10 May 2020

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Albums and Singles

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.

Luminelle

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.

Sound samples can be found here.

10 May 2020

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Albums and Singles

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.

Thrill Jockey

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.

Samples can be be found here.

(Note: The digital version of Rain Shadow has a May 15th release date.The physical album is due out June 19th.)

10 May 2020

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Albums and Singles

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.

Alter

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.

Samples can be found here.

09 May 2020

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Albums and Singles

Springing from a decades deep body of work, defined by a rigorously singular and adventurous approach to sound, cellist, composer, and improvisor, Okkyung Lee, returns with Yeo-Neun, her first outing with Shelter Press, and arguably her most groundbreaking and unexpected album to date.

A vital, present force in the contemporary global landscape of experimental music, Okkyung Lee is widely regarded for her solo and collaborative improvisations and compositions, weaving a continuously evolving network of sonority and event, notable for its profound depth of instrumental sensitivity, exacting intellect, and visceral emotiveness. Yeo-Neun, recorded by Yeo-Neun Quartet - an experimental chamber music ensemble founded in 2016 and led by Lee on cello, featuring harpist Maeve Gilchrist, pianist Jacob Sacks, and bassist Eivind Opsvik - represents the culmination of one of longest and most intimate arcs in her remarkable career. A radical departure from much of the experimental language for which she has become widely known, it is equally a fearless return.

Yeo-Neun loosely translates to the gesture of an opening in Korean, presenting window into the poetic multiplicity that rests at the album’s core. Balanced at the outer reaches of Lee’s radically forward thinking creative process, its 10 discrete works are born of the ambient displacement of musician's life; intimate melodic constructions and deconstructions that traces their roots across the last 30 years, from her early days spent away from home studying the cello in Seoul and Boston, to her subsequent move to New York and the nomadism of a near endless routine of tours. At its foundation, lay glimpses of a once melancholic teen, traces of the sentimentality and sensitivity (감성 / Gahmsung) that underpins the Korean popular music of Lee’s youth, and an artist for whom the notions of time, place, and home have become increasingly complex.

Elegantly binding modern classical composition and freely improvised music with the emotive drama of Korean traditional music and popular ballads, the expanse of Yeo-Neun pushes toward the palpably unknown, as radical for what it is and does, as it for its approachability. In Lee’s hands, carried by a body of composition that rests beyond the prescriptive boundaries of culture, genre, geography, and time, a vision of the experimental avant-garde emerges as a music of experience, humanity, and life. Meandering melodies, from the deceptively simple to the tonally and structurally complex, slowly evolve and fall from view, the harp, piano, and bass forming an airy, liminal non-place, through which Lee’s cello and unplaceable memories freely drift.

Remarkably honest, unflinchingly beautiful, and creatively challenging, Shelter Press is proud to present Yeo-Neun, an album that takes one the most important voices in contemporary experimental music, Okkyung Lee, far afield into an unknown future, bound to her past.

More information can be found here.

09 May 2020

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Albums and Singles

KAMILHAN; il y a péril en la demeure is the conclusion of a 5-part work cycle by artist Grischa Lichtenberger which was initiated with the album LA DEMEURE; il y a péril en la demeure in 2015 and continued with the 3-part EP Spielraum, Allgegenwart, Strahlung in 2016.

In contrast to the first part of the series, which tried to trace the other in the intimacy of the private (the residence, la demeure), Lichtenberger now focuses on the phrase "il y a péril en la demeure." The french phrase literally translates into "there is a danger in one's residence" (la demeure) or "a danger is persistent, remains" (demeurer). Lichtenberger is interested in this ambiguity in relation to a metaphor of art:

"In a way, one could describe art as a pathological condition to hold onto a communicative defect. in this respect, the album is about a crisis - about the impossibility of expressing the unspeakable and instead secretly tying it in a parallel thread that deepens the relationship to the impossible."

