This week's series of episodes features images from Asheville, NC, which was devastated by Hurricane Helene this past week.
Please consider donating to the various organizations in and around the area.
Episode 714 features music by Pan•American, Maria Somerville, Patrick Cowley, The Gaslamp Killer and Jason Wool, Der Stil, Astrid Sonne, Reymour, Carlos Haayen Y Su Piano Candeloso, Harry Beckett, Tarwater, Mermaid Chunky, and Three Quarter Skies.
Episode 715 has Liquid Liquid, Kim Deal, Severed Heads, Los Agentes Secretos, mHz, Troller, Mark Templeton, Onkonomiyaki Labs, Deadly Headley, Windy and Carl, Sunroof, and claire rousay.
Episode 716 includes Actors, MJ Guider, The Advisory Circle, The Bug, Alessandro Cortini, The Legendary Pink Dots, Chihei Hatakeyama and Shun Ishiwaka, Arborra, Ceremony, Ueno Takashi, Organi, and Saagara.
As both an experimentalist and a songwriter, Jim O’Rourke has been responsible for a number of beloved and highly influential albums over the course of his storied career, but he is a bit of a prolific wild card as well: it is damn near impossible to guess which albums will capture him in an especially inspired mood and which will not. That said, his previous collaboration with Kassel Jaeger (2017's Wakes on Cerulean) had some very promising passages that transcended typical drone/sound art fare, so I was quite curious to see if this follow-up would flesh out their shared vision into something truly great. As it turns out, In Cobalt Aura Sleeps is a hell of a lot like its predecessor: fitfully wonderful, but not without some lulls. Nevertheless, it does feel like a significant evolution, as it is both darker and more tightly focused than Cerulean, erring more on the side of "understated" and "curiously constructed" rather than "too improvisatory." Fortunately, those hurdles can be mostly overcome with the aid of some headphones and suitable volume, revealing a satisfyingly strong album that is richly textured, absorbing, and mysterious.
This album borrows its title from a Mikhail Lermontov poem ("Alone I Set Out on The Road") in which the author wrestles with a deep sense of hopelessness despite the pleasures of the misty landscape and a lovely canopy of stars overhead.To some extent, the album evokes a similar sense of quiet solitude and desolate nocturnal beauty, as well as its concurrent existential dread.Later in the poem, however, Lermontov expresses the wish to abandon consciousness for a blissful sleep among gently rustling leaves and the soothing sounds of "voices sweet," which is definitely where the poet and this album part ways (though In Cobalt Aura Sleeps does have a slow-motion feel of dreamlike unreality).While I would not say that the album quite crosses the line into nightmare territory, it would be a stretch to describe either half of this two-part piece as anything resembling an untroubled idyll.There are some natural night sounds drifting throughout the album though, creating an unusual balance of textures that calls to mind the haunted ruins of factory bordered by a pond populated by all manner of frogs and crickets.In the piece's first half, for example, a skeletal drum machine-like rhythm of pops and clicks emerges from an insectoid hum to settle into a quietly simmering and off-kilter groove.For a while, Jaeger and O’Rourke skillfully embellish that backdrop with ghostly feedback whines, assorted noises, and swells of distorted guitar, achieving an impressive degree of fragile, phantasmagoric beauty.Sadly, that spell was not destined to last, as all sense of structure gets sucked into a black hole of deep space abstraction around the halfway point.That said, the "stoned kosmische synth" interlude that follows is occasionally compelling, resembling a deconstructed and borderline malevolent remix of something off I'm Happy and I'm Singing.
