Unitxt

After finishing the Transall Cycle in 2006 and introducing the Xerrox series in 2007, Alva Noto (Carsten Nicolai) makes a move back to his more rhythmic approach with Unitxt. Seen as a kind of continuation of the Transspray EP from 2004, Unitxt was recorded during Raster-Noton Japan tours in 2006 and 2007. Unit -- the initial working title of the album -- is the name of Club Unit in Tokyo. The way of composing the tracks in the grid of 120 bpm and out of different rhythmic units or modules recombined, as well as the mode of expression used for the text component of the recordings (developed in collaboration with the French sound poet Anne-James Chaton), changed the original title to Unitxt. Anne-James Chaton delivers the text/voice for the tracks "U_07" and "U_08-1." Track "U_07" is based on a portrait of Carsten Nicolai, where the text was generated from a simple instruction: just to read all notes, credit cards, invoices, business cards, etc., out of Nicolai's wallet. For "U_8-1," Anne-James Chaton used numbers from the golden cut (or golden ratio), quoting a simple but endless row of numbers from the mathematical concept. After the first 10 tracks that are the core recordings of Unitxt, there are 15 more tracks generated from converting pure data from programs, jpgs or other digital files into sound material. These tracks could be considered as source code "solos" to be played on top of the first 10 tracks or to be regarded as sonic concept recordings.