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THOMAS WYDLER & TOBY DAMMIT, "MORPHOSA HARMONIA"
Toby Dammit has played drums for Iggy Pop, Swans, The Residents andMark Eitzel, to name a few. He is also the creator of 2001's Top Dollar, a solo percussion album that took Hal Blaine's Psychedelic Percussionto its logical (and utterly absurd) extreme. Thomas Wydler is thedrummer for The Bad Seeds and formerly of Die Haut.Hit Thing
For the meeting ofthese two master percussionists, one could be forgiven for expecting analbum composed equally of competitive drum solos or hippie rhythmcircle music. What Wydler and Dammit do instead is create a variedalbum of exotic pop instrumentals that neatly defies any easycategorization. While Morphosa Harmonia is undoubtedly andunashamedly heavy on the percussive side of things, Thomas and Tobyalso tackle Buchla synthesizers, vibraphones, electric piano and bass.Contributions from guest players Jochen Arbeit (of EinsturzendeNeubauten), Chris Hahn (of Angels of Light, Martin Peter (of Die Haut)and Beate Bartel (of Liaisons Dangereuses) add further layers ofcompositional complexity to the album. The album's title gives asubstantial clue as to the sort of sound Wydler and Dammit are aimingfor; the krautrock of Musik Von Harmonia and the Cluster &Eno albums is clearly evoked in the album's floating, psychedelicatmospheres. In fact, the pair even recruited Ingo Krauss, the engineerfrom Conny Plank's legendary studio, to mix this album. Perhaps becausedrummers are often the most maligned member of any given band andfrequently the most ignored element of rock music, Toby Dammit opts toplace the percussion of utmost primacy in his music, forcing the restof the elements to follow the lead of the drums, cymbals, gongs andbells. As a listener, I was placed right next to the drum set, a uniqueperspective from which to experience this collection of chuggingpsychedelic pop songs. Most of the tracks on the album are eclectic andwhimsical, combining Martin Denny's high-fidelity exotica with EnnioMorricone's kitchen sink compositional style. Each track is built fromthe rhythm down, with eerie birdcalls, chants and synthesized choirsweaving in and out of the beats. Canny use of echo, reverb and phasingkeep the album in a constant state of dreamy psychedelia, adding bonghits to bongos, as it were. The packaging is an intriguing mystery,filled with watercolors of cats and nude females. (Kitties and titties?Pussies and pussycats?) Whatever the intention was, its a suitably oddjuxtaposition for a fun and goofy little album that quietly pushes theboundaries of percussion-based music.
For the meeting ofthese two master percussionists, one could be forgiven for expecting analbum composed equally of competitive drum solos or hippie rhythmcircle music. What Wydler and Dammit do instead is create a variedalbum of exotic pop instrumentals that neatly defies any easycategorization. While Morphosa Harmonia is undoubtedly andunashamedly heavy on the percussive side of things, Thomas and Tobyalso tackle Buchla synthesizers, vibraphones, electric piano and bass.Contributions from guest players Jochen Arbeit (of EinsturzendeNeubauten), Chris Hahn (of Angels of Light, Martin Peter (of Die Haut)and Beate Bartel (of Liaisons Dangereuses) add further layers ofcompositional complexity to the album. The album's title gives asubstantial clue as to the sort of sound Wydler and Dammit are aimingfor; the krautrock of Musik Von Harmonia and the Cluster &Eno albums is clearly evoked in the album's floating, psychedelicatmospheres. In fact, the pair even recruited Ingo Krauss, the engineerfrom Conny Plank's legendary studio, to mix this album. Perhaps becausedrummers are often the most maligned member of any given band andfrequently the most ignored element of rock music, Toby Dammit opts toplace the percussion of utmost primacy in his music, forcing the restof the elements to follow the lead of the drums, cymbals, gongs andbells. As a listener, I was placed right next to the drum set, a uniqueperspective from which to experience this collection of chuggingpsychedelic pop songs. Most of the tracks on the album are eclectic andwhimsical, combining Martin Denny's high-fidelity exotica with EnnioMorricone's kitchen sink compositional style. Each track is built fromthe rhythm down, with eerie birdcalls, chants and synthesized choirsweaving in and out of the beats. Canny use of echo, reverb and phasingkeep the album in a constant state of dreamy psychedelia, adding bonghits to bongos, as it were. The packaging is an intriguing mystery,filled with watercolors of cats and nude females. (Kitties and titties?Pussies and pussycats?) Whatever the intention was, its a suitably oddjuxtaposition for a fun and goofy little album that quietly pushes theboundaries of percussion-based music. samples:
