Release date: 23rd August 2024
Available to order now on Bandcamp
Track Listing: [CD – 15 tracks – 58:43]
1. Rivers of Sand
2. Chateau Rouge
3. City of Light
4. Onsra
5. Circassian (guitar: Burkhard Stangl)
6. Onsay
7. The Other Face
8. Transit (vocals: David Sylvian)
9. The Point of It All
10. Laguna
11. Asusu
12. The Stone of Impermanence
13. Sognato di Domani
14. Tree
15. The Future Will Be Different
All tracks written, mixed and produced by Christian Fennesz
Re-Mastered by Denis Blackham
Photography & Design: Jon Wozencroft
The 20th anniversary re-issue of Fennesz’s best-selling ‘Venice’, originally released in 2004, is now available as a deluxe version remastered by Denis Blackham, with new and extra tracks not on the previous CD or vinyl versions. Included in the DVD-format edition is a booklet with texts by Fennesz himself, Denis Blackham & Jon Wozencroft, with unseen photographs from the original 2004 sessions. The booklet also reproduces David Sylvian’s original handwritten lyrics for ‘Transit’. This “stunning collaboration with David Sylvian continues where their fantastic duo track on Sylvian’s album Blemish left off. Situated directly in the middle of a mostly subdued listening experience, ‘Transit’ literally bursts out of the speakers accentuating the album’s more pop-like characteristics as well as its more restrained moments.”
Denis Blackham:
“Fast forward to 2024 and here I am again with the same original master mixes I used in 2003 to make a new and expanded version of the album – Venice 20. A little over twenty years later, technology in audio production, recording and mastering has improved substantially, so I was excited to return to this album and give my 2024 treatment.”
Jon Wozencroft:
“…The whole work has a stillness and a stature that is essentially timeless. This is of course exemplified by the collaboration with David Sylvian on ‘Transit’, which, now 20 years on, has all come true. I hoped the cover art to be on the level of a painting, to endure, like the music. It’s mad because I’d never claim to be able to paint, or assume that photographs can endure as long as paintings can. The work with Christian, which continues, always moves me and above all it’s a chemistry, a feeling you can’t quite put your finger on.”
Christian Fennesz:
“Over months, I collected material for the album: short recordings of acoustic and electric guitars, experiments with newly introduced soft synths and samplers, and field recordings, sometimes done on the go and directly in Venice, where I stayed for several weeks. The sound and acoustics of the city fascinated me. From my room, you could clearly hear conversations at night with the window open, but it was uncertain whether they came from the neighbouring house or several blocks away, as if the sound waves in Venice followed their own rules. It was during this time that the idea for Venice as an album title came to me, as a suggestive description of a dignified decline, decay, death, and rebirth. David Sylvian’s lyrics and vocal performance for ‘Transit’ perfectly encapsulated this idea for me. The piece remains a highlight of a wonderful, ongoing collaboration.”
Reviews:
Igloo Magazine (CAN):
Vogue (US):
Salt Peanuts (SWE)
Venice is Austrain guitarist-sound artist-producer Christian Fennesz’s masterpiece. It was released originally in 2004, followed by a 10th-anniversary edition (Touch, 2014) with a bonus track, and now its limited edition, 20th-anniversary re-issue in DVD style digipack adds two more pieces and unseen photographs from the original sessions. It was remastered by the original sound engineer Denis Blackham who makes full use of today’s much improved audio production, recording and mastering technology, with liner notes by the graphic designer and Touch label co-founder Jon Wozencroft, who designed the timeless, painting-like cover artwork, and Fennesez himself.
Fennesz composed Venice in the Italian city where he stayed for several weeks. He was fascinated by the sounds and the acoustics of Venice. «From my room, you could clearly hear conversations at night with the window open, but it was uncertain whether they came from the neighboring house or several blocks away as if the sound waves in Venice followed their own rules», he writes in his liner notes. The album title came to him as a suggestive description of a dignified decline, decay, death, and rebirth.
Fennesz collected short recordings of him playing acoustic and electric guitars over months, experimenting with newly introduced soft synths and samplers, and field recordings, sometimes taken on the go and directly in Venice. The recording continued in Vieena’s Amann Studios in January and February 2004. Fennesz hosted fellow Viennese guitarist Burkhard Stangle (who has previously worked with Fennesz as a member of the experimental Polwechsel) on two pieces.
David Sylvian (of Japan fame) wrote the lyrics and sings the beautiful and touching «Transit», a piece that encapsulates masterfully the emotional core of Venice and marked an ongoing collaboration that began on Sylvian’s Blemish (Smadhisound, 2003) and continued on When Loud Weather Buffeted Naoshima, Manafon and Died In The Wool | Manafon Variations (Smadhisound, 2007, 2009 and 2011). The new booklet also reproduces David Sylvian’s original handwritten lyrics for «Transit».
This remastered version of Venice keeps its timeless magic. Fennesz’meticulously crafted layers of enigmatic yet highly immersive ambient textures sound fresh and draw you immediately into his suggestive and cinematic sonic vision. The music swings between experimental and abstract, and noisy and accessible but keeps its subdued, mysterious atmosphere. [Eyal Hareuveni]