"Революцию действительно революционную осуществить возможно не во внешнем мире, а лишь в душе и теле человека"
(Олдос Хаксли, "Дивный новый мир")

Новый мир (Novy Svet) - парадоксальный проект последней новаторской генерации австрийской сцены. Звуковую и поэтическую ткань своих композиций - от драматических индустриальных шумов, обескровленных речетативов сэмплов и горького похмелья незатейливых деревенских мелодий до светлой аллегории образов и экзотических инструментов - они используют как полотно, где в безудержной бескомпромиссности и творческой раскованности творят новым языком знакомые "рисунки пациента О.Т.", переплетающиеся воединно в непривычном эмоциональном ракурсе и пропорциях. Стартовав несколькими годами раннее с нашумевшей cover-version Beatles "Help!" и записав 4 кассетных альбома, в декабре прошлого года они дебютировали в Вене первым официальным релизом на саб-лэйбле фронтмена The Moon Lay Hidden Beneath A Cloud/Der Blutharsch Albin Julius "Hau Ruck!", получившим странный заголовок "Rumorarmonio". Мы искренне благодарны Novy Svet за любезно предоставленную возможность получить ответы на наши вопросы и их "героическое" терпение ним. Особая благодарность также Marco Deplano за "первую кровь" :-)

How did you get the idea for NS start?

no idea, only beer. one boring afternoon some years ago we took all the instruments which were stored somewhere in the house and started to play. maybe the music or the beer or both were so good that we seriously came to the decision that we were musicians. after lots of practising it ended as fairly conventional (but noisy) rock-project; then there were three people involved. although we began to integrate more and more tape loops and electronic equipment we found a more 'folky' style. this loose group split up and we, the two current members, started to produce more ritual orientated music using only tape decks which led us directly to the decision to use a sampler, later also traditional instruments like zieharmonika etc. that was when NOVY SVET was born an given its name.

If NS is any sort of conceptual art-idea for you, could you tell me about the main principles of it, ideas, specifical moments for your activity with NS?

there's no art-idea at all. the main concept is our youth. being part of a lost generation. since the beginning of the century the longing for 'revolutions' and ideals has become smaller and smaller. today we can't see any will to change anything. maybe our message is: you don't have to behave social in an antisocial society. if you are talking about a musical frame: same answer as above. nothing. of course there are traditions we can't run away from like all styles of european folklore (for example). our attempt is to break this traditions and make them valid for ourselves, make them concrete.

Can you tell me about start of your interest in musical activity, about some influences that had place to be there that time around your concepts and the idea' formation?

hm, as we have told you before it all started more or less by accident. at that time we were influenced by several art theories, art brut, etc. and vienna with its inhabitants and people surrounding us. Albin Julius of DER BLUTHARSCH / THE MOON LAY HIDDEN BENEATH A CLOUD surely was playing an important role. the same goes for some of his friends who visited him here too, for example Lina Baby Doll, the general of DEUTSCH NEPAL / FROZEN FACES. We got to know their uncramped way of working and were encouraged by their activities to work in more 'professional' dimensions. other influences now and then ranged from different musicians and bands like THE VELVET UNDERGROUND or GENESIS P. ORRIDGE , all kinds of folk music, some books, some films, to some visual artists and writers (e.g. RAINER, NITSCH, SCHWARZKOGLER, ARTAUD, JARRY, to mention five of thousands)...as always.

If is there also any relations with ideas of Aldous Huxley works, and first of all, his book "Brave New World" could you comment the words of Futurist artist Carlo Carra: "...painting of sound, noises and smell" as well as Marinetti words from Futurism manifesto: "Moving and light have destroy the materiality of bodies" in connection with NS personal vision?

there's no relation at all to Huxley. nice quotations, especially the sentence taken from the futuristic manifesto by Marinetti. as we said he was an outstanding theorist, very precise and poetic at the same time. everyone has to experience this visions again and again; it's a personal thing. so, that's the wrong question for a collective like NOVY SVET.

What are the ideas and concepts of Futurism nowadays for you, and why Futurism is so important for your inspiration? How did you get your interest for it? What about any parallels between Futurism and folk roots?

to stop all this questions concerning the futurism-thing. NOVY SVET never claimed to be a futuristic band which would be totally daft. but it's a matter of fact that we were highly influenced and fascinated by historical futuristic theories and artists - especially Luigi Russolo - when we started the band and released the first tapes. we regard the art movement of futurism as well as the whole avantgarde movement in the 'hot phase' at the beginning of the century as a kind of 'relation-point' that qualifies all produced art before and after. the european avantgarde of the years 10/20 made everything possible...and at the same moment everything seemed to become impossible. so, we have to keep this 'relation-point' in mind and with the early NOVY SVET recordings we just wanted to offer some personal interpretations and constructions which were built on historical discoveries. but as all these tapes were released in very limited quantities they are not known to most of the today's listeners. maybe 'dobrolet '23' (a song on 'rumorarmonio') is an example for all the works dealing with this topics. this special track is simply about dynamism. we don't need to explain any connection between the historical avantgarde and folklore. there has always been a strong bond: the art of the scientist, the art of the musical/visual genius and the art of the people interlocked. and that's how it should be in the ideal case...it never was like this before and it never will be like this in the future.