The album's second half fades in with something that sounds like a field recording of a ghost train before resolving into a passage of heavy synth drones mingled with sputtering noise squalls and washes of enigmatic field recordings.It is considerably more menacing than the album's first half, as it has a very sickly, corroded feel as well as a prominent motif that resembles a slowed-down air raid siren.Gradually, however, the mood becomes increasingly shifting and ambiguous, blossoming into a stretch that feels like a rapturously gorgeous piece of music has been smeared into out-of-tune harmonies.Then, around the halfway point, the piece transforms into something resembling a psychedelic chorus of chirping space frogs accompanied by a sinister-sounding shimmer of dissonant synth tones.After that, the piece builds to a strange and otherworldly crescendo that seems like a mindbending collage of machine noise, beeping computers, a burbling stream, still more frogs, and some alternately brooding and blurting space rock synths.There might also be some unrecognizably warped and stretched classical music in the mix too, but the most compelling aspect of that culminating pile-up of disparate sounds is how the entire mass has the unsettling feel of a living mass that is erratically pulsing and fading in and out of focus.
My only minor grievance with Cobalt is the same one that I have with just about every collaboration between prominent experimental musicians: it seems like it was edited together from improvisations and its flashes of genuine inspiration are bridged together by passages of comparative indulgence and directionlessness.That said, the best moments on this album are damn near revelatory, so I cannot lament the meandering path that it took to get those places.The crucial thing is only that they got there at all.That said, the duo were unusually successful in shaping a solid and coherent album from their seemingly disparate vignettes.And, more importantly, there are at least two novel aesthetic niches pioneered on Cobalt that I would have loved to hear expanded into their own full-length albums.While I sincerely doubt O'Rourke and Jaeger will ever revisit those territories themselves, it was nevertheless a delight to get a glimpse of otherworldly vistas that would absolutely not otherwise exist without this album.Perhaps some other artists will someday pick up the baton and attempt to grant me my wish, but they will have an extremely tough act to follow if they do, as O'Rourke and Jaeger share quite a unique sensibility that merges masterful lightness of touch with bold experimentation.Obviously, both artists have produced plenty of wonderful and compelling work on their own, but in the realm of pure creativity, this formidable union sometimes feels even greater than the sum of its parts.
I am an enormous fan of this latest endeavor from Ulan Bator founder Amaury Cambuzat, as AmOrtH was easily one of my favorite albums of 2019. Notably, this latest release marks the project's vinyl debut, which makes it the first album in which Cambuzat's real-time layering has had to contend with actual time constraints. I was not sure how well that would work, as the core Cathedral aesthetic has always been to allow pieces to unhurriedly and organically unfold until they complete their "natural" progression (and the project's crowning achievement thus far is a piece that stretched out for 40 glorious minutes). As it turns out, however, Cambuzat handled that challenge quite well. Given the greatness of the opening "Indignation," it is entirely possible that he simply had a killer 20-minute piece in the vault just waiting for this opportunity to arise, but it is equally possible that he mathematically converted that duration into a fixed number of heartbeats and simply worked from that. While the B-side is admittedly a more minor pleasure, I remain continually amazed by the depth and breadth of what Cambuzat can achieve with just a guitar and some pedals. This is yet another excellent release.
Given that all I Feel Like A Bombed Cathedral releases are essentially composed the exact same way, Cambuzat wisely did not bother to provide much information about W's creation or inspiration at all.Instead, he opted for the far more appropriate alternative of creating a black and white promotional video of masked and hooded figures lurking ominously in a bleak winter forest.The video has a very creepy "found footage" feel akin to The Blair Witch Project, which is very much an appropriate mood to convey for W's first half (and much of the project's past work as well).While I cannot say that I am a huge fan of black metal imagery in general (at least not unironically), the image of Cambuzat as a lone, sorcerer-like figure haunting ruins and stark landscapes is a decidedly apt one, as it both distances this project from more ambient-minded experimental guitarists and emphasizes its ritualistic nature.At its best, I Feel Like A Bombed Cathedral seems to lie somewhere between a trance state and a sort of ecstatic catharsis, as Cambuzat patiently builds harmonically rich and emotionally resonant soundscapes through the exacting accretion of layers.Much like the similarly hooded Sunn O))), Cambuzat shares a lot of common ground with drone music, yet strives to transcend the form with a more maximalist approach to dynamics and intensity.Unlike Sunn O))), however, the beauty of Cambuzat's work lies in steadily deepening and darkening harmonies rather than seismic vibrational power.
