In a world that seems more and more driven by conflict, selfishness and competition, we Elli artists believe in the power of cooperation. This is why we present this collective release, in which 8 different artists offer their personal artistic response to the current war in Ukraine. And to wars in general, because there are way too many conflicts going on for which we barely receive any information at all…

Thus the great Roman historian Tacitus described the reality of war : “Where they make a desert, they call it peace”. A war is never the right path to find peace. War will call for other wars, hatred will nurture hatred. In this dark picture, can there still be hope ?

Interestingly enough, the word mir (мир), that we chose for the album title, comes from a proto-slavic term meaning both “peace” and “world”. As if the only way to live together in this world could be through peace !

The cover presents a coded image of a sphere, and each track represents a section of the global picture, with small traces of the surrounding space. When we open ourselves to difference and we accept the others around us, we become part of a bigger and more meaningful unity.

We need to be united.

Mir !


ARTIST STATEMENTS

HAND
I'm not a politician. I am an artist and my tools are frequencies. And even if these aggressive war images trigger me and make me angry, I want to remain peaceful. I hope my 2 pieces send calmness and peacefulness to this world. Thanks to Ema & Julien at Elli Rec.
(www.hand-music.com)

BEN PEERS
Ubiquity was one of several recordings made in March 2022 as the crisis in Ukraine began to unfold. The music is not created specifically in reference to the situation but exists in its shadow.

LUCIEN DE BAIXO
"Marche au combat" is the sole finished track from an old abandoned EP called "Les Marches militaires" which I was working on around late 2008. The overall project was to use the composing rules of martial music to produce an anti military anthem.

GIONA VINTI
This track is entirely made with a trogotronic TR-Valkyrie, an untamable beast made of five pentodes circuit bent in every possible way by the mad scientists at Trogotronic. Some aspects of sound modulation and processing are available as cv inputs, I have abused them in order to get some rhythmic stuff out of the sheer chaos this crazy tube oscillator produces. Hoping that in the future all wars will be deserted and no human being will ever allow their governors to send them to the slaughter.
Mir.

ALESSANDRO CHEMIE
“6pz” is the mathematical function that describes the movement of the 6th energy level electron towards its nucleus. It draws beautiful shapes which remind me of the spinning top I used to play when I was a child.
Childhood is as pure as atomic orbitals and its protection should always be a priority.
STOP ALL THE WARS NOW.

JULIEN BAYLE
zero is a soundscape extending few seconds selected from a field recorded I did in Kiev City circa 2016. I was alone in a green park, next to a church, and I heard spectral voices coming out from it. I recorded one hour of this, with Kiev urban sounds. This is the only sample used for composing this track and everything is based upon it as I didn’t want to use external sound or instruments for this piece, to make it more introspective and folded on itself. It extends the concept of cut-up to different times scales. By working at these different scales of time, from micro and granulation to Sound object and tones researches, from meso and deep reverberation trying to express void space to macro and composition itself, I wanted to express the collapse of time and space into a dimensionless space, to the void: point zero, which links to the title of this piece.

EMANUELE BATTISTI
These two tracks represent a diptych of contrasting yet complementary emotional states related to the current war in Ukraine and to war in general.
I recorded some vocals back in 2020, for a possible “vocal electronic” project to come. When we decided with Julien and the other artists in this project to launch a collective release, I thought that this material could be appropriate for the kind of emotional ground that I wanted to cross.
“Ghost town” is dedicated to the city of Mariupol, almost completely destroyed, to the thousands of civilians killed, to those children left to die without water and food. A reminder of the sheer inhumanity associated to each war.
The material is heavily processed, mainly with a H9 multi effect pedal.
The second track, “Iridescence”, serves as a cathartic moment. Two singing voices are here free to create a dialogue, showing that even in despair, the hope in humanity can and must survive, and communication is the only way out of any conflict.

SABINA COVARRUBIAS
Together : The coexistence of different worlds. The synthesizers and their arpeggios of my childhood in the 80's, a "spectralist" piano, a robot inspired by Hal 9000, techno, African and other Mexican rhythms, a memory of Rimsky Korsakov's orchestrations... This music is my way of telling you : we can find ways to exist in the same space and at the same time, by finding the points that unite us.