Estamos recebendo o Prof. Robert Shields, da University of Alberta, Canadá, aqui no nosso Grupo de Pesquisa em Cibercidade/Ciberpesquisa. Shields chegou há menos de um mês e já começa a colocar suas impressões da cidade no blog da revista Space and Culture, SAGE, da qual ele é o editor. Ele fala dos sons da Bahia, do “punk broadcasting” e da relação com o espaço e o tempo na cidade. Confiram!

Trechos:

“Distortion is introduced from the moment of performance in refrains shouted by tired, breaking voices into microphones and amplifiers pushed beyond their intended specifications. Cassette tape recording technology introduces a further flattening of the sound spectrum, even with a direct ‘line’ connection; municipal PA amplifiers and outdoor loudspeakers highlight the static and fuzz of the treble while the bass drops out. The end result is an auditory experience in which static and infidelities to make this music markedly distinct from the timbre and sonorousness of studio-recorded music that has become the mundane norm. Like the anti-musical ethos of 1980s punk, one might call this Brazilian form the ‘punk broadcasting’ of a music of distortion.”

“To respond is to affirm the ethical quality of this experience I called urban memory. To respond is to contribute, to begin to take responsibility for the future. The lo-fi ‘punk broadcasting’ of neighbourhood, ‘community radio’ sound systems, whispers the unofficial, local ‘urban memory’ of events and affirm a collective future. Around their reduction of music, they orchestrate a chiasmic relation in which the past makes a thought-provoking cross-over. In as much as we are ‘hailed’ by this attention-grabbing line of flight, we too are drawn into the socialness of thinking-as-waiting, even if only as visitors to this future.”