On the opening "Indignation," a single sustained note slowly undulates for roughly an entire minute before Cambuzat begins to unfold a slow-motion melody of swelling tones.The piece soon takes on an eerie and majestic feel, but it does not linger in that shadowy, dreamlike state for long, as a bass-heavy heartbeat pulse soon injects a propulsive sense of purpose and forward motion.As the heartbeat insistently throbs away, the layers of drones sneakily expand like fresh streaks of color in a haunting, smog-blurred sunset.Cambuzat then intensifies the pulse of the piece through rhythmic splashes of chiming chords and that is the point where the incredible intricacy and precision of the piece starts to fully manifest itself, as some chords are deliberately out of phase or dissonant.It is a beguiling balance of clarity, shadow, subtlety, and force, yet it gets even better when Cambuzat finally stomps his distortion pedal and the piece blossoms into wonderfully roiling sea of shifting, intertwined layers.Even when the piece is at its full power, however, there is the ghost of a submerged melody lurking behind the cacophony.It is a truly masterful feat of patience and elegantly controlled visceral intensity.The following "Fear & Disorder," on the other hand, takes a very different direction, as Cambuzat's web of guitar loops embraces a very hazy and impressionistic tone, evoking a languorous bed of flutes and strings.It is initially an unexpectedly warm and tender piece, resembling a time-stretched and deconstructed Debussy homage, but it gradually transforms into something evoking a desolate, windswept plane.In its final moments, however, it unexpectedly opens up into slow-burning and darkly hallucinatory coda of blackened bass rumble and dissonant smears of spectral guitars that feel wonderfully supernatural.Admittedly, the piece takes quite some time to get to that point, but it is an impressive pay-off nonetheless.
As far as I know, Cambuzat is still fully devoted to performing all of his pieces in real-time for this project, so some feats simply take longer to lay the appropriate groundwork for than others.Viewed in that light, "Fear & Disorder" is a fascinating performance and a bold step outside the project's comfort zone rather than a composition in need of tighter editing.When Cambuzat is at his best, however, he easily transcends the challenges and limitations of his unusual working methods: "Indignation" is gripping right from its first note and only gets better from there.In fact, it is downright astonishing that this side of Cambuzat's artistry has only recently been revealed, as he is a goddamn drone shaman—I cannot think of any similar artists who share his seemingly unerring intuitions for texture, flow, tension, focus, or well-timed slashes of controlled violence.From an execution standpoint, Cambuzat is likely a man without peer.It legitimately boggles my mind that this project is not more well-known and appreciated than it is, especially in the wake of AmOrtH.As far as I am concerned, that album still remains Cathedral's zenith, but W is not too far behind and "Indignation" adds yet another instant classic to Cambuzat's growing pile.
With A New Form of Crime coming out last fall, and a new double LP on the horizon, Matt Weston has been prolific as of late. One thing that sets Tell Us About Your Stupor apart from these other albums, however, is that it is a live recording, although that of an installation project rather than a traditional concert setting. That is an important distinction to make because, having seen Weston perform on multiple occasions, the live experience is a significantly different animal, and that is clearly captured here. As an installation, it would seem that this is more of a live performance augmented by other instruments or recordings rather than a purely live, solo recording, but it has an exceptional balance between live Weston and studio Weston.
While attending a Matt Weston performance with a friend of mine, my friend (who is not well versed in experimental or avant garde type music) remarked that "he plays the drums wrong."Not in a demeaning sense, but succinctly summarizing Weston's live approach.Sure, there is usually a traditional drum kit set up, with some additional found objects scattered about, but with Weston's (mis)use of the instrument is what makes his work so unique.His rapid fire playing, heavily informed by free jazz and improvisation, rarely hits the drums in the conventional sense, but instead he focuses on the sides of the drums themselves, the stands on which they are set up, objects he has placed on them, etc.
