There are few of us in the experimental community that haven’t passed a supermarket refrigrator, or perhaps a central heating duct without actively resisting reaching out for the recording equipment to capture and harness all the sonic possibilities yielded by the depth and tonality of electrical or electro-mechanical equipment. Likewise Yann Novak, who whilst residing with his partner, noticed the swirling auditory ebbs and flows of an oscillating fan in their bedroom. Upon recording the fan, Novak tunes in to the nuanced respiratory rhythms and cadences, the natural overtones and harmonics being the most pronounced in this type of equipment, as air circulates and rotates, creating tracks and eddies alive with activity. At times, the equipment also appears to momentarily condense incidental tonalisms carried in the air, further adding textures and transitions. Novak then opens the piece out with drone like gradations of sound, that swell and diffuse, vaporising like steam into the atmosphere. Essentially, this is a drone workout, but in the hands of one of its most proficient exponents, becomes a glistening, precious sound work, unrivalled but by a handful of contemporaries. Novak has seemingly taken an obvious source sound, and with an exploratory and majestic treatment transmuted it into sonic gold. Masterful.

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