Trainspotter Alert! Chris Watson - El Tren Fantasma

Trainspotter Alert! Chris Watson - El Tren Fantasma

18 November, 2011 | 10.12AM

• Written by: Beatportal
• Filed under: Music News: chris watson, touch

Fans of experimental music and field recording will surely be well aware of Chris Watson. Formerly a member of Cabaret Voltaire and The Hafler Trio, Watson is best known, these days, as one of the world’s preeminent field-recording artists. In addition to his work soundtracking BBC nature documentaries, he has released a number of albums for the Touch label, gathering his recordings of wildlife and wind and presenting them as uncanny journeys into sound.

His latest project, El Tren Fantasma, is also a journey of a literal sort. A decade ago, Watson spent a month riding the rails in Mexico, capturing the sounds of the Ferrocarriles Nacionales de México’s cross-country line in its last month of service. His audio served as the backing for an acclaimed BBC documentary last fall; now he reconfigures the material into an immersive soundscape of buzzing insects, dry winds, wailing horns—a symphony of empty space and mechanized determination. A history lesson, of sorts, it’s also the ticket to another world.

EL TREN FANTASMA
Chihuaua

Fans of deep ambient will want to turn their attentions to ”The Signal Man’s Mix,” a two-track EP that manipulates the raw recordings into shimmering drones and rhythmic chug. One of the year’s unlikelier records, it’s also, in its own way, one of the heaviest.

EL TREN FANTASMA (THE SIGNAL MAN’S MIX)
El Divisadero (The Telegraph)

EL TREN FANTASMA (THE SIGNAL MAN’S MIX)
Veracruz (The Tunnel)

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