On the other hand, Lichtenberger contraposes a social function of art. the legal meaning of the phrase "il ya péril en la demeure" (in German "gefahr im verzug," in English "imminent danger") describes a situation in which a person or authority intrudes into a private space that is particularly protected against access in order to prevent danger or secure evidence. Lichtenberger writes: "In art, the public is something that could perhaps be described in legal terms as a legitimate transgression of responsibility - it secures and holds what would otherwise be lost because the artist has become entangled in it."

This ambivalence between crisis and social reinsurance is aesthetically embodied by musical material that on the one hand seems unwieldy and subversive, on the other hand idiosyncratically grooving and encouraging to nod. The focus is on songs featuring computer-generated voices that sing in a language that remains incomprehensible. Fragmented from English syllables and reassembled into cryptic pop songs, Lichtenberger calls them "crooked ballads."

"In a way the tracks on KAMILHAN; il y a péril en la demeure are best understood as crooked ballads. They are songs - intentionally tying themselves to a symbolic repetition of classical pop-song structures. They seek to smuggle the crooked into the common and vice versa smuggle the hope of recognition and transference into the crooked."

Regardless of the theoretically excessive reflections that are typical of Lichtenberger, this album also succeeds in emotionally connecting to his topic with intimacy and sincerity that immediately touches the listener.

More information can be found here.

04 May 2020

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Albums and Singles

It is a safe assumption to say that most folks who buy a ticket to a concert expect to hear a few songs from their favorite band's latest album; after all, this is how bands showcase their latest music, but also provide fans the chance to hear their earlier work. Anyone seeing Wire since the '00s can assume no such thing; entire tours have included nothing but their newest work, barely acknowledging the fact that they've been around since the '70s. Wire does what Wire wants. Thankfully, they're great at it. It's a testament that Wire can still sound like Wire, maintaining that certain "Wire" sound, and yet continuously reinvent themselves, creating memorable - and fresh — music after 40 years.

Pink Flag

This approach to reinvention has served Wire well. They don't need the music press to fawn over them; they've entrenched themselves in the annals of musical history. Wire is for music aficionados of all ages. Bands of such long standing stature can be prone to the crime of repeating history. This album has the band showcasing their expertise at creating familiar musical tension that stems from their punk roots, but they remain unbound by their past and allow themselves to wander, creating lush and ethereal landscapes. "Oh there's that word, ethereal, the most overused word in music." Yeah, but consider the word for a moment: the ancient Greeks believed the earth consisted of the four basic elements (earth, air, fire and water), but the heavens consisted of substance even less tangible than air known as ether, described as an invisible light or fire. Ethereal eventually came to mean anything "marked by unusual delicacy or refinement." And there you have the blend of tension and etherealness that Wire has perfected on this album: punk lullabies for existential dread.

There's a sense of that dread that runs through the entire album. The title suggests a flip on the term "hive mind," which refers to united consciousness with a lack of individuality. "Mind hive," on the other hand, suggests a figurative place where each mind works autonomously but not necessarily united, instead creating an "ideal copy" of the majority instead of their own unique vision.

For those seeking the acid Wire are known for, the album bursts forth with it: "It's nothing new, hungry cats/ Getting fatter minds & thinner ideas." The lyrics bristle with references to a divided world, forces that seek to distort reality for their own nefarious group vision. "You are well-versed in verses, and chorus the chorus" from "Cactused" suggests we regurgitate what we are fed. The tension peeks out even in the most gentle moments, lulling the listener into a false sense of comfort, and in that lies the crux of their craft. Wire again reminds us how deceiving appearances can be, wolves camouflaged in the fluffiest of sheep wool. Wire could simply rest on their laurels and make a punk album, or follow the shoegaze crowd, but as usual they have done neither, choosing to lead instead of follow, hoping you'll follow along.

Sound samples available here.

03 May 2020

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Albums and Singles

Saturday Night is the debut LP by old friends and collaborators Alex Twomey, Matthew Sullivan, and Sean McCann. Recorded over numerous evenings at the artists' homes, and completed just before the birth of Matthew's daughter, Flora. The album became an excuse to spend time with one another as well as perform. As the trio ordered take-out, drank scotch, smoked on patios, laughing off the weight of reality–they stumbled into moments of musical focus. 