What is the idea of futurism in connection with NS activity? As well as I know, futurism is much more Italian-French art-movement, not Austrian, and in idea Futurism had some sort of art-reflection from industrial-economic progress that time. And what's more, in the time of First War (1914-1918) Italian (central root/core of Futurism movement) artists had write their political manifests against Austria. That time futurists have had their exaltation from technical/scientific Dawn, their personal identification with Novy Svet (New World) that time, composition chaos and disharmony of colors, numerous provocative moments in their activity - what do you think about all these things in the connection with NS activity now, as well as about the methods of provocation in art?

we've answered this question before. there've always been darker and brighter moments within the relationships of austria and their neighbours, it's the same for italy. but that has nothing to do with the futuristic idea. we are not interested in embarrassing weirdos like D'Annunzio or peng-peng-dandies like Marinetti. your compatriots were laughing at him when he got out of the plane in moscow. we value some of his theoretical works, but not him as (political) provocateur. provocation is a question of moral which is not to answere.

About the connection between art and ideology - if there any relations also with politic sides of Futurism that time in NS activity?

there's no connection between art and ideology. art is the antithesis of ideology. the rest is propaganda. we have always said that we are not interested in politics at all. we don't want and don't need to be divided up and governed. recommended reading: J. Cage 'pour les oiseaux. entretiens avec D. Charles (paris, 1.976).

What is your interest in Balkans and Slovenian countries, their folk roots and cultures there?

an old proverb in vienna, our hometown, is: 'the balkans start here.' - and that's true. it's the same with slovenia, the czech republic, slovakia and hungary. there are hundreds of years in history we share with the eastern parts of europa; vienna is called 'the door between the west and the east'. since the beginning of the conflict in ex-yugoslavia, the wars in croatia, bosnia and the kosovo our interest in the balkans became deeper: a part of the continent is burning, our brothers are butchered.

Your opinion about the counter crossroad between folk traditions and modern post-industrial society now?

'post-industrialism' as well as 'post-modernism' don't mean anything to us. this words are simply empty shells without any content. what the listener calls folk comes to us naturally. we are the crossroad.

What is the meaning of 'experiment' word for your activity? also I have a special question about samples, language and texts on 'rumorarmonio' (by the way, stupid traditional question, but what is it - rumorarmonio? from 'rumour' word?)

we would not mention the word 'experiment' in connection with NOVY SVET as it's a scientific term which must be reserved for scientific works. we prefer 'improvisation' instead - that's where many of the results we archieve come from. we simply start to play and wait what happens. 50% of the used samples are substitutes for lyrics or support the content of a song. they examine the topic from another point of view. so, there's the possibility of a parallel presentation of a personal approach (through the sung lyrics) and a more distant view (for example through passages from the news). the other half simply comes out of the radio when we put it on and adds some atmosphere to the creations. we love the idea of miles of cables under the ground connecting all the cities and people on the continent. this are the voices of the other cities. concerning the vocals: in most cases we use spanish for the lyrics which makes it more simple for us to transport a message. nobody wants us to be especially profound. we also wrote english and italian, in the future possibly french and even german, lyrics. we'll see. once again: there are no limits. there were people who called our methods 'dada' - not bad, isn't it? the 'rumorarmonio' is a noise intoner, a noise harmonium, invented by russolo. we think our debut also has got some noisy moments...

Also I got an idea that some of the songs on your debut release have their own history, no? What about "hey Moscow" for example? could you told me a short pre-history of it?

of course all songs we write have got a very special, in most cases personal, background and a very special story to tell. normally we don't want to have our music dissected, so we never give any information on the motives why a song was composed or the intention we pursue to anybody. we simply want our creations to work like a projection surface which offers space for the imaginations of each particular listener. in the special case of '!e moscu!' we understand your interest as russian. so we make an exception for this time, although i think everything is quite clear when reading the lyrics. in fact the basic idea was to work on electricity, but as each song has its own life this is what came out in the end. the few lines of the text deal with several topics at once (the futuristic ecstasy, energy, electricity, the city and as most of our songs: love and longing) - they have a certain complexity if you think about them, or better don't think about them. the inspiration came from a friend who lived in moscow and brought some 'bits of the city' to vienna.

NS have a many influence from "province chanson" also, what about it?

our songs are 'chansons de la ciudad' (chansons of the city)... loving and living, longing and dying.

Who are NS members, how many persons really, or you and frl. tost only? what about 'divide of the roles' in project there?

from the point of having found our musical way the line-up was fixed. it's me and frl. tost. we collect the sounds surrounding us and chose the ones we use together. i'm responsible for creating the basic tracks and bring ideas to a certain form. when it comes to recording there are no limits, everyone plays the instruments he/she wants to play. so, for example, normally i perform all accordion parts and sampling sequences whilest frl. tost plays the piano. in the end NOVY SVET is an open project - we want to integrate the people we like and who can add an extra dimension to the music. but these guests are not part of the tough centre of the band.

What do you think really about the sense of creation? What man must to create something for?

even if we, like you, often use the word 'creation' thoughtless: we should leave this whole thing up to god...we have and had already to many persons in the world who wanted to create something - we know what came out in most cases... 

IGOR VAGANOV vs NOVY SVET
28 February 1999