The recent studio albums from Weston have been centered largely around electronics and processing and while drums often could be heard, they were never the focus, nor did they have the intensity of his performances.Here, however, that comes through a bit more clearly.The first side, "Don't Yell or Hit," opens with classic live Weston sounds.Erratic (though structured) drum sounds and various rattling objects cut through, with the occasional tympani outburst to punctuate things nicely.It is not solely drums and percussion to be heard, however.Electronics appear throughout, sometimes mimicking pained horns, other times being nice, noisy additions to flesh out the sound.To this he adds a myriad of skittering junk, bells, bird calls, etc., resulting in a work that is intensely chaotic, but carefully considered and improvised in the classic sense.
On the other side, "Stop With The Brushing" opens with a noise that could either be a synthesizer burst or horn squelching, with some processed voices thrown in for good measure.Weston punctuates this with deep, heavy drum thuds, metallic clanging, and the occasional outburst of found sound clatter, but compared to the A side there is a bit more breathing room to be had.Overall, however,it is a darker feeling work, however, with an emphasis on lower registers and heavily uses of reverb, with shimmering, serrated electronics cutting through.
One of the things I greatly appreciate about Tell Us About Your Stupor is how Matt Weston is able to clearly present both his stripped-down percussion live work and his electronic experiments together.His studio records are all exceptional, and I am very eager to hear the new one he is working on, but I also love his pure percussion excursions as well.It may not have the same impact as seeing him perform live, but it is an acceptable approximation, especially in this current time where it is questionable when the next show will be performed anywhere.I imagine this is going to be an excellent companion work to his new material, but it also stands quite well on its own.
Enigmatic Afro-Transcendentalist figure Laraaji has a long, fascinating history with music and is still very active at the age of 76. He is known for being "discovered" by Brian Eno, and working with such underground darlings as Sun Araw, Dallas Acid, and Blues Control. He studied piano composition in college, and then found himself with Eastern mysticism and began improvising with zithers and mbira. This album finds him returning to his roots with an all instrumental piano meditation.
Recorded in a church on what sounds like a grand piano, these pieces have an open air feeling that fills in and traces the contours of that large hall. I can envision the sunlight streaming in the sanctuary as if by divine light, and the character of these pieces matches the peacefulness of that setting.
Harmonically, these brief songs are actually similar in sound to certain turn of the 19th century composers such as Scriabin, Revel, and Debussy. As one track title suggests, "Flow Joy," the pieces unfold like a joyful conversation, meandering gently and contemplatively with a bright outlook and some hints of the 1950s African-American music that influenced Laraaji as a child. He skitters lightly around the keyboard, only to include a sudden idea of a blues lick, or a diversion into a march like a gospel chorale.
The whole album is so airy and dreamy that it would suit as music for one of Laraaji's laughter meditation workshops well. Deep listening is transportive to a lighter emotional plane, something I think we could all use during these times of challenge and stress. Sun Piano is the first release in a trilogy from the same session, and follows the full length releases Sun Gong, Bring on the Sun, and Sun Transformations also on All Saints. A companion LP, Moon Piano, and an extended EP of piano/autoharp duets will follow later in 2020.
Plone's album Puzzlewood continues in their very specific oeuvre of midtempo music with a playful, childlike hue to it. It's all soft edges and singable tunes in a digital mishmash that includes electronics, synths, trumpet, piano, guitar, strings, and exotic percussion. This happy orchestration yields bite sized songs full of lift and happiness. The album is a comeback after a twenty year absence, and although the genre they helped pioneer has fallen out of favor, their self-consciously retro sound makes their music a timeless affair.
Plone experiments with different styles and influences. "Miniature Magic" has a vintage, groovy feel to it that is quintessential to Plone's sound. "Watson's Telescope" is another 1970's throwback with a swinging pulse. "The Model Village" dabbles in Latin American rhythms for a springtime hit. "Circler" is the scaled down song, enveloped in strings and a creamy synth lead with nods to classical music. Many of these songs have a kickin', hammered drum track, including "Chalk Stream," "Build a Small Fire," and "Day Trip." One of the few songs with vocal samples, "Sarcelle," is a zany uptempo jam that calls to mind pillow fights and jumping on the bed.
