Babel is a large-scale musical structure making use of many technologies and music languages, with each piece of music being thought of as a “room” or place within an enormous tower city.
In the main section are 3 CDs where each track corresponds to a virtual architecture. The pieces are divided into two kinds: aural representations of actual spaces (e.g. The Dressing Room, The Stairwell, Mr. Brady’s Room), and internalised dream spaces (e.g. The Room of Rhetoric, Mall Fountain, the Spirit Levels, the Mansard childhood memory room). Listeners can navigate their way differently through this CD building at each hearing if they so wish. The instrumental solos in some of these ‘chamber musics’ evolved in collaboration with the musicians and would not have been possible without the unique approach and talent of each performer.
As a Babel ‘supplement’ are the 2 CDs of KBBL - the Tower’s fictitious radio station. Each of its 4 ‘shows’ has its own style and atmosphere. Collaborating with DJs, actors, writers and singers, KBBL is made to sound like a real radio station with ads, traffic reports, phone-ins etc. There are also ‘live’ circus and nightclub recordings associated with KBBL in this supplement and in the main section. As an example of the many connections and links within Babel, two routes can be taken. The first is an architectural one: the saxophonist in the off-stage dressing room is rehearsing for her solo in the concert-hall (heard in Pagoda Charm) as is Mr. Brady, whose room is somewhere off the stairwell, where the sounds of piano lessons and apartment life can be heard. The Squat is another apartment off the stairwell. KBBL can be overheard in the stairwell, the squat, Mr. Brady’s room, the room of rhetoric and in the temple rehearsal space. There are other more hidden connections waiting to be discovered (e.g. the Movie Theme is buried in a Dark Scenery and an Entry Level)
The second connections route is a musical one, at a molecular level. The Iron Language Alphabet (one of the six Temple Musics from six unspecified religions) is a sound alphabet containing tiny fragments of sound representing letters or characters of an alien alphabet. At the start of this piece, after an heraldic trumpet solo, letters are introduced one by one slowly and then sped up. This sound alphabet can be heard scattered through other pieces like: The Room of Rhetoric, Pagoda Charm, Entry Level I and in KBBL in Johnny’s Body at 002 and Navigation. Other molecular scatterings can be found in Cantilena where two songs sung by Elena Lopez in KBBL are exploded and re-arranged to form new entities, and in the Leisure Pursuits Show from KBBL three pieces from its Morning Show are cannibalised in Senanbru Vendanswi.
There is also convergence - the Entry Levels are like overtures, openings or peepholes and contain material from all parts of the Tower. Other than these connections, and others not mentioned, Babel celebrates language (a slight variation on the Biblical morality tale) and musical expression in all its variety. Roger Doyle, 1990-1999 (main section); 1988-1999 with short excursions into the early eighties (KBBL).
Interview with Roger Doyle on Babel
CD1 Temple Music
1 |
Pagoda Charm |  |
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2 |
Mansard | ||
3 |
Yunnus |
o |
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4 |
Earth to Earth | ||
5 |
Cantilena | ||
6 |
Kalu Rehearsals | ||
7
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Mercedes Spring | |
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8
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The Iron Language Alphabet |
CD2 Chambers & Spirit Levels
1 |
Entry Level I | ||
2 |
Mr Brady's Room | ||
3 |
Squat |
o |
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4 |
The Room of Rhetoric | |
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5 |
Spirit Levels I-IV | |
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6 |
The Stairwell |
CD3 Delusional Architecture
1
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Entry Level II | ||
2 |
Dark Scenery Court Games | ||
3 |
The Dressing Room | ||
4 |
Vertical Fissures in Stone |
o |
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5 |
Beautiful Day |
o |
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6 |
Mall Fountain |
o |
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7 |
Johnny's Body at 002 | ||
8 |
Mr Foley's Final Moments |
CD4 Earth at Full-Moon
1
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The Morning Show | ||
2 |
Rise up and shine | |
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3 |
You must be in | |
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4 |
Big Headline. | |
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5 |
President Hilary and the Sherpas | ||
6 |
Traffic.The more you do it. Frantic yoyos | ||
7 |
Walter Ego's weekend High speed commercial. Badoomba | ||
8 |
The seventh angel's flying dream Nanada in the bar | ||
9 |
Weather. Fun Crime Hotline | ||
10 |
Brunswick leaves | ||
11 |
Mall | ||
12 |
Surface du Monde | ||
13 |
L'amour d'une Poule au Ritz | ||
14 |
Lettuce is my hair, well watered | ||
15 |
Navigatio | ||
16 |
Ronda de Bastos | ||
17 |
Cultures Mondiale | |
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18 |
Au Fond du Jardin | ||
19 |
I may never come back | ||
20 |
Trapeze in Full-Moon Nights |
CD5 Leisure Pursuits
1 |
The Entertainment & Leisure Pursuits Show | |
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2 |
The Nightshow | |
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