“There were slight irritations TODAY because F'agotty had confused his mouthpiece with that of Trømp. The SIGNALIUM then developed backwards, so to speak, but all in all it was understandable (category: aktsepteeritav). Not unproductive!  (13.01.1911, BUDAPEST – KÁLVIN TÉR)”

With cymbals, triangles, thunder sheets, large drums and lots of reverb, the four percussionists of Ensemble This | Ensemble That transport the audience into a crashing, rustling echo chamber beneath the city. With the help of light and sound, they take us into the life of Europe's B-levels. Alongside passers-by, homeless people, fruit sellers, cleaning vehicles and street musicians, these places are animated by a community that observes and documents us. Under the term SIGNALIUM, a “collective” that is as strange as it is intangible summarises the experimental results it produces through its interventions in public spaces across Europe's underground passages. Their names sound like passwords. They always distance themselves from the “people” by inverted commas. Apparently they travel through time. Are they post-human? Aliens? Or simply fetishists?

“Early Reflections” is the prelude to a series of very different works in and about life under the city.

In acoustics, echoes from walls in a room are called “early reflections”. They tell us about the place we are in long before we even see it: whether they be tiled walls, large halls with low ceilings, concrete columns or winding corridors.