Puzzlewood is very relaxed with dense, layered production and a strong sense of humor. The light touch and infectious character lends it to bouncing around and movement in general. This is a great spin for a party, or just for party people.
On Microphone Permission, Jasmine Guffond has created some truly rapturous detours and alleyways in sound. The ever shifting musical landscape is like an aural house of mirrors, though there is nothing circus-like about this project. It contains inward, reflective compositions—at times somber and at other times buzzing about—but always interesting and beautiful.
"Forever Listening" is a standout song and the opening introduction to the album. It is a malleable collection of chromatic bends and sly arches of sound made with lovely, eerie harmonies. "Dotcompound" opens sounding like something from Edgar Allan Poe's chambers with its creaks and rattles and trilling, ghostly strings. Oddly, it evolves into something that could be heard at a 1980s throwback club, with synth pads and digital drums.
"Default Cultures" is another highlight, with a locomotion to it that is oddly reminiscent of Kraftwerk. Doll-like female vocals spackle this short, angular song. "An Utterly Dark Spot" is a fine conclusion to the album, opening like a question mark and evolving into a twelve minute sketch of a ride through a tunnel, with bell-like tones bouncing off the smooth enclosed walls and gentle vocals daubing the warm, scratchy bed of static.
I loved this album. It has a certain continuity of story to it as an album even though each song is remarkably unique.
Los Angeles' Flatworms kicked off their career creating psychedelic-tinged and feedback-driven guitar riffs embedded in a foundation of high-octane garage punk, with lyrical content to match. The latest direction finds the trio of vocalist and guitarist Will Ivy, drummer Justin Sullivan and bassist Tim Hellman (Ty Segall, Oh Sees) painting on a less fuzzy canvas, with a more refined sound and finer songwriting precision, with both Steve Albini and Ty Segall in the engineering booth. Segall's '60s psychedelic influence can be felt here, as well as Albini's commitment to high fidelity, but some of the musical experimentation heard on their prior work has been traded in for a more well-oiled machine, albeit a well-oiled machine with punk sizzle.
The title of the album speaks to today's society as a barren wilderness, as cold and barren as Antarctica, and its inhabitants devoid of empathy. Album opener "The Aughts" was inspired by Ivy's trip to the ruins of the Tomb of the Kings in Cyprus, lamenting the end of a once grand civilization, failures laid bare as if in a wasteland, and this and other tracks carry a similar theme: if we do not learn from our mistakes and fly right, we stand to be what Antarctica became, in culture, community, climate and beyond. Tracks like "Market Forces" and "Mine" take shots at just some of the forces pushing society in that direction. It's a bleak concept with angry energy crackling throughout the entire album, but not all is without hope if we cooperate to turn the ship around, as tracks like "Via" attest. "If I follow the fallen's path / I walk to my own demise / Can't burn the history / But I can try to rebuild."
Yet, the musical formula that Flat Worms used so successfully in the past is diminished here. Gone are the buzzy melodies, modulated noise, focused vocal blasts, and messy, chaotic riffs, in favor of cleaner fidelity and more formulaic melody. The concept of the album is worth exploring, but the delivery of the message falls short. This, their second full-length delivery, was recorded in a mere six days in Steve Albini's Electrical Audio studio. With such a quick turnaround it might be expected that the same fuzzed out chaos is present here, but its presence is felt much less. While the album offers plenty of energy, the production washes away some of the rawness, unique flourishes, and personality that made the self-titled album so memorable.
