Nonturn — Repeating Town

Life is full of repeating patterns and cycles, be they from the Earth and Moon, our natural beings, or those we create in our day-to-day. Extend this out, and one can see a city come to life, following its own patterns and cycles, built upon thousands (or more) simultaneously running and moving cycles of its denizens. Nonturn takes these repetitive city cycles, repurposes their sounds, and structures them into a new, 96 BPM cycle for Repeating Town. Capturing the machines, footsteps, sounds, and rhythms of Koenji, Tokyo, Nonturn builds an intriguing new city life via experimental electronic music. Rearranging the recorded sounds to form something musical from nothing, this dada-esque reconstruction makes art from the repetitive chaos of the city routine

Spread over seven tracks, the 96 BPM grid connects each piece like the cycles and patterns repeated each day by the denizens and district of Koenji. This grid, though, is just a reference point for the cycles, and the BPM listing may make one think this is dance music in some way. One would better liken it to a pulse, a heartbeat that makes the city tick, each beat another contraction moving the traffic forward. This interconnectedness helps keep Repeating Town cohesive as well as furthering the motif, not to mention giving the album a pulse and life of its own. WIth as much field recording as Repeating Town contains, Nonturn keeps it from sounding mundane and like a street recording with a beat. Lids slam, cars rush past, machines hum, but even the discernible city noises get new life on this album. The pacing keeps the album moving, as is the point of the project, but remains aloof enough to allow the sounds and loops to remain at the forefront, not the grid itself. Coming from the speakers, the sounds display a new look at Koenji, a secret view greater than the sum of the parts. Knowing how the album was made helps the listener to contextualise it in this way, but if one were to listen fresh, they'd find a very engaging electronic album that teases at EDM while dragging its dress through ambient puddles. Like the din of the city routine, one makes of it what one will, and each experience will be different.

Nonturn's Repeating Town takes an interesting approach to capturing the mundane cycles of city life and transforming them into something different and beautiful. Keeping the repetitive, cyclical nature with each piece, the album moves from track to track as one would go about their own day, becoming a being of its own. Repeating Town is full of engaging layers and loops, and like the cycles it is based upon, when the album ends, one will hit play and start it all over again.