Tetreault, Martin

Snipettes!

Label: Ambiances Magnetiques Country: Canada

Montreal experimental turntablist and Ambiances Magnetiques collective member Martin Tétreault in a reissue of his early 1992 cassette releases, originally issued in limited and numbered editions of 250.

" Snipettes! 1991-1992.

It had already been two years since the release of Des pas et des mois (AM 017 CD). Given the surprise success of that first CD, I was looking for a way to make another studio work with the help of precious acolytes. The experience with René Lussier, Michel F Côté & Co. had been so stimulating, I wanted to push my explorations further down that path. But production costs, way too high at the time, forced me to abandon this idea early on.

And so I began to hunt for a virtual back-up band. What I was mostly looking for was a rhythm section with whom I could perform various kinds of solos by borrowing from techniques I had previously developed on the turntable. After numerous auditions, I finally selected Eddie Osborne, Baldwin Organ & Bongos (Audio Fidelity asfd 5974). It was the perfect record: the instrumentation was simple - organ and percussion - and the songbook (popular music) easy to recognize. And as a bonus, I still had a soft spot for the ballroom melodies I had featured on Des Pas et des Mois (AM 017 CD).

So I made this LP my own, at a time when the sampling issue was heatedly debated. It was the early '90s. After a few work-outs with this new invisible orchestra, the idea came to me of pairing this record of instrumental popular music with what seemed to me its complete opposite: contemporary music and musique concrète. A wonderful musical fantasy we rarely get the chance to witness, either on record or on stage The collaboration took place side by side, between two record players (an automatic Garrard and a belt-driven Thorens) and a careful selection of instrumental records of serious music, easy to find at ridiculously low prices back in the '80s. Of course, it was all second-hand. Tracks 2 through 10 present the fruits of this historical meeting. Eddie Osborne is featured on all tracks but track 4.

Morceaux choisis 1984-1986.

As its title implies, Morceaux choisis (Selected Pieces) is a collection of various experimental works recorded between 1984 and 1986. Back then, I had no knowledge of recording and editing techniques. I was using reel-to-reel tape recorders acquired here and there without paying attention to their condition. I was also salvaging pre-recorded magnetic tape bougth the same way. You could say that it was a very "low-tech" recycling operation. This reissue retains all the original awkwardness. The only change I made happens in track 23 _Fear No. 3, where the spoken fragment "... d'arrêter votre magnétophone..." ("... to stop your tape player...") has become "... votre lecteur de disque compact..." ("... your CD player..."), a necessary adjustment for this CD reissue."-Martin Tétreault