This album has a prism of fidelities. High and low resolutions press together as the environment blows through the instruments. The woozy, side-long titular track of hesitant cello and pianos opens the record. Quiet music with blemishes and inebriated pauses, breathing an alleviated air. Phrases with failing propellers, teetering between melodic and apathetic. The true speed of their Saturday nights.

Side two opens with "London On My Mind."  Reflecting the other pole, manic cassette treatments duel over Twomey's placid keyboard, ultimately breaking into a little joke on the piano. "Collection" features guitar by Sullivan, remembered for his thick fog of work under the alias Earn. With Sullivan's return to the instrument, he is joined by Twomey on upright piano and McCann processing the room in real-time. The brief final work, "Bird," recalls the style of the group's private press cassettes, The Bird and Charlotte's Office: poorly-played pleasant-hearted music.

Each edition of the record includes a 20-page photo booklet of stills documenting the recording process. The deluxe edition, limited to 25, includes signed and annotated jackets and an exclusive cassette, One More Saturday Night. In 2019 two practice sessions were filmed by Sullivan on VHS, the audio has been isolated for this cassette. Side One opens with an alternate version of "Saturday Night," recorded outside at night on Twomey's patio, looking in through a glass door at the artists. Crickets and dogs hum over the trio's dampened music. Side Two features a live, 25-minute run through of "London On My Mind," their erratic piece for microcassettes, piano, and synthesizer. This recording was pulled from a video of a little glass clown, sitting motionless in a bouquet of flowers as the cacophony wails through the room.

More information can be found here.

03 May 2020

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Albums and Singles

It has been roughly three years since Lawrence English last released a proper solo album (2017’s Cruel Optimism), though he has kept himself quite busy with collaborative work since then (most notably as half of HEXA). Nevertheless, I have always been quite fond of his solo work, so I was hoping that he had something ambitious in the pipeline and this latest release hits the mark in that regard. While I am not sure that I would necessarily characterize Lassitude as one of English's major releases, it is at least half brilliant and takes quite a different approach to drone than his usual fare. Part of that uniqueness lies in the fact that English focused entirely upon the pipe organ for this release, but Lassitude is perhaps even more significantly influenced by its inspirations, as one piece is inspired by Éliane Radigue and another by Phill Niblock.

Room40

I suspect Lassitude’s title is intended as droll exploitation of the word's dual meanings, as the timing of the release certainly coincides with an abundance of dispiriting and mentally wearying events throughout the world.However, in a highly localized sense, English seems to also be alluding to how physically exhausting it can be to play a pipe organ: in his description of the album, he notes how sore he was after "holding the bass pedals and manipulating the stops ever so delicately" for the performance of the title piece.The organ in question, currently housed in Brisbane's Old Museum, dates from the 19th century and is presumably a familiar instrument for English, as pipe organs have been audibly surfacing in his work since at least as far back as 2014's Wilderness of Mirrors (and I doubt there are a wealth of other building-sized instrument options in his immediate vicinity).Given the complexity of the instrument, I would not envy anyone trying to master advanced melodic compositions, but the organ's elaborate system of stops allows for nuanced tonal changes that are extremely well-suited to drone-based compositions such as these (or those of Kali Malone).Given that, it is no surprise that both of Lassitude's lengthy compositions are hyper-minimal drone works, though the stylistic difference between the two is admittedly quite dramatic.

