Robert Normandeau is currently working on the stage music for Marguerite Duras’ L’Éden cinéma, directed by Brigitte Haentjens. The play will be presented at Ottawa’s National Center for the Arts on May 13, 2003. It is also scheduled for Montréal’s Festival de théâtre des Amériques (FTA). Normandeau is simultaneously working on the concert version, Éden. The composition was commissioned by the GMEM (Groupe de musique expérimentale de Marseille) and will be premiered on May 12, 2003.

Chants libres will repeat Zack Settel’s “electr’opera” L’enfant des glaces on June 4 & 5, 2003 in Montréal, with Pauline Vaillancourt and Jean Maheux.

20 artistes 72.15 min (20 artists 72:15 minutes) is the menu proposed by small electronic label Déluge with this compilation. A multitude of genres and attitudes perfect for summer by artists from Québec City.

Magali Babin se fraye un chemin à travers la matière grise. Matière froide, sans âme, elle tente de lui donner vie. D’une lame en acier trempé à un couvercle de casserole, Magali Babin explore tous les alliages du métal. Fonte de l’enregistrement. Elle forge les sons. Torsion, martèlement, étirement, soudure, cisaillement. Les voix se multiplient et bientôt se perdent dans la grisaille d’une pluie de limaille de fer. Corrosion. Le rythme s’oxyde progressivement. Les enregistrements (tels des photographies) sont punaisés au mur en guise de souvenir. Estompage de la mémoire. Grattage de la surface rouillée pour lui redonner son éclat. Donne à réfléchir.

Diane Labrosse takes pleasure in absurdity, harmony, dissonance, structure and improvisation. Her fascination with unconventional sounds has led her to digital sampling, to which she brings a hard-core approach. For the last fifteen years she has regularly appeared on contemporary, improvised and avant-garde music stages both in Canada and in Europe. Some of her projects are done with Île bizarre (Ikue Mori & Martin Tétreault), L’Oreille à vincent with Christof Migone, Michel F Côté, Martin Tétreault and sound sculptor Jean-Pierre Gauthier.

A self-taught composer, Aimé Dontigny is one of the founding members of the “free-noise” collective Napalm Jazz and of the electronic duo morceaux_de_machines. Dontigny has been working for empreintes DIGITALes and Ambiances Magnétiques. He devotes himself eagerly to the challenges of improvised music and is particularly interested in the development of new electronic music in Canada. His compositions are full of subtle quotes and his sonic palette adapts itself to many aesthetics, as reflected in his recent collaborations with Diane Labrosse

This collaboration is found on Télépathie a new release by No Type records. It is an intense listen, with a loud blend of sounds, movement and ambience. Recorded live on April 20th, 2002 this release captures the direct approach of their unique improvisations. Télépathie is a must for fans of noise, collage, explosions and just plain weird stuff. It definitely pushes the boundaries in music, composition, writing methods and approaches.

After a couple of years of building up an impressive catalog of MP3 and CD-R releases, Todd Drootin of Books on Tape has really pulled out the stops for his first official full-length album. Recording live in the studio to 24-track tape using a set-up based almost exclusively around oid school sound gear, and inviting in a slew of guests including Kerri Kirchheimer on drums and his sister Stefanie Drootin of Bright Eyes on keyboard and vocals, Drootin has put together an exciting and dynamic set that wonderfully meshes his punk and indie-rock roots with his current proclivities for knob twiddling and key pressing.

The material on Throw Down Your Laptops sounds unlike pretty much any other record I’ve heard in quite some time, which is an achievement in a genre that is strewn with so many sound-alikes. Drootin throws down a strong base of thick electro melodies and beefy beats that range from downtempo cool to a jackhammer frenzy. These elements are often left alone to happily co-mingle, but Drootin is also generous with his guests, allowing them to have a strong influence, especially on tracks like The Contenders, a short but sweet collaboration with electro-noise-rock trio Rose For Bohdan. So while Throw Down Your Laptops may not be a record that will change your life, you can at least be guaranteed that it won’t sound like anything else in your collection, and when it comes to today’s electronic music scene, that’s really saying something.