Aferro Publication No. 35, Elevator Music 5

Elevator Music 5, curated by Juno Zago.

Elevator Music is a continuous rotation of experimental sound art curated for the permanent Elevator Music installation on the second floor of Gallery Aferro. The installation is comprised of a very early Otis Elevator (single digit) from the early 1900s excavated from the basement of Gallery Aferro’s facilities at 73 Market Street. The Elevator was cleaned up, refurbished and equipped with a motion sensor-activated media player. Guests enter the elevator and the audio-works are activated, analogous to the ways we may enter a functioning elevator ready to deliver us to our desired (or undesired) destination. Elevator Music is a space where audio works can become accessible within a visual arts gallery experience. 

The fifth iteration of Elevator Music marked Juno Zago’s first foray as curator for the project. He sought out two friends and electronic musicians, NJ-based Tom Chupela aka Trop, and PA-based Kiirstin Rutabaga who went by Mün Lün Kir Sa for this project. Trop’s contripution, the track “Amoeba Rock” provides a feeling as though you’re listening to the surrounding sound spaces from within an aquatic enclosure. This feeling deepens the longer the track runs, as conversations from out in the world start to take shape beneath, on top, and around the synthetic motif present for the entirety of the track. Listen to “Aboeba Rock” below and buy it on Trop’s Bandcamp. Mün Lün Kir Sa contributed two tracks “Room Of Many Windows” and “Great Wheel,” excerpts from their 2015 record Tower Of Tarot (recorded under the moniker of Grand Lunar). Densely and richly layered, together these tracks continue to express similar atmospheres to the other music in Elevator Music 5, but also push the psychedelic ideas forward, with heavier beats and other warbled sounds. Explore Kiirstin Rutabaga’s music on their Bandcamp.

Rounding out Elevator Music 5 is a showcase of NY-based rock and electronic musician Daniel Shaw’s instrumental music as UPPERCASE D & the lowercases. Upbeat and aggressive, and at other times sprawling and melodic, Shaw’s suite saw a “return to form” of sorts for the Elevator Music project, after a near three year gap it once again featured longer, “album-length” statements.

Elevator Music 5: Thomas Chupela – 07/14/2018 – 09/08/2018

Elevator Music 5: Mün Lün Kir Sa – 10/05/2018 – 11/17/2018

Elevator Music 5: Daniel Shaw – 04/06/2019 – 05/25/2019

Published by Gallery Aferro