Album Review: Passages
Album Review: Franck Martin – Passages
May 4, 2022
Elise Mills
Modular synthesist Franck Martin has immersed himself in the SF modular synthesizer scene over the past 10 years. As of March 2022, his latest dark ambient album Passages is available in its entirety, reviewed here. In Elise’s words, “the clash of sounds disturb at first, then climax into a cacophonous symphony– the sounds themselves are no longer singular subdivisions but render an eclectic patchworked landscape, revealing a gestalt much more than the sum of its craggy parts.” Support and follow his work on Bandcamp, Youtube, and Instagram.
Album artwork via Bandcamp
Franck Martin’s latest release Passages immediately reminds me of the sound design from the first 10 minutes of the 1985 cult film and animated cinematic masterpiece Night On the Galactic Railroad. Similarly metaphysical in nature, in sound and in feel, to me, Franck Martin’s album is the distorted sister of Haroumi Hosono’s haunting soundtrack. Martin sets an ethereal, austere atmosphere, cultivated by intentionally “placed” sound within a larger sense of timelessness and spatial expansion. While Passages was inspired by its album artwork, where the sun breaks through the clouds from a serene, coastal viewpoint, the album was produced in reaction to Franck Martin’s personal health complications amidst the uncertainties of the early pandemic days.
“They say the only thing that does not change is change. The sun passing through the clouds, the right imagery for Passages. The world will be different after covid-19. We are also on a path of self ecological destruction. It is a passage for humanity. I poured this mood, these emotions into this music.”
Though “dark ambient” is an apt descriptor for Martin’s music, Passages is in many ways a natural friend to many of the early French musique concrete experimental compositions. The voices that emerge ominously in Part V remind me of Else Marie Pade’s “Faust” from 1962, as the clash of sounds disturb at first, then climax into a cacophonous symphony– the sounds themselves are no longer singular subdivisions, but render an eclectic patchwork-ed landscape, revealing a gestalt much more than the sum of its craggy parts.
With consistent sound reiterations that naturally flow in and out of consciousness, by the end of the journey, you are convinced by the reconstructed reality that Franck Martin has brewed for your listening pleasure. The patch floats in and alongside your consciousness, disrupting your brain chemistry and exposing you to subtle change, often pushing the bounds of typical “ambient” music. As it goes with modular works in general, Passages is less of an “album” than it is one long-form continuous work forced into parts due to file limitations on most music platforms. It should be listened to from start to finish, so as to hear the entire evolution of the patch into cosmic, even demonic, depths.
Photo courtesy of Franck Martin, taken by Jasmine Ali
In Franck Martin’s words, modular synthesis is “organic, improvisational, sometimes guided. It’s more about becoming acquainted with the patch. And then you can slow down and be with the music and with the audience, being in the moment. Modular is not about being reproducible.”
This piece builds upon a fledgling synth patch that Martin had been working on since his submission to NPR Tiny Desk over the last year. Thus, Passages is the culmination of that early work, perfected into this beautifully haunting piece of music that buzzes in and around your ears, vying for the listener’s attention. Slightly off-kilter, over the course of the piece you may succumb to the patch’s own distinct rhythm and world.
Photo courtesy of Franck Martin, taken by Matt Biddulph
For Franck Martin’s work specifically, this sense of space is uniquely accentuated by the use of quadraphonic recording, where sounds can be “placed” among four channels instead of two, where the components of unwelcome (?) dissonances can thrive distinctly in its own space without muddling, layering across timbral differences into the piece’s own kind of wholeness. Inspired by Suzanne Ciani’s employ of quadraphonic recording at Gray Area’s Buchla memorial concert series, Martin knew that this was his recording medium of choice.
By using quadraphonic recording technology, Martin allows for the musical dissonances in Passages to absolve potential complications of clashing from typical mixes, aligning in ways where the dissonance is distant, sometimes unrelated, yet forged together in a sensical manner due to there being literally more space between the sounds moving: “It’s easier to place your sound in quadraphonic space. You have four speakers to play with, easier to mix sounds that don’t layer together as easily.” Martin describes how regardless of the tools used to achieve a certain atmosphere, modular or otherwise, the tools are ever significant for the emotion that music creates: “Music is a feeling, you don’t really remember the tools but you remember the emotions.”
“You really feel your space. It’s like a blanket. I have trouble explaining it to people. In music, it’s a feeling. When you go to a movie [...], a 3d movie, do you remember that the movie was in 3d? You remember the story, you remember there was emotion for you. But you don’t remember necessarily that it was in 3d or the sound was around you. But that contributed to your emotions.”
Passages is music that holds a weight, a necessary one, as we resentfully accept the present and future of our uncertain times, treading deeper and deeper into the unknown of this absolute global mess that we are living in. While the work is best listened to with a compatible 5.1 audio listening set up, the Bandcamp rendering is just as profound of a listening experience. Give it a deep listen on Bandcamp.
You can follow along with Franck Martin’s modular projects by subscribing to his Bandcamp mailing list and his Youtube channel, and following him on Instagram. Recently, he also participated in an impressive 4-day modular retreat and performance series in the desert. You can purchase Passages via Bandcamp or, if you are equipped for it, listen to it in its ideal quadraphonic form via Surround Music.
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Photo courtesy of Franck Martin, taken by Korey Luna
Elise is a recovering 2020 graduate, sound artist, and noise lover born and raised in San Francisco. Especially interested in the metaphysicality of sound, she spends her time attempting to prototype DIY synthesizers and experimenting with (and lamenting!) the whims of magnetic tape, among other experimental electronic projects.