one that seems less stale than that of film festivals focussed on politically appropriate posturing while conducting business as usual. (European elites role-playing the underdog, etc.) I’m excited to have «The Discoverer of the Discoverers» be a part of something actually independent, and not «indie». You should check it out.

06/07/2023

Happy birthday to music producer, big drummer boy, synthesizer fingerer, boom operator (coast to coast, LA to Chicago) and sound engineer extraordinaire, Stian Kjelstad Granmo, seen here listening intently to acoustics on location in Benin.

03/07/2023

Just finished a film this weekend that may or may not see a release.

13/06/2023

I’m thrilled to announce that «The Discoverer of the Discoverers» is setting out on her virgin voyage of exploration: Revelation Film Festival in Perth, Australia has officially selected the short for its 26th edition!

It seems fitting that a doc dealing with colonialism and globalism will have its first screening abroad in a land marked by European imperialism. On a personal note, I’m proud to see the film premiere internationally at a festival that has hosted expanded cinema performances by Einstürzende Neubauten’s Alexander Hacke, Sonic Youth’s Lee Ranaldo, and Lawrence English, to name a few. Crispin Glover has been there… They’ve screened docs about Negativland… John Fahey… Bruce LaBruce! And this year, thee Soda Jerk will be in attendance.

I couldn’t possibly ask for better homes for this odd little short than Revelation Perth International Film Festival and, come September, the Chicago Underground Film Festival. For a few years now, most pairs of eyes giving my work a look have been blank stares. Perhaps it should come as no surprise that the «scene» that influenced me is the one that gets what I’m aiming for with this flick. Still, what a relief that *somebody* out there is wearing similar goggles. Turns out if you just yell into the void and stare into the abyss long enough, the abyss answers back, «Come on in, the void’s fine!»

Wadda revelation. And on that note: Thank you, Perth International Film Festival!

Watch «The Discoverer of the Discoverers» splashed out in all its celluloid, surround sound glory on 17 July at 7 pm, paired with Sean Wilsey’s feature doc IX XI.

05/04/2023

Well, well, well… Guess which little film has somehow found its way into the market catalogue of one of the most renowned documentary festivals on the planet, ?

Apparently, «The Discoverer of the Discoverers» caught the attention of the Swiss giant’s selection committee «for its international sales potential»(!). Not words I was expecting to hear about my somewhat experimental film, but I sure ain’t gonna argue. Everybody should buy it!

From today, 800 industry movers & shakers are invited to watch «The Discoverer of the Discoverers». Hopefully, one—no, lots of them—will decide that everyone else should have the chance to experience it as well. Write your MP! Call your local congresswoman!

So, crossing fingers and gritting teeth here. Let’s see if this motivational self-help stuff about «manifesting» actually works…

-market ́lɛɛé

08/04/2022

It’s that time of year again, when Mondo Gonzo’s very own handy hunk, meticulous sound recordist and all-round .stjern, completes another tour around ye olde sun.

Grattis, kiiis!

We’d have nothing without you.

Photo:

29/01/2022

Happy birthday to fixer extraordinaire and star of our documentary-in-progress, ! Here she is in her grandfather’s bedroom inside Singbomey, the mansion and compound built by her ancestor Francisco Félix «Chacha» de Souza (1754-1849), a/k/a «the Viceroy of Ouidah». The bedpost in the photo is part of the bed once owned by the Chacha’s first wife, a princess of Glidji called Mama Ahossi («ahossi» meaning queen).

18/01/2022

The third film scoring session with producer/multi-instrumentalist was rudely interrupted by residual gusts and aftershocks from Storm Gyda. We had to evacuate the bunker(!) and move equipment to the guest room at Stian’s place up by the forest, where our postmodern sampling of modernist music made his Rottweiler dance in his sleep.