Sitting conceptually somewhere between Partial’s LL and R.O.T.’s Klein Eiland (and musically between early AMM and Melkings), Temporary Presence is a release that is claustrophobic only in regard to its origins. The recordings were captured over the course of a night in a rented-out music store, an approach that certainly implies some essential limitations, but the four inimitable members of the long-running but sporadically active Naturaliste project transform their finite supply of materials into shifting masses of abstract sound that extend well beyond any possible permutation of four-walls-and-a-roof. Plenty of the participating personnel have made names for themselves in the field of convention-defying instrumentation, especially inventor and miniature installation engineer Bryan Day, but the stuffed shelves and corners of the unidentified shop offer many a traditional flavor for the bubbling stew: considered strikes on both the inside and outside of a classical piano, jagged rakes across the strings of an off-tune zither (at some points I was fully convinced the next thing I would hear would be “ME is a meadow meal”), extended-technique violin, and more. As if the diversity of the purely “musical” elements wasn’t enough, Temporary Presence also evokes both defined and undefined space with additional auxiliary intrusions intentional and otherwise; a cavernous, spectral recitation here, the horn of passing car there; uncomfortably close clatter one moment, distant and detached din the next. Some say their spirits still haunt the building to this day— “Oh don’t worry about all the shit falling off the shelves for no apparent reason, we have a bit of a ghost infestation. No, no, they’re not poltergeists, not pranksters; they genuinely believe they’re making music.”
Noise Not Music 