Deison/Favaron - Nearly Invisible

A Closer Listen 0

Deison and Gianluca Favaron have each appeared on our site before, both as solo artists and as collaborators; this is the first time they have worked together on a full-fledged work.  Nearly Invisible is a measured study in deteriorating texture, a testimony to the artists’ individual and collaborative strengths.

As the album begins, light drones are joined by clicks and rattles – nearly invisible, but not quite.  The field recording and electronic aspects hold equal sway.  When perusing the photo magazine that accompanies the release, one can find corollaries between the visual art and the sound art.  Stefano Gentile’s photographs portray an array of identifiable abstractions: peeling paint, cement cracks, soot-caked walls.  At certain times during the recording – for example, the metal dumpster sound of “Inside” – one imagines a decaying metropolis populated only by scavengers.  This desolate feeling continues throughout the work: batteries dying, machines running down.  By “Metal Tongue”, the drones finally find their way to the fore, exposing the album’s industrial undercurrent.

The point is hammered home by the lead video (seen below), which features flooded streets, deserted amusement parks, decaying blackboards and other miscellaneous debris.  In the final scene, a mold-crusted doll sprawls stomach down like a person shot in the back.  By this point, one begins to wonder about the title.  What do Deison and Favaron mean by nearly invisible?  It’s not the music, nor is it the people.  The answer may instead be the sights and sounds that are exposed when the outer layer is stripped away: the hidden world that gurgles and flows beneath the surface.  By excavating these buried layers, the artists flip expectations, making even the dark seem light.  (Richard Allen)

Available here