Los Angeles' Flatworms kicked off their career creating psychedelic-tinged and feedback-driven guitar riffs embedded in a foundation of high-octane garage punk, with lyrical content to match. The latest direction finds the trio of vocalist and guitarist Will Ivy, drummer Justin Sullivan and bassist Tim Hellman (Ty Segall, Oh Sees) painting on a less fuzzy canvas, with a more refined sound and finer songwriting precision, with both Steve Albini and Ty Segall in the engineering booth. Segall's '60s psychedelic influence can be felt here, as well as Albini's commitment to high fidelity, but some of the musical experimentation heard on their prior work has been traded in for a more well-oiled machine, albeit a well-oiled machine with punk sizzle.
The debut from Montreal’s Bodywash is an album that sounds lovely for casual listening, but after focused listening reveals deeper pockets of brilliance. In the past couple of decades the MP3 audio format, much in the same way as CDs and cassettes, has allowed for a viable "listen and run" approach. Digital music has offered tremendous convenience but has also encouraged less immersive music listening. With the emergence of many lockdowns and stay-at-home orders, now is the perfect time to settle in and get deeply immersed into a full-length piece of music. Comforter is a work full of familiar and, yes, comforting sounds, and it is a great place to practice immersive listening.
The layers of sound and instrumentation are the true magic, with the vocals overlaying much of the music for a quiet and hazy effect. A consistently relaxed yet upbeat energy supports hypnotic harmonies and atmospheric melodies, affirming its suggestive title. Life imitates art on opener "Reverie:" the song was written while member Chris Steward was delirious with fever while working in a claustrophobically small and dark rehearsal space, ultimately being written with an underlying motorik rhythm suggesting urgency and hinting at a need for release. From here, comfort is provided in waves of textured guitar, layered electronics and gauzy vocals, offering a relaxing float through subtle soundscapes.
It is tempting to categorize it merely as shoegaze or dream pop, both styles are heavily present on the album. A casual listener fond of these genres will enjoy this just based on that alone, but there are enough twists and turns here that warrant attention and will enrich the attentive listener. In the midst of tranquil guitar and quiet vocals are splashes of spacey electronics ("Paradisiac"), homages to the '80s ("Eye to Eye") and forays into electronic '90s ("Comforter"). More listens reveal previously unnoticed nuances such as interwoven vocal harmonies, emotive passages, and diverse use of instruments and effects that add new dimensions on each listen.
It is obvious this work was crafted with dedication to their art, and the band have had time to hone their craft. Having started in 2014 as college students, the album was recorded over a span of two years and released in 2019. Bodywash captures a mood, and capture it very well. The most optimal experience for me has been on vinyl with a good set of speakers, but headphones work. Tune everything out for the perfect transportation to a blissful sonic dimension, somewhere between the onset of sleep and dream.
I can think of few other projects that have elicited such a wide and continually shifting range of opinions from me as Portland's Golden Retriever, as Jonathan Sielaff and Matt Carlson sometimes seem like immensely talented and idiosyncratic visionaries and sometimes seem like dedicated revivalists of my least favorite strains of kosmische musik. This new collaboration with Oakland-based pedal steel master Chuck Johnson, however, is unambiguously a marriage made in heaven, as Johnson's warm and soulful ambient shimmer provides the perfect context for Sielaff and Carlson to work their magic. At its best, Rain Shadow feels a bit like a long-lost Brian Eno/Daniel Lanois collaboration, but one that has been updated with sharper edges and a more sophisticated approach to harmony (and, of course, a heavily processed clarinet). This is very likely the strongest album that either Johnson or Golden Retriever have ever recorded.
Rain Shadow takes its name from "the natural phenomenon which leaves plains and shallow land just beyond mountain ranges desolate and dry" and I suspect that title was chosen by Chuck Johnson, as both it and the album's general tone are strongly reminiscent of his earthy, meditative work as half of Saariselka.As such, it is safe to say that this collaboration draws Golden Retriever further from their comfort zone than it does Johnson, though trying to accurately delineate Sielaff and Carlson’s evolving aesthetic would be a challenging task for anyone.Still, one of the hallmarks of the duo's artistry has long been an emphasis on live performance and Rain Shadow makes a significant departure from that working method (or any conventional working method, for that matter).The album was essentially composed remotely, as all three artists worked in isolation and built these four pieces up from sketchlike foundations.Or, as the album description puts it: the album "grew from members introducing a simple idea, as if posing a musical question which the others would respond to with recordings of their musical reactions.").In essence, this approach split Golden Retriever into two solo artists rather than a single entity.In addition to that unusual compositional approach, both Johnson and Golden Retriever each selected two pieces for final control over the finished mix and arrangement.I would have expected such an approach to result in two very different halves of the album, but I cannot discern any significant variation in the overarching aesthetic of these four pieces, as each member of the trio seemed to be very much on the same egoless and sublime wavelength. 