According to English, the opening "Saccade (For Éliane Radigue)" was largely inspired by classic Radigue albums like Adnos, Trilogie de la morte, and L'île re-sonante and he makes absolutely no attempt to conceal that influence at all.In fact, "Saccade" is textbook Radigue fare on its face, as it is essentially just a single pulsing, quavering tone that gradually blossoms into a hypnotic swirl of chirping and buzzing oscillations.To his credit, however, English brings some impressively effective innovations to Radigue's signature aesthetic, condensing her characteristically epic time scale into a lean and heavy 20-minute dose of visceral, slow-burning, and hallucinatory drone nirvana.That could very well be unintentional, as not many artists share Radigue's superhuman patience, but English's more distilled and dense incarnation of simmering and throbbing oscillation worship could not possibly have been executed any more beautifully: "Saccade" is harmonically and rhythmically absorbing and intense from start to finish.The pleasures of the Niblock-inspired "Lassitude," on the other hand, are a bit less readily apparent, though that is partially because all of the action takes place in a lower frequency range.That said, the piece is considerably more consonant than predecessor, unfolding mostly as a single deep chord undarkened by ugly harmonies.Consequently, it feels comparably placid and "ambient," though sufficient volume and focused listening reveals seismic, slow-motion transformations continually unfolding in its rumbling depths.    

As an homage to Niblock, "Lassitude" is admittedly solid, but it is no better or no worse than its inspiration and too minimal to allow much (if any) of English's individual character to manifest itself.As such, it is by far the weaker of the two pieces.Unlike "Saccade," however, the title piece was recorded as a single one-take performance (a first for English).Seen in that light, "Lassitude" is quite an impressive feat of control, patience, and nuance.Of course, given that this is an album and not a public performance, I still cannot help but wonder how much better the piece could have been if it had been subjected to English's full compositional, editing, and production powers.Given how beautifully "Saccade" turned out, it is hard to imagine that "Lassitude" would have been anything other than a similarly sublime stunner in those circumstances.Then again, maybe not, as it is difficult to envision much that would not pale in comparison to "Saccade."In fact, it may very well be the single best piece Lawrence has ever recorded: a mesmerizing, billowing dream cloud curdled by endlessly shifting dissonances.

Samples can be found here.

03 May 2020

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Albums and Singles

This long-running Chicago slowcore trio has been uncharacteristically silent for the last five years, though vocalist Matt Christensen has been as tirelessly prolific as ever as a solo artist. Given that lengthy hiatus, it is not entirely surprising that the Zelienople that has resurfaced with Hold You Up is a somewhat different beast than the Zelienople of old. Admittedly, the band's usual fragility, languorous pacing, and pervading sense of melancholia have definitely not gone anywhere, but this latest release is considerably more driving and pop-minded than the fare I have grown to expect from the band. That said, I suppose I should put "driving" and "pop" in quotes, as the closest Hold You Up comes to the mainstream is an aesthetic indebtedness to Mark Hollis's solo work. Zelienople are still considerably more monochromatic and minimal than Hollis ever was though, so none of the band's distinctive character has been sacrificed—they have merely gotten a bit better at enhancing their vision with a greater emphasis on hooks and grooves. Needless to say, that evolution suits them well.

Miasmah

If I had to guess, I would say that I have been a casual fan of Zelienople for roughly a decade now, yet this project has only grown more inscrutable to me with each new release.For one, Christensen and drummer Mike Weis seem like exceptionally unlikely candidates for anything remotely resembling a conventional rock band (even though some of Christensen's solo work can be quite structured and melodic).For his part, Weis is now "a focused student of Korean Shaman and Buddhist music, often performing in Zen-based percussive rituals."That said, Zelienople is still quite far from sounding like a conventional rock band, though their more experimental tendencies manifest themselves in some very unusual and almost self-sabotaging ways on Hold You Up.The most dramatic divergence from the expected path lies in the album's production, as it sounds almost like the band is playing at the bottom of a nearby well.As a result, the music sounds weirdly bloodless, spectral, and impressionistic.In some ways, that gives the album kind of a cool hypnagogic feel, yet it also has the unfortunate effect of undercutting some of the band's strengths.While Christensen is both a stellar guitarist and an emotive vocalist, I get the distinct impression that he would vastly prefer to become a ghost or vanish into a fog than front a rock band.Curiously, however, Weis’s ride cymbal seems to exist outside of that elegantly blurred veil, cutting crisply through the reverb-heavy, submerged-sounding music to take an unusually prominent role.

