Alejandra Cárdenas aka Ale Hop is a Peru born multi-instrumentalist, currently based in Berlin, Germany. She has been active since the 2000s participating with underground bands in her home country, as well as other filmmakers, musicians and artists. Why Is It They Say A City Like Any City? is her fourth full-length. It was released on Karlrecords and materialized as a big, at times overwhelming collaboration, for these strange times. It’s an experimental venture into sound collage, field recordings and spoken word, which is fed through the sonic lens of electronic/ambient with acoustic instrumental touches.

Conceived during the first covid-19 lockdown, a period of limited mobility and exchange. Ale Hop started a process of sending voice messages to several musicians across the world: Ana Quiroga, Concepcion Huerta, Daniela Huerta, Elsa M’Bala, Felicity Magan, Fil Uno, Ignacio Briceño, KMRU, Manongo Mujica, Moises Horta, Nicole L’Huillier, Raul Jardín, Sukitoa Onamau, Tomas Tello. These messages were sent from various places, during a South American trip. Why Is It They Say A City Like Any City? is a conceptual album that feeds from the actual experience of interacting with the collaborators, and the music that was created. Moreover, it’s an instant (and remote) dialogue between all those involved

Conceptually Why Is It They Say A City Like Any City? has its roots on the road, with the momentum of space being predominant. Its raw material, the voice messages the collaborators sent in, are engulfed by Cárdenas first-person experiences. As such, they are functioning as a map for the sound, like hide and seek within the vastness of remembrance and experimenting with it. A telephone of desire, where one speaker tells while the other listens and imagines, making images out of the stories. This is a sonic diary, passed through to us. 

Through-out Cárdenas masterfully creates a keen feeling of atmosphere. With the sound production making easily anticipated sonic spaces and thus atmosphere, in a very direct and intimate manner. All the field recordings are well preserved. Moreover, the emerging and unique spoken word/ manipulated voice messages are transmuted into layered poetry, with blissfully crafted sounds attached to the words. 

A sound patchwork, with elements of an electronic nature, loops and more, together with a crushing cello, twisted mouth drumming, chunks of sounds here and there, surrealistic cut-ups, field recordings, eerie synth sequences, drones, minimalistic beats, haunting and processed vocal recitations. An ambient album no less, in the very true sense of the term. Sometimes rhythmic, while others being hypnotic, but in all, fully exaggerating, totally uplifting and playful; slow-paced, elegantly and steadily flowing.  

The whole process behind Why Is It They Say A City Like Any City? is well-executed, with Cárdenas asking questions and making statements on the omnipotence of virtual, the limits of free movement in the real world, and how to remotely collaborate in an unreal situation. It’s an experiment too. With the way the collaboration taking place with all the mobility limitations that the lockdown brought. A process demanding co-existence and co- even from far away. In conclusion, Why Is It They Say A City Like Any City? is a hazy snapshot from something we only can imagine by listening. A sonic bag full of traveling memories. Lucky us!...head by here to find out more