The album seems like it was definitely edited and sequenced with the vinyl format in mind, as it is made up of alternately long and short pieces that add up to two 20-minute sides.Unsurprisingly, it is the longer pieces that feel like Rain Shadow's raison d'être, but the shorter pieces are not at all lacking in inspiration or quality.The first long piece, "Empty Quarter," is initially a dreamlike haze of warm synths and languorously fluid pedal steel glissandi.Gradually, however, it amasses more textural and harmonic depth, as Carlson's synth lazily twinkles and sputters around a quietly soulful and smoldering bass clarinet solo from Sielaff.It is an achingly lovely and slow-burning piece in general, yet it becomes even more beautiful with deeper listening, as the way the various motifs organically intertwine with one another is downright mesmerizing.Remarkably, however, the threesome manage to somehow top that achievement later on the album with "Sage Thrasher," which is a stone-cold masterpiece.Much like its illustrious predecessor, it too begins as a heavenly pool of slow-moving ambient bliss.It soon blossoms into a rich passage of ghostly, swooning pedal steel work from Johnson, but my favorite part is when something resembling a tightly harmonized mass guitar solo rises up from the mists.Given Golden Retriever's promiscuous use of effects pedals, it is hard to exactly say who is responsible for that brilliant and sublime performance, but whoever it was single-handedly elevated an already great piece into something absolutely transcendent.That said, everything else about "Sage Thrasher" is rapturously beautiful as well, as its various layers all unfold like billowing, slow-motion tendrils of smoke en route to an unexpectedly dense and roaring crescendo.
The shorter two pieces suffer only from their lesser scale and scope, as Johnson and Golden Retriever seem to work best when they can stretch out and allow a piece to evolve at a natural, unhurried pace.That said, both "Lupine" and "Creosote Ring" manage to explore some very appealing places that that the longer pieces did not reach.In "Lupine," for example, two tenderly bittersweet clarinet lines intertwine over an elegiac structure of descending bass tones.Then, on "Creosote Ring," the trio creep quite close to the heavy synth drones of an Abul Mogard epic, yet enhance the gravitas of that foundation with some roiling guitar shimmer and yet another killer clarinet solo (apparently I suddenly love clarinets now).That amounts to nothing less than four great songs in a row, each with their own distinct character.As much as I have been impressed by both Johnson and Golden Retriever in the past, I was legitimately blindsided by the greatness of this album, as these three artists have a truly amazing natural chemistry and seem to have absolutely unerring shared instincts about everything from pacing to harmony to density.Moreover, every single piece starts off good and ultimately winds up somewhere exponentially better, all while nimbly avoiding predictability, indulgence, or shallow prettiness.In fact, this album only seems more and more inspired and masterful every single time I listen to it.Rain Shadow is an instant classic.
Ren Schofield might be living in a new country (England) and releasing music on a new label (Alter), but no one need worry about those differing circumstances having any impact at all on the single-minded and relentless brutality of his work as Container. That said, Scramblers is (rightly) billed as a more "high-octane" incarnation of Schofield's punishing aesthetic, as it evolved directly out of his aggressive live performances. To some degree, such a statement is largely academic, as just about every Container album has felt like the techno equivalent of a runaway train, but it is true that this particular album offers virtually no breaks at all in the intensity of Container's splattering and pummeling rhythmic assaults. That is just fine by me, as Schofield's primal violence is consistently executed with surgical precision and visceral power, but more casual fans may find themselves wishing that Container would someday evolve further beyond the mercilessly one-dimensional onslaught of previous albums.
