Don’t ask me why but whenever I’m tasked to write about contemporary music, or receive a listening recommendation of a current artist, I have a certain practice. I like to go back and listen to the first track they’ve ever “officially” released and then listen to the last track of whatever their latest work is. In a way, it gives me an arc of what they want to say. On the latest “Digging Deep” episode for LYL Radio, I had the pleasure to invite Emma Palm (aka No Translation) to provide a guest mix that spoke to music that inspired her latest work: Inner Distance.
When I first listened to No Translation’s Inner Distance I was instantly drawn to the intimacy of its sonic atmosphere. On the album, songs like it’s closing track, “Inner Distance”, reminded me of a special kind of environmental music where music seems to exist on an equal playing field with the “worldly” memories of recorded found sounds. Emma’s ideas tapped into some vein of ambient music that felt truer to the possibilities available within it. Yes, one could zone out to it but Inner Distance always had something that drew you into its world. Floating music tends to float away but this, her work feels heavier, grounded, as if meant to be heard all around you. Only later on would I discover that this album gave us a peek into a very personal conversation.
Although Emma lives in California, many of the field recordings that make up the majority of Inner Distance’s were recorded by or shared by her mother during the COVID pandemic. As she would relate elsewhere, Inner Distance was a way to merge many worlds separated by distance. From Taiwan, where her mother lives now, she’d get moments that spoke of a walk through Mingchih Forest in Datong. From herself, we’d get moments in and around the desert of Joshua Tree, capturing the special ambiance of such an expanse. What were once traded sonic conversations between her mother and Emma, become this keybed where they can cut the distance between themselves and them and us.
It’s a special sound that I’m happy to be introduced to and to get Emma to explore a bit in her mix with us and our conversation below.
No Translation Interview
F/S: Can you tell me a bit about the image you shared to accompany your mix?
Emma: It’s a picture I took when I first moved to the California desert. I took a walk in my neighborhood at night and had my camera with me since I love taking night time photos.
F/S: What’s your relationship with music (yours or others) at the moment?
Emma: These days, I find my relationship to music expanding in the way that I pay attention to the mix of sounds. I’ve been noticing how listening to or playing music intersects with life happening around. How a song is not just a song by itself. It’s different every time it’s heard or played. Whether it’s birds chirping outside, cars passing by, or someone in the distance talking on the phone, they all contribute to creating a sonic environment. Lately, I’ve been really enjoying that aspect, of how everything is connected and sonically contributing to what’s being heard.
F/S: How has your musical practice evolved over the years?
Emma: Over the years, I’ve become a lot more patient and accepting of myself. When I first started making music, I felt like I had lost a lot of time since I didn’t realize that I wanted to do this earlier in life. I used to get frustrated and overwhelmed because I felt like I had so much to learn and improve on. I still do, but I’ve grown to focus on and appreciate the process of it all; not holding myself to any specific expectations and knowing that I have permission to create whatever, whenever, regardless of where I’m at in my journey.
F/S: Nowadays, do you find yourself writing or creating out of all your acquired technique or is it something else altogether?
Emma: I guess by nature of the electronic equipment I use and had to learn, there is some acquired technique that informs what I create. Overall though, I don’t feel bound by instruments. They definitely play a big role as tools for expressing and coloring with perspectives or emotions. But I find the most inspiring and creative moments come from just listening to environments and interacting with them – which is why I love field recordings so much and frequently use them in my music.
F/S: Emma, I know your artist name is No Translation, but what were you trying to communicate with the music on your latest release, Inner Distance?
Emma: With Inner Distance, I wanted to create a space for the emotions I felt between me, my mother and Taiwan (where my mother lives). Living in the desert and being among such open space, solitude, and silence, allowed me to fully feel and realize the emotions I’ve felt from not seeing both my mother and Taiwan for over 4 years. This music is very much about that distance, and why I combined recordings of our respective environments. This music is meant to be a gift to my mother, and like a sonic diary of the temporal and spatial distance we’ve experienced. It’s specific to my life circumstances, but the theme of distance and separation, I’m sure, relates with many others.
F/S: As I listen to your music, what I really find compelling is the kind of artistic vocabulary you’re presenting/using — field recordings, inorganic and organic, improvised and deliberate. It’s a palette, I find, that sounds deep and intimate but lands on something more universal. How is much of what you’re doing tied to a specific time or space, or is it something else altogether? Do your performances and recordings take you somewhere more transcendental?
Emma: Using field recordings definitely brings up the specificity of time and place, but also can become something entirely new to me. I often like to meditate on the recordings to discover what they bring up and move within me, and explore placing them in different sonic contexts. It’s a way of blurring the past and present, connecting memories, making sense of it all.
F/S: Can you describe the recording sessions for Inner Distance? How long did this album take to be made, if you don’t mind me asking?
Emma: This album took about five months to make. Over the course of these months, my mom had sent me field recordings from Taiwan and I was also making my own recordings, during various explorations and deep listening sessions in the desert. I knew I wanted to create a musical space for both of our field recordings, as I was collecting them. So the sessions of recording and writing the music would involve listening to our recordings, meditating on them, and then creating new synth sounds to accompany and improvise with them. When the sounds and mood felt right, I’d start recording.
