27 September 2020

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Albums and Singles

Mourning Jewelry, the second release from Julie Carpenter’s orchestral outlet, fashions beauty out of grief, even as it takes listeners on a complex journey through darkness and grace, conveying it in not a single lyric. As with the prior release Solifuge, the palette consists of both electronic and acoustic instruments — choir, violin, cello, piano, flute, synth, bells, and this time, more acoustic guitar — that encourages the listener to succumb to grief, at times to feel overwhelmed but to be cathartically guided through and out of the challenging quagmire of emotions.

Kranky

Mourning (or remembrance) jewelry — around since ancient times and reaching peak popularity during Victorian times — has long served as a way to remember deceased loved ones, heartfelt creations seeking to commemorate loved ones and construct beauty from grief. Like religious relics, these pieces were venerated by the wearers, often embedded with hair, bone, and cremains of the deceased. Mourning Jewelry leads off with "Brooch" as a nod to it. To reinforce the mystical aura, Carpenter has stated the track titles comprise the major arcana of an imaginary tarot deck from an alternate universe, ruled by "The Queen of Crickets." Like other tarot decks, various personalities and archetypes are represented in "The Gates," "The Fault," and "The Fang." And, like the Tarot, interpretations are left open to the listener.

The cover of the album features the Queen of Crickets: a woman dressed in combination of mourning Burlesque fashion (as designed by Carpenter), cradling a giant cricket, framed by a dry and barren landscape, hearkening back to the content within. The folksy Americana banjo of the song "Queen of Crickets" bends with classical imagery, suggesting earlier times, harrowing violin underlining an emptiness that echoes the desert landscape on the cover. Each member is masterful enough to mask traditional instruments as modern and vice versa, tricking the listener’s ear and making it more complicated to identify the source of celestial drone, blurring the contrast between ancient and modern.

Carpenter is a masterful composer, having scored for numerous films and television series. She knows exactly how to blur lines, combining sweeping majesty with haunted melody. And, like a soundtrack, moments of natural sound appear throughout the album that often suggest a moment matched to an imaginary film, as in the rolling thunder in "Plait." Plait is to braid, and like hair, compositional elements are braided together to guide the listener. Just as thunder suggests the dual-edged coming of impending rain — offering both inundation and relief — Less Bells’ many plaited elements provide a welcome crafting of beauty out of grief.

Samples available here.

 

27 September 2020

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Albums and Singles

In what will undoubtedly become a trend for artists in the coming months, Susana López’s latest work was conceived, constructed, and finalized during the lockdown. Largely completed early on, during the month of March, López took advantage of that forced isolation to produce this lengthy, rich disc of synthesizers, electronics, and processed voices. Although the sense of claustrophobia and tension are apparent, there is far more to Crónica de un Secuestro than just that.

Elevator Bath

There is an all-pervading sense of isolation throughout the disc, but not exclusively in that sense of being deprived of human contact.Instead it often feels more like being the proverbial stranger in a strange land:unfamiliar spaces and unknown experiences abound throughout.The bleak ambience throughout "Luz Negra" exemplifies this beautifully:a rhythmic loop and pulsating synth line are of course familiar touchstones when it comes to electronic music, but the way in which López layers and constructs them, as well as the buzzing electronics that appear later on, is anything but conventional.

The vintage tone to the sounds throughout "Thousand Drones to Nubla" conjures an unfamiliar sense of nostalgia that is foreign, but simultaneously inviting.Expansive ambient spaces and rhythmic thumps throughout are comforting in their own way.With a later addition of a guitar-like tone, she builds a wonderfully woozy mood throughout."Ibn Arabi" is constructed from a foundation of sustained drone that is expanded with continually falling electronics and the overt use of field recordings (which appear throughout the album as a whole, but never as explicitly as here.)

There are other moments in which the isolation has a more sinister, less inviting color to it, however.The buzzing sawtooth synth and drifting tones of the title piece make for a dense, swirling bit of heavy ambience.The density and rhythmic rattling cast the overall sound in a darker, bleaker mood.As perhaps the most stripped down composition here, "Huldra" is largely a roar of filtered and surging electronics with a distant, continuous heartbeat like throb adding a hint of creepiness.

It is on the album’s final piece, "The Last Wave," that López's work bares the most distinct trappings of quarantine and isolation.Falling just short of 20 minutes long, there are a multitude of intentionally sparse and repetitive passages that slowly expand.I would never say the piece is boring at any point, but López simulates that relentless sense of ennui that so many of us have been experiencing over the past six months.To this she adds infrequent, but undeniably forceful passages of deep and oppressive electronics that may break up the monotony, but also convey tension and dread beautifully.

