Laurie Anderson & Kronos Quartet - Landfall

Nonesuch Records releases Laurie Anderson and Kronos Quartet’s Landfall. The piece, which was inspired by Anderson’s experience of Hurricane Sandy, is the first collaboration between the iconic storyteller/musician and the groundbreaking string quartet, who perform together on the recording. Landfall juxtaposes lush electronics and strings with Anderson’s powerful descriptions of loss, from water-logged pianos to disappearing animal species to Dutch karaoke bars.

Kronos Quartet and Laurie Anderson have performed Landfall at commissioning presenters Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center, Adelaide Festival, Barbican Centre, Montclair State University, Perth International Arts Festival, Stanford Live, and the University of Texas at Austin, among other venues. The New York Times said the piece’s presentation at Brooklyn Academy of Music ‘set the auditorium awash in elegiac string sounds and postmillennial gloom. Performed by the composer and the tirelessly innovative Kronos Quartet, the work, written in New York during that epic storm, often resembled the flotsam bobbing on the receding floodwaters, with poignant snippets and small treasures.'

“These are stories with tempos,” Anderson says. “I’ve always been fascinated by the complex relationship of words and music whether in song lyrics, supertitles or voice over.  In Landfall, instruments initiate language through our new text software, erst.  The blend of electronic and acoustic strings is the dominant sound of Landfall.  Much of the music in this work is generated from the harmonies and delays of unique software designed for the solo viola and reinterpreted for the quartet.  In addition, there were elements of the optigan, a keyboard that uses information stored on optical discs.”

 Kronos Quartet founder, artistic director, and violinist David Harrington says, “Laurie Anderson is the master magician musician who has always inhabited those secret places where technology has personality, where ‘real time’ is questioned and where all the elements of performance meet and combine into music.  Her process is to gather and continue to gather potentially useful aspects as she sculpts a shape.  Her sense of play and fun and her continuous experimenting make her the ideal chemist (or is it alchemist?) in the laboratory of music.”

TRACK LISTING

1. CNN Predicts a Monster Storm 
2. Wind Whistles Through the Dark City 
3. The Water Rises 
4. Our Street Is a Black River 
5. Galaxies 
6. Darkness Falls 
7. Dreams 
8. Dreams Translated 
9. The Dark Side 
10. Built You a Mountain 
11. The Electricity Goes out and We Move to a Hotel 
12. We Learn to Speak Yet Another Language 
13. Dawn of the World 
14. The Wind Lifted the Boats and Left Them on the Highway 
15. It Twisted the Street Signs 
16. Then It Receded 
17. The Nineteen Stars of Heaven 
18. Nothing Left but Their Names 
19. All the Extinct Animals 
20. Galaxies II 
21. Never What You Think It Will Be 
22. Thunder Continues in the Aftermath 
23. We Blame Each Other for Losing the Way 
24. Another Long Evening 
25. Riding Bicycles Through the Muddy Streets 
26. Helicopters Hang Over Downtown 
27. We Head Out 
28. Everything Is Floating 
29. Gongs and Bells Sing 
30. Old Motors and Helicopters

PRODUCT DETAILS

Artist:  Laurie Anderson & Kronos Quartet
Label:  Pluto
Condition:  New 
Genre:  Indie & Alternative

Format:  Vinyl LP
Cat Number:  564164-1
Released:  16 February 2018