Various Artists Metrómetro VARIZ 004Den. CD Release date: Dec. 2002 Cover images by Dora Sousa Santos 01 Pedro Cabral Santo Drop (1:00) 02 João Castro Pinto Rigra (4:00) 03 Soundtrap. Gendernauts And Spacecrowds (5:36) 04 Migso No Joke (1:45) 05 Twokindermen Magnolia (5:44) 06 @C Metrodub (5:19) 07 António Caramelo I'm Too Ugly (1:21) 08 Producers Vent (6:56) 09 Ana I Try Not To Read (3:30) 10 Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzp! 1604mm1t (1:18) 11 Roq Ns Robotiq (4:17) 12 Gustavo Sumpta Dá Um Tempo (2:28) 13 Fadigaz + Fernando José Pereira Geo Tilt (3:23) 14 Ru*mor* Hvoava (4:26) 15 Sr. Passageiro Makre Hambuzios (4:12) 16 Manuel Mota Side Walk 7 (2:48) 17 Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzp! Le Derniere Métro (14:53) 18 Ru*mor* Lockness (5:00) 19 João Simões Homeless (?)

This sound-specific project is based on the concept of a planned functional music and it was thought of for the exclusive use of the Lisbon subway stations. Due to some alterations in the production process - mainly in what concerns the initial 1999 concept - the Metrómetro project came to gain in added formal and conceptual aspects. The 'soundtrack-produced-by-a-single-artist' format was discarded in favour of a more comprehensive creative space in which several musicians and some emerging artists from the 'new media art' area were challenged to produce original sound and visual arts pieces for the Metrómetro CD.
The pieces that would eventually come into the final CD alignment would have to take into account the inherent characteristics of the Lisbon subway in its role as an urban service equipment, e.g., its architecture, its acoustics or its social relevance. The Metrómetro project is part of the urban intervention and public arts plan and it was supported by the Ministério da Cultura/Instituto de Arte Contemporânea.
me.trô.no.mo [metr'onomu] sm mús metronome: an instrument designed to mark exact time by a regularly repeated tick.

PRESS:

"Metrómetro provides an oblique glimpse at the wealth of electronic music making in Lisbon. Funded, as these things tend to be, by the Portuguese Ministério da Cultura and Instituto de Arte Contemporânea, the project invited musicians and multimedia artists to compose "functional music" for playback on Lisbon's underground stations. It's unclear whether the concept ever made it further then here, but this fantastic idea ought to be implemented in subway systems around the world. It's anyone's guess what commuters would make of the ultra-abstract digital twitches offered up by some contributors - "Vent" by Producers being a case of point. Other offerings are more obviously relevant to the schema - "Drop" by Pedro Cabral Santo, offers electroacoustic trickles and plops which could have transformed a platform into a stalactite-festooned subterranean cavern, while "Magnolia" by Twokindermen is built on the kind of restlessly repetitious cello motif that animates Steve Reich's Different Trains. All told, it's a refreshing alternative to the hackneyed crowd-pleasers that busters routinely inflict on must underground travellers." - 2003 Rewind, Chris Sharp in The Wire

"Metrómetro is the fourth record released by Variz. The results are noteworthy, both in what regards its inner coherence and the quality of each track (...) much of the best electronic music made in and out of Portugal is present there." - Sérgio Gomes da Costa in Blitz


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