I imagine there will be a lot of "quarantine" albums to be had this year, but Susana López's work does not seem as if it is forcing that theme in any way.The sparse structures and unconventional production feel isolating, but in almost an open, exploratory way.Other than the conclusion, Crónica de un Secuestro works more as the sound of an artist using her time forced indoors to create something unique and beautiful, but concluding on more of a downer note that really solidifies that, no matter how productively we try to use our time during all of this, fear and dread are never far behind.

Samples Available Here

27 September 2020

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Albums and Singles

Bob Mould’s career stems from a raw rock aesthetic full of fury, but he has never limited himself to it, as can be attested to as recently as his 2019 album Sunshine Rock, awash in joyful power pop melodies. Cue up 2020 and almost on a complete turnaround, he fully unleashes on Blue Hearts, holding nothing back of the raw emotions that many of us have been experiencing. Utilizing a power trio format that is his earmark, Mould has crafted a raging slab of mobilizing brilliance that is both a reactive and proactive rallying cry for our future, dialing in to anger, disbelief and disorientation that transcend the current headlines, filtered through Mould’s own storied past.

Merge

Mould gets the mildest track out of the way immediately with "Heart on My Sleeve," but lyrically, he clearly sets the stage for the ride to come with this track: "The West Coast is covered in ash and flames / Keep denying the winds of climate change," seething with disgust at the current administration fostering a culture of climate change denial. "The rising tide of a broken government…don’t know who to believe, don’t know what to believe anymore." Unlike the first track, the rest of the album is melodically a frontal blast to the heart, fury turned to maximum and no critical topic left untouched. Apart from the aforementioned climate change, Mould addresses the future we are leaving for the "Next Generation," the decay of free speech, the reintroduction of anti-LGBTQ policies, lambasting the current narcissistic U.S. administration, pseudo-Christianity, aging in a time of crisis...phew. If that is not enough, Mould questions how one can not only maintain one’s humanity through it all, but continue to grow.

There is much raw anger throughout the album, but Blue Hearts also finds Mould opening up about his personal life as well, as he does on "When You Left," a heartfelt and vulnerable look at a past relationship. "Little Pieces" is a naked assessment of overcoming the challenges of aging. "The last few years have been so frustrating, I lose little pieces of myself each day. The lines get deeper on my face each season, say I don’t care as I weather away." "Everything to You" offers optimism in spite of our failings ("We get there somehow with not much know-how") and "Leather Dreams" is a provocative and honest look at his sexual preferences.

Lead single "American Crisis" was originally written for Sunshine Rock but left off for stylistic reasons. Blue Hearts was an album written around it. "Wake up every day to see a nation in flames, we click and we tweet and we spread these tales of blame. It’s another American crisis, keeps me wide awake at night." The key word here is "another." Mould lived through the 1980s as a young, gay man touring in an America that was chillingly mute on the AIDS crisis. "Silence = Death" was true then, just as it is now, and Mould reminds us that we are experiencing a tragically parallel chain of events in continuing to treat so many tragedies with denial and inaction.

Sound samples may be heard here.

20 September 2020

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Albums and Singles

The third release from musician and DJ Melissa Guion was recorded largely in her home, with only limited studio time, and is truly a step forward from her earlier releases. Where 2018’s Precious Systems had heavy emphasis on ethereal moodiness, Sour Cherry Bell delivers a bigger punch, one that is more forceful and up-front — raw power. The release is filled with dark synthesizers and demanding drum machines, balanced by airy, angelic vocals and atmospheric soundscapes for a moody and dreamy effect that suggests movement: mental, emotional, and physical. This quickly became a 2020 album of the year for me.

Kranky

Layered with cascading sounds, awash with reverb and modulated vocals, Guion crafts emotionally charged soundscapes that come from a place of heartfelt experience. The music reinforces a sense of open space, both of expansive landscapes, as well as the clubs and dance floors that used to be active pre-pandemic.

Looking forward post-pandemic, if I were to pick this album off the shelves, I would expect written notes from DJs to span a wide gamut, beginning with "The Steelyard:" ‘cold, dreamy, heavy, persistent drum machine.’ But reading further, the notes ‘moody, dreamy, ethereal -- let’s get lost!’ written elegantly next to "FM Secure" suggest this is not music exclusive to the dancefloor. Inky scrawlings next to "Sourbell" read ‘crushingly emotive vocals, driving beat’ while below, scribbled next to closing track "Petrechoria" reads ‘somber, sparse, dark, dearmy.’

