 |
|
William Fowler Collins & James Jackson Toth, "Under Stars and Smoke"
The rural areas from which William Fowler Collins and James Jackson Toth hail have an inescapable influence on this new collaborative record. Across the three pieces that make up Under Stars and Smoke it is impossible to not hear the ambient desolation of Collins’ New Mexico home, while Kentucky’s own Toth provides unsettling Appalachian folk-tinged guitar and vocals. The two styles meld together perfectly, and with an appropriately challenging approach to production and aesthetic, it is a powerful entry in both artists’ already impressive catalogs.
The barren, sunbleached sands of New Mexico appear in sonic form immediately on the expansive introduction to "The Border".Elongated passages of bleak guitar tone are layered subtly, with occasional shifts in tone mimicking the errant desert mirage.Toth's guitar and vocals eventually come into focus, a sound that is simultaneously reminiscent of monastic chanting and country tinged revival bluegrass.His strained, intentionally thin voice adds to the creepiness factor that is already strongly in play before the icy sound is pulled apart by the duo into grinding guitar noise dissonance.
Connecting the two lengthy pieces that open and close this record is the brief "The Memorial".The song stands alone with a very different sense of composition, with a focus on quiet rumbling percussion that is far in the distance, enough to be disconcerting in its ambiguity.Collins and Toth keep the dynamic sparse and hushed, even as they push the composition into a more commanding wall of glistening processed sound for its conclusion.
The final piece, the 17 minute "The Man Who Could Not Stay" abandons the subtleties and instead opens abruptly with buzzing, noisy electronics and more overt electronic guitar squall.Just as quickly it fades back into more acoustic passages, with the duo returning to the more obvious electric guitar vibrations.There is a significant amount of effects here, but the sound is quite clearly that of a guitar, blending the more commanding notes with the space in which they are allowed to resonate.
Toth's vocals reappear amidst the guitar and what resembles the sparsest of field recordings.Buried low and hard panned, his voice sounds disconnected and isolated, made all the more pronounced via heavy echoes applied to it.The piece evolves and changes throughout the long duration, melding electrics, guitar, and vocals in different configurations that hint at both ambient noise and country-tinged folk, but never settle comfortably into either framework.
While the two different landscapes that James Jackson Toth and William Fowler Collins conjure via their work on Under Stars and Smoke, they complement each other wonderfully.Both may also have roots in the folk and drone metal scenes as well (respectively), and they bring those sensibilities to this record, the final product stands on its own as a singularly unique, bleak, but also gripping record that excels in its ambiguity and mystery.
samples:
 
