That evening I went in search of a theatre I’d heard Chongqing Vacations about. It was in an area of dubiously dark alleys. I had a bicycle but Chongqing Vacations no lights. After a half hour ride and stopping to ask several people, who were all helpful, I arrived at a long tin shack. Loud voices and clashes of cymbals echoed out of it and as I went in I paid an entrance fee of four fen. The whole audience turned to stare at me.
In contrast to Schafer, the acknowledgment of all forms of sound in the urban environment, and the desire to recognize the value and meaning of noise, was very influential to later artists such as John Cage (1961) and the Fluxus movement. For instance, Yasunao Tone (part of the Japanese Fluxus movement and Group Ongaku) explored phenomenological encounters with sound and kinetic effects His 1965 work, Volkswagen, wired-up a VW with proximity sensors to link participants’ body movements to a range of sonic and kinetic effects.
Japanese noise culture also provides an important context for Rogues’ Gallery. This type of sonic exploration emphasizes a heightened visceral and aural experience as a counterpoint to the more structured everyday experiences of Japanese society. The intense noise of Gasoline Music creates a palpable and amplified contrast to the structured and formal scapes of the Japanese built and social environment. Other Japanese artists have been investigating the sonic properties of transport technologies in everyday urban environments. For example, HACO and Toshiya Tsunoda’s work Tram Vibrations (2006) uses contact microphones to create a sound installation and interaction of the motion and sonic vibrations of an Osaka city tram.