My first listen to "Quiet Time" suggested a feeling of ocean waves crashing to the shore, pulling back in retreat, then returning to crash on the beach again. The track starts off with a throbbing and metallic synth beat into an entirely pulsating rhythm akin to powerful waves, pulling back and softening about halfway and allowing Guion’s airy vocals to be lost in the mix — only to have the music shift about halfway and return forcefully with a vengeance, reinforcing a forceful return. Hurricanes are a common occurrence in New Orleans, and Guion has noted that the song reflects the eye of the hurricane, the retreat of the onslaught and the destruction that comes after. Both interpretations offer the sense of movement that may be expected from this album.

New Orleans is known for many things, but not for a burgeoning scene of electronic music. There are a couple electronic names that come to mind: Telefon Tel Aviv being the most well-known, and the less well-known (but personal favorite of mine) Marker, who tours as part of her live band. Sour Cherry Bell is worthy of recognition, and with such a strong showing may prove to change New Orleans' standing in that genre. This is a welcome release for 2020, and I can’t wait to see what else MJ Guider has in store.

Sound samples may be heard here.

20 September 2020

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Albums and Singles

Superior Viaduct's Ike Yard reissue campaign continues (and presumably ends) with this, the band's woefully underheard debut EP. Night After Night was recorded shortly after the band formed and was originally released on Belgium's Les Disques Du Crépuscule back in 1981. It has never been reissued before now, which means that it was never actually available domestically (except as an import) during Ike Yard's brief initial lifespan. That is unfortunate, as it is objectively one of the better releases to emerge from NYC's No Wave scene, even if it was completely eclipsed by Ike Yard's classic full-length a year later. The difference between the two releases is quite an interesting and significant one, as Night After Night feels like the work of an actual human band with recognizable instruments rather than an audacious feat of stark, alienating production. On one level, the transformation between the two releases calls to mind pre-Martin Hannett Warsaw versus the iconic post-Hannett Joy Division, but the aesthetic itself is closer to a Public Image Ltd. homage by people who thought Jah Wobble and Keith Levene's parts were the only bits worth saving.

Superior Viaduct

It is fitting that I already mentioned Joy Division, as Peter Hook once saved an Ike Yard show at the Ukrainian National Home by stepping in as a replacement soundman (the venue's own soundman was completely ruining the simmering subtlety of their sound).According to Stuart Argabright, the soundman had made it clear that he hated their band, yet I can easily imagine that achieving Ike Yard's aesthetic of thick bass, buried vocals, hallucinatory guitar and synth textures, and austere, dub-inspired drumming in a live setting would be an exasperating challenge for anyone (particularly for someone unfamiliar with the band's vision).Without the right balance of clarity, space, and visceral bass rumble, it is not hard to imagine Ike Yard's unconventional songs falling completely flat, as they are more of a thoughtful, precarious architecture of complementary textures than anything that would pass for conventional music (melodies and hooks were very much anathema to the Ike Yard vision).Predictably, bassist Kenny Compton was already the star of the show even at this early stage, as his propulsive riffing is the bedrock of everything on Night After Night, though Argabright's unusual, minimalist percussion played quite a significant role in shaping these songs too.That is especially true on the opening title piece, which is essentially just a driving bass line, a thumping kick drum groove, and a deadpan monologue from Argabright.That said, the contributions of guitarist Michael Diekmann and Fred Szymanski (synth) are considerably more prominent on this EP than they are the full-length.Admittedly, neither quite brings a unique voice to the opening salvo, but their playing gets significantly more compelling as the EP unfolds.

