Three soundtracks to movies from sound artist Eric La Casa, developed for directors Luke Fowler, Christian Jaccard and Marie-Christine Navarro, organizing sounds from field recordings, with Navarro's soundtrack complemented by organ recordings from Jean-Luc Guionnet.
"By now it seems that Eric La Casa is someone who is a fixed artist for the Herbal International label. Soundtracks might be his fourth release on this label and as the title suggests these are soundtracks to movies. Three soundtracks to be precise. A film by the ever obscure Luke Fowler, a video by Christian Jaccard and a 'drama' by Marie-Christine Navarro. Apart from three stills, there is nothing to see on this disc. Maybe these films/drama exist somewhere in the digital domain, but I decided to stick to the music and think about that.
Of course we know LaCasa from his many works that involve field recordings, and in "A Hemero Phaestos 2" these might be made in a foundry. In the other pieces it is less obvious, and sometimes I am thinking this has more to do with electronic music than with field recordings. Most likely however it is Eric LaCasa sticking his microphones in very unusual places and taping sounds as they come through odd routes into the heads of his recorders.
Sometimes it sounds far away, like a motorway (the first part of 'Polymeres 2' for instance), or (very softy) the sound of fire in the same piece. Jean-Luc Guionnet plays organ in the second part of that piece, but here too La Casa adds a lot of other sounds and (perhaps) processes. The Luke Fowler film soundtrack might be more to do with street sounds - I have no idea why I assume this, whereas 'A Hemero Phaestos 2' has the most electronic feel to it. There are some interesting combinations at work, quite some mystery as well. One never seems to be fully sure what one is hearing, which I guess works always best for this kind of music; no doubt these are soundtracks to more abstract visual material, and as such these work fine."-Frans De Waard, Vital Weekly