While the non-Zelienople activities of bassist Brian Harding remain a mystery, he plays no less a role than Weis and Christensen, as his melodic, Peter Hook-esque riffing provides most of the album's structure (and gives Christensen license to improvise with as much looseness and spontaneity as he wants).In fact, Zelienople are amusingly akin to a hushed, post-rock Rush: all three members are formidable musicians with their own distinctive styles, each has plenty of space to work, and the end result is greater than the sum of its parts.I found much to love about the contributions of all three members and it is hard to imagine the band working nearly as well with a different line-up.In general, however, the best songs on Hold You Up are the ones where the rhythm section takes the most muscular role, such as the stomping, slow-burning, and propulsively rolling title piece.While it certainly takes its time to get to the vocals, "Hold You Up" is easily the best piece on the album, as every single element comes together seamlessly: the bass-driven groove is quite strong, Weis's cymbal patterns are very cool, the melodic synth hook provides a faint splash of color, and Christensen's ringing chords and arpeggios linger like a hallucinatory vapor trail.Elsewhere, the closing "America" makes excellent use of an oddly timed tom-tom rhythm, while the opening "Safer" is propelled by one of Harding's meatiest and most melodic bass riffs.The somewhat sleepy and meandering "Just An Unkind Time" is a dark horse candidate for an album highlight as well, as its spare arpeggios gradually intertwine with a burbling, groaning, and chirping host of other instruments for a quietly gorgeous and hallucinatory second half.      

As much as admire and appreciate how nuanced and beautifully crafted these songs are, however, I have a difficult time getting past the semi-incorporeal and almost weightless production of the album.I recognize that it was entirely a deliberate decision on the band's part, but it was still a perplexing one: it feels like the actual songs are reduced to a mere trebly haze over the considerably more "real" and physical contributions of the rhythm section.Charitably speaking, that gives Hold You Up a flickering, dreamlike feel that is quite unique to Zelienople.Normally, I am exactly the target demographic for that approach, yet I find myself exasperated at both the distance it creates and the blurring effect it has upon Christensen's guitar work.That said, it is definitely a good thing that I find his playing absorbing and unusual enough to actually wish that there was enough clarity for me to fully hear and appreciate its intricacies.Consequently, I have conflicting feelings about the album, but they are admittedly highly subjective ones.To my ears, Zelienople have crafted a remarkably good album that simply errs too far on the side of quiet subtlety and understatement to fully connect with me.For those more attuned and amenable to the band's hushed and shadowy niche, however, I suspect Hold You Up is easily one of the most focused and masterfully crafted iterations of that aesthetic to date.If someone told me that they thought this album was an absolute masterpiece, I would certainly not think they were crazy, as Hold You Up is a near-perfect example of a very specific sound.I could definitely see this album enjoying impressive longevity with a small but extremely devoted group of fans.

Samples can be found here.

03 May 2020

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Billed as a thematic successor to 2017's Toxic City Music, Evan Caminiti's latest release delves even deeper into the fragmented and deconstructionist dub experimentation of its predecessor. In a few important ways, however, Varispeed Hydra is a very different album. For one, it is conceptually inspired by rural sounds and the fragility of the natural environment rather than by dystopian urban environments. More significantly, Caminiti's music subverts traditional dub techno structures in an even more challenging way, often distilling the form down to just a few simple chords expanding and contracting in a disorienting state of suspended animation. Given that pointed lack of hooks, rhythm, or harmonic evolution, Varispeed Hydra is not the easiest Caminiti album to love, but he manages to make the paroxysms of that hyper-limited palette far more compelling than I would have expected.