Obviously, I cannot fault Ike Yard for evolving into a considerably more distinctive and minimalist entity by the time they recorded their album for Factory, but it is worth noting that Night After Night's "Sense of Male" could easily have been the inspiration for a similarly great alternate direction.In it, the focus is shifted away from Compton's bass line and onto snarls of guitar noise and eruptions of warped, siren-like synths.As such, it feels significantly more colorful and explosive than the seething, monochromatic fare to come, though Argabright's austere, off-kilter percussion remains as unconventional as ever.Similarly stellar is "Motiv," which marries a thick, biting bass groove with burbling synth tones that call to mind a hallucinatory jungle scene.Admittedly, "Motiv" lacks vocals, so it perhaps does not qualify as a fully formed song, but it is nevertheless an extremely appealing vamp.Argabright returns to the microphone for a strong closer though, as "Cherish" combines his bloodless, elliptical vocals with an insistent bass groove, slashes of guitar noise, and a chirping tour de force of unusual synth flourishes.That makes for a collision of aesthetics not commonly found elsewhere, approximating some sort of deep, fragmented psychedelia equally informed by industrial music and Jamaican dub.While I am not sure it quite scales the same impressive heights as the earlier "Sense of Male," "Cherish" is an illustrative example of Ike Yard was such a singular entity: they were obviously listening to much cooler music than most of their peers and had an uncanny knack for assimilating disparate influences in appealing new ways.I suspect they probably had some very cool non-musical inspirations as well, given how dramatically and quickly they evolved.

Obviously, plenty of merely good or somewhat unusual releases are hailed as newly crucial "lost classics" these days, but Night After Night is the rare exception that has arguably earned such high praise.There is an asterix though, as this EP went largely unheard upon its release, then was rendered nearly irrelevant by the full-length that followed.If Night After Night had had been better distributed and reached more ears in the US and UK during that brief window, I suspect most post-punk fans would have been playing it in heavy rotation along with their Gang of Four, Cabaret Voltaire, and Joy Division records, as it features a strong batch of songs and the band's stark, brutalist, and post-apocalyptic broken funk was (and is) unique and visceral.Night-era Ike Yard were still a bit ahead of their time, of course, but they nevertheless sounded more or less like a good post-punk band comfortably within the bounds of the zeitgeist (perhaps akin to a menacing, subversive mirror-world version of A Certain Ratio).It is hard to imagine how Ike Yard's career might have unfolded if they had stayed on that track, but the exceptional thing about Ike Yard is that they almost immediately jumped onto an even more fascinating and almost post-human vision with their LP, leaving Night After Night in a strange no-man's land in which it suddenly resembled the Peel Sessions for a better album by a better band rather than a great, stand-alone debut in its own right.It deserved a better fate than that.At least it will now find itself in heavy rotation in my life four decades later as a somewhat Pyrrhic example of delayed cosmic justice.Obviously, if I could only have one Ike Yard album, it would still be the self-titled LP, but it is damn nice to now be able to alternate that with its almost-as-good predecessor.

Samples can be found here.

20 September 2020

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Albums and Singles

It has been three years since this eclectic duo last released a proper full-length, though they have released a few fitfully intriguing cassettes in the interim. While I enjoyed the looser, more abstract side of the project showcased on last year's Science Religion, it did not quite build upon the incredible promise of Frequency is the New Ecstasy's incredible "Astodaan." That particular piece suggested that Téléplasmiste might someday deserve their own place in the illustrious Coil/Cyclobe continuum of heavy, occult-tinged, post-industrial psychedelia, though neither Mark Pilkington or Michael J. York are exactly starving for underground cred (Pilkington runs Strange Attractor Press and York was briefly a touring member of Coil). The twist is that the two artists make for a pair every bit as curious and improbable as Golden Retriever, as York's expertise in bagpipes and other wind instruments is hardly common as a guiding force in the post-industrial milieu and Pilkington is not exactly a conventional musician himself. In the context of Téléplasmiste, however, the pair tend to focus on combining heady synth drones and eerie, ritualistic pipes to evoke something akin to a portal to an altered state of consciousness. Occasionally their more bubbly kosmische side rubs me the wrong way, but the lion's share of this album is both wonderful and mesmerizing.

