Piercing Brightness (Soundtrack to the film by Shezad Dawood, 2013)

Shezad Dawood’s Piercing Brightness began life as a public art work commissioned by In Certain Places in Preston. It exists as film in four versions; a 15 minute ‘Trailer’ intended for museum display; a 40 minute cut made to be played with a live soundtrack, a 78 minute feature film and a three minute ‘interruption’ made for television. City Projects has produced the soundtrack album and single, made for vinyl in an edition of 540 and 300 to be sold through record shops. The soundtrack album imagines being played out in a teenagers bedroom, and the single on a dance floor in Ibiza. Whilst deriving from the film and recognisable as such, the two records operate autonomously as music, that could theoretically derive from a non specific or non existant film. The album sleeve artwork encourages a new film to be imagined.

The album contains music by Acid Mothers Temple, Mordant Music, Alexander Tucker & Decomposed Orchestra and Raed Yassin & Omar Dewachi. It has three tracks – two to the A Side and one to the B side – each combines more than one artist or piece of music, with Acid Mothers Temple and Mordant Music sharing track one, and all four artists on a single 20 minute track on the B side. Layered with sound design and elements of dialogue from the film it creates an immersive soundscape intended to be listened to as an album. The 12” single is a remix by DJ Radioactive Man with two versions each between 6 and 7 minutes, the optimum length for a dance floor sound system.

Track listings and edition details:

ALBUM

540 copies with artwork to the inner sleeve, 40 with a unique signed, screen printed cover by Shezad Dawood. Sound Design by Tom Drew. Graphic Design by Paul Abbott. Outer sleeve: 280gsm white reverse board with custom gold sticker, stamped and numbered by hand. Inner sleeve: 140gsm coated card, black and white printed with sleeve notes by Kate Parker and track listings to one side, and film stills to the other. Label: Colour printed with image and track listings.

Side A: 18:29
Track 1.
01:13 Acid Mothers Temple & The Melting Paraiso U.F.O. ‘Nam Myo Ho Ren Ge Kyo (Part 1)’ (2008) duration 02:51 (original 1:05:15)
04:21 Mordant Music ‘Ghost Ship’ (2003) duration 02:17 (Original 09:45) – Previously released as a demo only
Track 2.
00:30 Acid Mothers Temple & The Melting Paraiso U.F.O. ‘Interplanetary Love’ (2008) duration 03:40 (original 05:54 minutes)
03:41 Acid Mothers Temple & The Melting Paraiso U.F.O. ‘Cometary Orbital Drive Suite (A) Light My Fire Ball’ (2008) duration 06:32 (original 12:50)

Side B: 19:51
Track 1.
00:08 Alexander Tucker & Decomposed Orchestra, featuring DCW Briggs and Mark Wagner. Recored live during the filming of Piercing Brightness (2011) duration 04:13 (original 06:19) – Previously unreleased
04:59 Raed Yassin & Omar Dewachi ‘Untitled’ (2011) duration 02:09 (original 03:16) – Previously unreleased
07:05 Mordant Music ‘Smasha’ (2004) duration 03:44 (original 04:45)
14:05 Acid Mothers Temple & The Melting Paraiso U.F.O. ‘Pink Lady Lemonade – You’re From Inner Space’ (2011) duration 05:06 (original 20:39)

SINGLE

300 white label copies, stamped. Black paper sleeve.

Side A: 6:54 ‘Glorious 100 Mix’
Side B: 6:39 ‘Automatic Extrication Mix’
Two versions mixed, mastered and cut by Radioactive Man includes parts of Acid Mothers Temple ‘Nam Myo Ho Ren Ge Kyo’ and ‘Cometary Orbital Drive Suite (A) Light My Fire Ball’, Mordant Music ‘Smasha’ and Alexander Tucker & Decomposed Orchestra.

The Album retails at £20 with a free digital download and the single £8 from 25th November 2013 from record shops including Rough Trade and selected book shops including the BFI. It can be purchased online from Cargo, BFI and LUX, and is also available direct from City Projects in Hackney. A digital download is available from iTunes.

Piercing Brightness (Soundtrack to the film by Shezad Dawood, 2013) has been produced by City Projects and is being distributed by Cargo. The film Piercing Brightness (78 mins, 2013) was commissioned by In Certain Places and is being distributed by Soda Film + Art and LUX. A DVD/Blu Ray of the film is also being released by Soda.