F/S: I’m going to ask you to geek out for a moment. I noticed in some of your performance videos that you use Elektron grooveboxes, a mix of modular synths an Arturia Keystep keyboard sequencer, augmented by delay/looper and modulation pedals — everything that would render one a DAW-less performer (meaning: you create/recreate everything without a laptop/PC nearby). Was that a conscious choice made by you on your part?
Emma: Yes. I have performed with a laptop before, and I still occasionally do. But I definitely find that using hardware and having a limited palette keeps me grounded in listening and being present with the sounds available to me. When I use a laptop to compose, there are so many options and choices, that I often get overwhelmed and end up taking forever to complete something because I keep changing my mind. Having options can be good too, though, especially if I’m looking for something specific that I don’t have in my hardware setup. Overall, though, I do like having some limitations and using what I have as a starting point.
F/S: I’m interested in how you collect your field recordings. What do you use to record them? And where do you look for interesting “ambient” ambiance to use?
Emma: I love being outside and solitarily exploring new and familiar landscapes. I usually dedicate time to go out a couple times a month and intentionally explore a space and pay attention to the sounds. I’ll bring my Zoom H4N field recorder for this and may or may not use it, but I always like having the option. Oftentimes, though, I find myself somewhere, like a grocery store parking lot or gas station, and feel that urge to capture the sounds and just use my phone since it’s so convenient. It’s a practice of listening and intuition. I end up with a lot more recordings than I know what to do with, but I like having them if just for the sake of remembering a place, a time.
F/S: At what time does your background in visual art kick in when you’re making music?
Emma: It can vary. Sometimes, I have a visual idea that is a starting point for sound, and other times, a visual idea is interpreted from sounds. Or they exist as separate ideas.
F/S: Your connection to Taiwan has in some shape or form been ever present in your work. Now in Inner Distance, listeners get to hear it, in a different way, at a more granular level via the way you weave your mother’s field recordings (recorded in and around Taipei where she currently lives) within your music. How much of this conversation, between you and the music, perhaps you and your mother, also becomes a conversation between you and your history? Your presence in California, surely, colors what you bring to the table, as well.
Emma: I was born and raised in California and grew up visiting Taiwan every couple of years. So I feel deeply tied to these locations, as does my mother, who lived in California for a large part of my life before moving back to Taiwan. Not visiting Taiwan for so long, has definitely made me nostalgic for the sounds there. One of the reasons I was so excited to receive field recordings from my mom was also because I could hear the busy streets of Taipei, the wet forests, people speaking Taiwanese. I live in a completely different soundscape, and it wasn’t until I heard my mother’s recordings when I realized how much I missed specific specific sounds of Taiwan.
F/S: As the child of immigrants, much like myself, how does your background speak to how you create art, music, or communicate you in your work?
Emma: Growing up, every time I’d visit Taiwan, I’d miss and think about my home in California. And everytime I’ve been in California, or anywhere else for that matter, I’ve always thought about and missed Taiwan. No matter the location, I have memories of Taiwan’s landscapes, languages, and soundscapes. I’ve become very interested in this duality of knowing and feeling multiple places at once, and I document my experiences of time and place, sonically and visually. Blending different places and spaces I’ve been, it’s naturally a very personal thing, specific to me. I’ve grown to love embracing these aspects in my work, especially since I can be a very sentimental person.
F/S: Ever since I’ve come into contact with Angela, who runs Pure Person Press, I’ve come to realize how uniquely tied you both are in myriad ways to shared stories, ideas, and influences. How and why did you choose to release Inner Distance with Pure Person Press?
Emma: Originally, I was going to self release. I literally was ready to make an order for some cassettes and then discovered Angie through her label, Pure Person Press. I was immediately excited to discover someone promoting Taiwanese artists making contemporary electronic music. I hadn’t been exposed to many Taiwanese musicians before and it felt comforting to hear their music (and discover a music community I could relate with). When we first met, we instantly connected and related on many levels. I sent her my album and she completely understood it; the distance and longing related to our mothers and Taiwan. She offered to release it on her label, and I knew that it was the right place to share it.
F/S: Other than being a fan of all this music we’re hearing on the mix, how does this music speak to you (or do you want it to speak to us, the listener)?
Emma: This mix includes music that has inspired me in my own practice as well as comforted and held me during the times I’ve felt the pain of distance. I hope it will provide some healing and comfort to those who listen as well.
F/S: Final question: Where do you hope to go from here?
Emma: From here, I hope to go back to Taiwan. To visit my mother and second home again. Discover new sounds, new ways of listening and creating. I have some new material in the works and will hopefully be sharing more music this year.
[Editor’s note: Thanks to Emma, for contributing to this mix and to Angie from Pure Person Press for introducing me to her music. You can find Inner Distance at Pure Person Press.]
Guest Mix by No Translation
Tracklist:
Nueen – Wait Until Then
Li Yilei – Nei – 内
Gabby Wen – 榕樹的夢 Banyan’s Dream
Susumu Yokota – I Imagine
Ulla – Clearly The Memory
Saskia – You Left Your Soul Behind
Carmen Villain – Agua Azul
Kuniyuki Takahashi – Your Home
Keith Lam – Inkuu
Nobuyoshi Ino – Window
Chiching X Unif – Taiwan Tapes (Unknown Artist, Unknown Track)
Nala Sinephro – Space 8