House of Mythology

In keeping with the project's founding principal of "deep awareness and respect for prior esoteric traditions and counterculture currents," To Kiss Earth Goodbye borrows its cover art from 20th century spirit painter Ethel Le Rossignol.In fact, Le Rossignol's work also provides the title for the woozy reverie of the album's second piece ("A Goodly Company").Elsewhere, Pilkington and York incorporate "a previously unheard trance recording of occultist Alex Sanders (the UK's "King of the Witches") into the album's best piece.Such arcane inspirations are obviously de rigueur for the man behind Strange Attractor Press and admirably quite far outside the current zeitgeist, yet they do not at all manifest themselves in the expected ways, which makes To Kiss Earth Goodbye a sometimes perplexing release.While the hypnotic and hallucinatory Sanders piece ("An Unexpected Visit") is absolutely sublime and sounds plucked from a great unreleased Coil album, many of the album's other pieces fall much closer to current experimental music trends than their esoteric pedigree might suggest.I suspect that is likely due to the pair's shared passion for vintage synthesizers though, as the duo have described their two Fenix II semi-modular synths as "the heart of the Téléplasmiste sound" in the past.As a result, it is not particularly surprising that this project objectively shares more aesthetic ground with classic Tangerine Dream than it does with timeless, otherworldly visions from the spirit realm (the pair are saddled with vintage earthbound tools rather than extra-dimensional ones).That is neither good nor bad, but there are some other artists more who are a bit successful at pulling back the veil to reveal an unearthly, phantasmagoric vista.There are not, however, many other artists who can rival Téléplasmiste at their best when it comes to crafting mesmerizing and psychotropic synthscapes.On To Kiss Earth Goodbye, only "An Unexpected Visit" fully captures the duo at the sustained height of their powers, but several other pieces contain some wonderfully sublime (if ephemeral) passages.

I suspect the success of "An Unexpected Visit" lies at least partially in the...ahem...unexpected visit from Sanders' voice, which adds a compelling additional layer to Pilkington and York's squirming and quivering synth melodies.Sometimes, however, the duo’s synth themes are unusual enough to stand on their own as something special and unique.I am especially fond of the burbling and lilting "A Boy Called Conjuror," which arguably resembles a woozy, time-stretched calliope intertwined with a winding pipe melody and floating, dreamlike flutes.Moreover, it strikes an evocative balance between "unsettling" and "pretty," resembling a surreal blurring together of "slow-motion folk dance" and "carnival that conceals a dark secret."Elsewhere, "Possessors of the Orb" is another highlight, as its gently fluttering ambient idyll gradually builds into an impressive crescendo of majestic-sounding bagpipes and gnarled electronics.The epic title piece is yet another second-tier highlight, slowly building from a languorous reverie of slow-moving drones into a haunting juggernaut of eerie pipes and heaving masses of dense synth tones.The album's bookends, on the other hand, feel more like an intro and an outro rather than fully formed pieces in their own right, but the opening "Come! Vehicles of Light" does contain some heavenly moments of transcendent inspiration (especially its initial theme, which calls to mind a gently swaying dreamscape of shimmering crystal chimes).

I feel quite safe in proclaiming that there will never be another Coil, as the X factor of Jhonn Balance's unique and creatively restless persona is absolutely impossible to replicate (though Alex Sanders unintentionally provides an amusingly passable Balance impression from beyond the grave in "An Unexpected Visit").As far as Coil's like-minded descendants are concerned, however, I enjoy this project almost as much as I enjoy Cyclobe.Moreover, the two projects absolutely belong together in the same sentence, as they are arguably the light and dark variations of a similarly otherworldly trip: if I want to astrally project myself into a shadow realm of dark ritual and seething menace, I could not choose a better guide than Cyclobe.If, however, I instead want to visit a sun-dappled, warm, and impressionist altered state instead, I will reach for a Téléplasmiste album.I still wind up in a haunted, mysterious, and alien place, but the ghosts at least seem like comparatively well-meaning ones.Aside from that, I genuinely appreciate Téléplasmiste's approach to synthesizers, as Pilkington and York clearly had a strong and focused vision first, then sought out the tools that would enable them to best realize it (as opposed to letting the tools themselves shape the vision).I suspect a lot of the details on To Kiss Earth Goodbye will be missed by casual listeners (or appreciated only unconsciously) as the overall spell is quite a vivid and beguiling one, but Earth is genuinely a multilayered delight: individual notes vibrantly dance, squirm, chirp, gurgle, and squeal throughout the album in an tour de force of elegant control and nuance.It is clear that an enormous amount of effort went into shaping and editing these pieces into their final form.Whether or not To Kiss Earth Goodbye surpasses Frequency is New Ecstasy, however, is hard to say.I am leaning toward "it does," but the more salient point is that Téléplasmiste are now two-for-two with their full-lengths.While neither album consistently hits the mark on every single song, the quivering and hallucinatory soundscapes that Pilkington and York conjure add up to a vividly realized and absorbing world that is uniquely their own.

Samples can be found here.

18 September 2020

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Albums and Singles

Cardinal Fuzz and Feeding Tube Records are delighted to be able to  bring to you the much anticipated vinyl pressing of Dark Country Magic from this wonderful Maine trio (Quinnisa making her first intentional effort with "Moo Hoo" on this release).