Longtime Container fans were likely gobsmacked to learn that Schofield was finally releasing an album that was not simply titled LP (a title he has used for all four previous full-lengths), so that particular change may be actually the most dramatic and unexpected evolution in evidence with Scramblers.Schofield was inspired to make that bold leap by the dual meaning that the word "scramblers" has for him, as it references both "a Baltimore street drug" and a diner that he used to frequent with his father.According to Schofield, the intent was to "pay homage to a nice name that lends itself to both depraved and wholesome contexts and do my part to carry on the tradition."Despite that sentiment, any real trace of wholesomeness on Scramblers seems to begin and end with the title, as the album is essentially a wall-to-wall onslaught of punishing beats and gnarled electronics.While the album's description name-checks EVOL and Ruff Sqwad and describes Container's music as "techno," Schofield is entirely in a class of his own for a couple of reasons.The first of those is his stripped-down and primitive approach to gear (a Roland MC-909, a four-track portastudio, and some pedals), which is no doubt a lingering vestige of his past as a noise artist.Another likely vestige from those origins: these eight songs ("recorded, mixed and mastered in one day") are lean, mean, and unembellished by anything resembling hooks or melody.The other unusual element of Container lies in the nature of Schofield's beats, which make Scramblers far feel more akin to punk or metal than dance music: these songs certainly inspire motion, yet they seem much better suited to whipping up a frenzied pit than they do for any attempt at more traditional, rhythmic dancing.
I would love to know how Schofield himself differentiated these songs or chose their titles, as they are all built from the same minimal components and share a similar feeling of explosive spontaneity.If I had to guess, I would say there is zero chance that any of these pieces could be played the same way twice.And, since there are no melodies, prominent hooks, or especially significant variations in the pummeling, stripped-down beats, the main differences between the pieces lie almost entirely in the character of their electronic noise squalls or how radically Schofield disrupts their rhythmic flow.That is not a grievance, mind you, as listening to Scramblers is lot like getting repeatedly run over by a truck: the superficial characteristics of the truck are entirely secondary to the force of the impact.Nevertheless, I have some personal favorites, such as the chirping and squelching groove that emerges from the noisy intro of "Ventilator," steadily building in gnarled, bulldozing, and bass-heavy intensity.Elsewhere, the relentless title piece erupts into a psychedelic spray of bubbling synth tones, then jettisons just about everything to lock into a cool bass and drum breakdown.The half-rolling/half-galloping "Duster" is another highlight, as the dense, grizzled synths blossom into a wonderfully plunging and blurting crescendo.
There are plenty of other great moments strewn throughout the album though, as Schofield's whirlwind day of recording did not preclude a host of killer twists, visceral climaxes, and adventurous rhythmic permutations.As a whole, Scramblers manages to feel simultaneously tightly focused and gleefully deranged: it is a tour de force of relentlessly slicing cymbals, viscerally crunching beats, and rumbling bass tones that ruthlessly barrels forward without any piece overstaying its welcome or falling prey to self-indulgence.The only real caveat is that such a description could just as accurately apply to just about every Container full-length to date, though Scramblers does amp up the frenzied intensity enough to feel like an evolution (an evolution that amusingly recalls the scene in Spinal Tap with the amps that go up to 11 rather than 10).Beyond that notable upgrade in speed and power, however, Scramblers occupies a unique stylistic niche that lies somewhere between "soundtrack to a futuristic warzone" (particularly on "Haircut") and hyperkinetic dancefloor fare (even if the resultant dancing is likely to be quite frenzied and spasmodic).Obviously, Schofield's tireless devotion to such a constrained and one-dimensional aesthetic means that Scramblers is unlikely to win over anyone who was not already a fan of previous Container albums, but there is something quite endearing and noble about an artist this committed to simply getting better and better at one specific thing with each new release.