Dust Editions

I have by no means fully explored Evan Caminiti's extensive and varied discography, but I have certainly heard enough to grasp that he has always been creatively restless and somewhat inscrutable.In fact, Barn Owl alone covered an unusually wide swath of stylistic ground during that project’s six-year run and that was just one of Caminiti's many guises and collaborative projects.Consequently, it was not all that surprising that he eventually delved into dub techno, but it is a bit unexpected that he has stuck with it as long as he has.Given that Caminiti has already proven that he has both a real aptitude for the genre and a very distinctive vision for it, he must believe that there are still unexplored frontiers left to pioneer: Caminiti is not one to keep doing the same thing again and again just because he happens to be good at it.In fact, he takes such a radical approach to dub with Varispeed Hydra that it almost dissolves into "ambient" territory.All of the elements of classic Chain Reaction or Mille Plateaux fare are present in theory (warm pads, burbling synths, deep bass), yet they are all stretched, blurred, and disrupted to the point of floating stasis.Or as the album's description poetically puts it, Varispeed Hydra is akin to "a collection of broken transmissions, terrestrial sounds melting into the abstract and rising again as vaporous spectres."Beyond that newly vaporous approach, the album's underlying ecological concept manifests itself in yet another new feature: buried animal sounds, such as the cheerily chirping birds that lurk behind the fog of the opening "Hand in Flame."There is also a significant change in mood since the bleak and corroded-sounding Toxic City Music, as a lot of these pieces are built from comparatively warm and lush chords (even if they feel frozen in time). 

Given that the backbone of the album is essentially reverberant washes of synth chords in a haze of ghostly guitar swells, crackles, hisses, and submerged field recordings, each of the album's ten pieces feel more like variations on a theme than like discrete entities with their own distinct character.Some are better than others, obviously, but the baseline level of quality is quite solid.In that regard, "Holo," is as representative of the album as any other piece: after a brief introduction of natural sounds (birds and a stream), the piece coheres into a slow pulse of stammering synth chords that quietly gurgle and reverberate without any real sense of evolution or threat of a possible chord change.Instead, all of the activity is textural, as the chords lazily heave and undulate as a host of hisses, shudders, and sharper, more grinding tones organically ebb and flow in their midst.Occasionally a piece like "Morphogenesis" will lock into an erratically heaving yet still recognizably rhythmic pulse, but if any actual kick drums or cymbals exist on this album, they have been abstracted into bloodless shadows.Still, Caminiti proves to be quite a sorcerer at finding new ways to make the same sounds seem fresh and compelling and there are a couple of especially fine pieces near the end of the album.On the first, the brief "Airlock," Caminiti allows his chords to occasionally fade into the background to shift the focus to a unusual groove that sounds like it is made up of a piece of metal, a rustling field of windblown grass, and some gnarled surges of bass tones.Then on "Russian Palm," the chords take on the flickering, trebly feel of a ghostly radio transmission while a more structured and substantial piece gradually takes shape in the depths.It is quite a nice bit of compositional sleight of hand, though Caminiti stops short of quite letting it materialize into a full-on song.

It is that deliberate lack of "songs" that leaves me with some conflicting feelings about Varispeed Hydra, though I suspect the less positive ones are mostly due to my own expectations rather than any shortcomings in execution.Still, I am reminded of a Thomas Bernhard book that I recently read (Correction) in which a character keeps mercilessly editing a manuscript until there is ultimately nothing left.Given that Caminiti spent three years working on this album, it is not hard to see the obvious parallel, but only he knows whether or not this album was ever destined to be more structured and straightforward than it eventually turned out.And, of course, it feels wrong to lament that Caminiti was too original and too aggressive in using the tools of dub techno to completely subvert the structure of dub techno.Consequently, it is best to view the album as pure sound art, as Caminiti took an incredibly difficult road and devoted himself solely to walking the blurry line where form and abstraction bleed together.Viewed in that light, Varispeed Hydra makes a lot more sense and seems like a far more unambiguous success than it does as an "outsider dub" album (albeit a success with the caveat that Hydra is VERY much a headphone album).Experienced at significant volume and with the benefit of focused listening, this album reveals itself to be a seething, sizzling, and multilayered production tour de force and quite an absorbing one at that.While I might feel a bit guilty for wishing that Caminiti would play to his strengths a bit more, I have doubt that he knows exactly what he is doing and I heartily appreciate his willful avoidance of the expected and the familiar.

Samples can be found here.