Caleb Mukerin and Colleen Kinsella have been key personages of the Portland sonic underground as members of the cosmically-shifting Cerberus Shoals and the folkily psychedelic Fire on Fire before forming the more personal and hermetic Big Blood back in 2006. The band's multi-phasic discography has thus far reminded people of everything from the Comus to Portishead to Julee Cruise at different moments, yet none of these thumbnails comes close to capturing the intimacy and directness of their recordings where they take things to a higher plane of personal expression.

In Dark Country Magic haunting effects and experimental sounds combine with wailing fuzzed-up garage folk anthems and twisted poetic freak-folk as lyrical layers peel away endlessly, tiny amps weep in pain, crude percussion booms thunderous, and ragged, beautiful hooks unfurl straight out of the void. On "Coming Home Pt.3" Kinsella’s quivering bewitching vocals ask you to succumb to the hauntingly melancholic drift while acoustics strum quietly up front before Dark Country Magic's playful closer "Moo-Hoo," where Quinnisa performs a children’s story. The combination is head spinning and gloriously original, but will be immediately identifiable as Big Blood by anyone who knows the band's music.

More information can be found here.

13 September 2020

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Albums and Singles

Since 2016, I maintained there would be the advent of a new mantra: "Make Music Great Again." Sometimes the reference became more specific, replaced with Punk or Deathrock depending on my mood, but the message remained the same: the impetus for music with a message would be opened. We’ve seen legends returning to take advantage of the era to release new work, so there was a mix of both surprise and lack thereof when, completely unannounced, legendary punk band X dropped ALPHABETLAND, their first studio release in 27 years (and the first with their original line-up in the past 35 years) to coincide with the 40th anniversary of their classic 1980 debut Los Angeles. A fresh blast from the past that looks to the future, X come racing out of the gate with the same ferociousness and insistent melody of any of their classics.

Fat Possum

It is worth checking out the cover of ALPHABETLAND, a work from L.A. artist Wayne White titled Curdled American Dream. The most prominent visual is the brightly painted title, primary colors in large block letters, with a large X underneath. This may well be the only thing a casual viewer sees. A closer look reveals the brightly colored title is worn, with an underlying scene showing a run-down rural house in the background. The house sits near an overgrown yard filled with broken boats and wagons that lie near an idyllic pond, while to the side, men prepare to fish, and a small gathering of people can be seen on the home’s porch. The grandiosity of the letters proclaim the positivity of the "American Dream," but closer investigation reveals the dream in decline, with X as the messenger.

The band is said to have written most of the tracks in the 18 months leading up to its release, but the messages here are timeless. Probably the most poignant of all tracks is "Water and Wine" which gets to the meat of the matter: "The divine that defines us / The evil that divides us / There’s a heaven & a hell / And there’s a live to tell / Who has to wait at the end of the line / Who gets water & who gets wine." ALPHABETLAND touches on some powerful topics throughout, starting out with the title track that seems to address gentrification and the dangerous changes that come with it. X deliver smart punk lyrics for tough topics: the quest for individual American liberty regardless of the consequences; powerlessness in the face of authority; squelching of the freedom to protest; the influence of media; support for the "Me Too" movement.

Not entirely political, X also takes the time to be nostalgic, taking time to reflect on their past as in "Star Chambered." Closing track "All the Time in the World" has a sense of finality about it, a heartfelt track that has X looking back on friends and family who have gone before, and touches on why the band still does what they do:

"And why do we still care enough about
Or even too much
To make words
In the hope that someone in the future will hear
History is just one lost language after another,
After another
And when they’re all taken together
We still can’t decipher the past
Or decode the future
We’re just lost without a map

We are dust
It’s true
And to dust we shall return
Me and you
But it was fun while it lasted

All the time in the world
Turns out
Not to be that much"

Thank you X, for making music great again.

Sound samples may be heard here.

06 September 2020

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Albums and Singles

A collaborative project between guitarist/composer Michael Pisaro-Lu and Zizia (the duo of Amber Wolfe Rounds and Jarrod Fowler), Pisaura has debuted with quite a complex album, both conceptually and compositionally. Constructed from field recordings and found sounds and composition strategies guided by astrological maps, it is a dense and intricate work from a conceptual standpoint, but also a fascinating one that has secrets that are never fully revealed.

Sedimental

I first listened to Asteraceae intentionally avoiding any specific information regarding its construction, because beyond the cover art and packaging of an album, I like to focus on just the audio elements at first.For all its conceptual depth, the sleeve of the disc is kept rather minimal:a detail of the hybrid celestial/geographical map that Pisaura created for the project with a tiny bit of the written score hidden in the art. A full explanation of the work, as well as the extensive list of audio sources, can be found at http://zizia.xyz/aster.html.

There are a lot of traditional and electronic instruments used by the trio throughout the album, but the most overt element would be field recordings.For example, there is a melodica passage that appears heavily processed (but perceptible) throughout opening piece "ht01 °41 suruaT norihC," but the primary focus is on a multitude of quiet, hushed elemental sounds, including insects and other organisms.Sampled spider recordings (from the publicly accessible Ohio University's Borror Lab of Bioacoustics) also appear frequently throughout the entirety of the album, which is fitting given that Pisaura is a species of spider and also likely the first time I have specifically heard an arachnid featured on a CD.

The trio’s restrained and heavily processed use of other instruments is also a fascinating element of Asteraceae.Treated guitar is restructured into shimmering bell-like melodies throughout "Sun Sagittarius 3° 5th" that is fleshed out with plant percussion and other less specific field recordings.For other pieces, like "Mars Aquarius 9° 7th," the focus is on layers of combined guitar performances, resulting in a pleasant churn that is more of a traditional, though well executed, take on darker ambient sounds.Drawn from the same sources, "Saturn Sagittarius 18° 5th" is a beautiful suite of expansive tones, enriched by some subtle field recordings of water.

The bulk of this disc showcases the less conventional sound sources, however.There are some digital interference sounds and drifting electronics for "ht5 °81 suirattigaS nrutaS" but beyond that it is a series of water and other nature recordings primarily, none of which are too obvious.The back-to-back sequenced short pieces, "Pluto Libra 17° 4th" and "ht5 °51 suirattigaS nrutaS" work perfectly in their contrast with one another.The former sounds to be a far off metallic clatter of indistinct origin, while the latter is a warm, organic piece that feels far more inviting than the chaotic work that preceded it."st1 °92 recnaC tnadnecsA" fits with the organic theme as well:opening with a wet, wobbling crunch that quickly subsides, there is a strangely natural tinge to the electronics and droning tones that pervade.

Interestingly enough, considering its highly structured and deliberately composed nature, Pisaura has also intended this disc to be played fully on shuffle mode.Which explains the multitude of shorter pieces that appear throughout the middle portion of the disc, with the more dense compositions bookending the album.Much like Gescom's MiniDisc release, the juxtaposition of a slew of short, sparse works presented in varying contexts give an added level of unpredictability to the album.With the sounds being sometimes consistent, sometimes disparate, having them sequenced in an unexpected way adds a new layer to the disc.

Being one of the most conceptually deep albums I have heard in a while, Asteraceae sounds as if it could be a daunting experience, but it is anything but.First listening to it as I would any other album, and then going back again following the "guide" that is posted online, it added to my appreciation for what I was hearing, as well as answered some questions I had regarding sound sources and the like.However, there remains a significant amount of mystery and ambiguity, which is exactly the sort of thing I want to hear on this type of record.

Samples Available Here

06 September 2020

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This unusual and inspired collaboration between a Finnish experimentalist and one of Jamaican music's most iconic rhythm sections has its roots in an even more unlikely previous pairing: 2018's Nordub album on the venerable OKeh label. On that album, Sasu Ripatti's role was primarily that of a producer for a melodic and accessible jazz/dub hybrid, but the very different 500-Push-Up documents the far more cacophonous and freewheeling side of their collaboration that resulted from Ripatti's move into the driver's seat. Moreover, this second reunion occurred at a particularly interesting time, as Vladislav Delay's harsher recent work is light years away from Ripatti's heyday as a dub techno producer. While I am sure that a version of this album featuring the Vladislav Delay of the early 2000s would have been absolutely wonderful as well, the less disparate aesthetics of the participants would have likely led towards considerably more familiar territory than this one does, so maybe it is for the best that this union did not occur until now. At its best, 500-Push-Up sounds almost like it is carving out an new genre that blurs the lines between hip-hop beat tapes, fluid reggae bass lines, and hallucinatory electronic chaos.

Sub Rosa

While it is admittedly still an uncommon event, there have been several recent collaborations between contemporary electronic/experimental artists and luminaries from the golden age of Jamaican dub and it is always intriguing to see which direction they head in.The reason for that is quite simple: in this case, Sly and Robbie have a resume that stretches back to classic fare like The Upsetters, The Aggrovators, and The Revolutionaries, but the pair did not remain frozen in time and have continued to evolve over the ensuing decades, exploring other genres and collaborating with artists as varied as Grace Jones, Yoko Ono, Bill Laswell, and Bob Dylan.In short, Sly and Robbie have proven themselves to be a rather adaptable twosome with the one real constant being that they are excellent instrumentalists with a deep chemistry.Given that unquestionable and influential prowess as a tight rhythm section, Ripatti wisely decided to make Sly and Robbie's signature grooves the foundation for this project (as opposed to their production skills), visiting Kingston in early 2019 to record some bass and drum rhythms with the pair (as well as few field recordings and vocal passages).For the most part, Ripatti generally leaves those rhythms fairly unmolested, but it is primarily Robbie Shakespeare's bass playing that drives these songs and holds everything together, as Dunbar's drumming is sometimes deconstructed or enhanced with visceral industrial heft.The latter is most evident on pieces like "(520)" and "(519)," as the sounds of Dunbar's kit seem enswathed in a reverberant chaos of machine-like textures.The former approach is evident too, as the drums actually fall completely away by the end of "(519)," revealing quite a complex and hallucinatory sound collage lurking within its hum of industrial ambiance.

As my personal sensibility is far more "Throbbing Gristle" than "Peter Tosh," it is unsurprising that those more mechanized and outré moments are the ones that resonate most strongly with me.Beyond that, however, my interest in the project lies primarily in hearing what emerges when Sly and Robbie's expected aesthetic is aggressively reshaped by Ripatti, as there are already plenty of fine Sly and Robbie releases in the world and they definitely do not need Vladislav Delay's help to perfect their own vision.Ripatti acts as a chaos agent here. gleefully disrupting the expected in ingenious ways.In that light, my favorite piece on the album is the aforementioned "(520)," as Ripatti crafts a massive, shuffling groove that burrows relentlessly through a cacophony of blooping electronic weirdness and field recordings of city sounds.Naturally, "(519)" is yet another of my personal highlights, as Shakespeare's bassline drives a surreal plunge into a swirl of chopped-up vocals, churning field recordings, and echoing psychedelic flourishes.While the trio are admittedly at their best when Ripatti aims for heaviness, they also find some success when he takes a wilder, more playful tone, as he does on "(514)," which marries an insistent, stomping groove with woodpecker-like electronic bleeps and looped and chopped vocal yelps.Sometimes that side creeps too far into indulgence for my taste, as it does on the weirdly cheery "(512)," but Ripatti does manage to make an otherwise unspectacular '80s reggae groove seem like a deranged mindfuck of whirring electronics and clattering metal cans.Other times, however, that approach yields some very likable, leftfield results, such as on the opening "(513)," in which Shakespeare’s insistent major key bass line becomes increasingly submerged in a haunted landscape of tape hiss, strangled blurts, and heaving metallic textures.In fact, the best part comes at the end when Ripatti carves away everything but a shuddering snippet of radio that fades in and out of focus. 

While I would not necessarily characterize it as a flaw with this album, it is worth noting that a significant part of classic Jamaican dub's appeal lies in the fact that producers were deconstructing and repurposing actual songs: it was the collision of strong hooks, melodies, and grooves with an experimental approach to composition that made the genre so unique and enjoyable.There are no such songs lurking at the heart of 500-Push-Up, so the relative success of these pieces tends to lie in how successfully Ripatti's electronic assault manages to fill that void, though sometimes the grooves are solid enough to carry the day on their own.Obviously, it would have been great if some label had both the resources and the will to enable this trio to devote themselves to a fully fleshed-out studio album of real songs with vocals and hooks, but Ripatti thankfully proved to be impressively resourceful in reshaping the trio's raw material alone in his studio in Finland.As such, 500-Push-Up is an absolute delight when it hits the mark.To my ears, that happens with roughly half of these songs, while the other half feels more like cool experiments that fall a bit short of truly catching fire.I suppose that ultimately makes this album a bit uneven and a comparatively minor entry in the discographies of all involved, but that does not detract from the exquisite pleasures of this one-off detour's high points.Moreover, 500-Push-Up reveals a welcome glimpse into the more loose and fun side of Ripatti's artistry, making this a comparatively accessible counterbalance to the wintry, abrasive vision realized earlier this year on Rakka.

Samples can be found here.