Plenty of new music to be had this week from Laetitia Sadier and Storefront Church, Six Organs of Admittance, Able Noise, Yui Onodera, SML, Clinic Stars, Austyn Wohlers, Build Buildings, Zelienople, and Lea Thomas, plus some older tunes by Farah, Guy Blakeslee, Jessica Bailiff, and Richard H. Kirk.
Lake in Girdwood, Alaska by Johnny.
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I wrote about Akiyama's last record, describing him as a kind ofaccidental hero of the instrumental glitch musicians. His newerrecordings, alone or with Desormais, channel the same tugging, emotivebaggage and fragile tension as other real-time deconstructionists(clearest touchstone: Christian Fennesz), but Akiyama's are mostcomplex, less dependenton a single instrument or one's traditional referents. Sub Rosa They reach pastdeconstruction as a means or an end, entering new space, a labyrinthinelogic all their own. A lot of this probably has to do with the artist'sfavoring rounder instrumental combinations: strings of a chamberensemble sort, bare piano, brass, metal percussion. Akiyama's last, If Night is a Weed...,inspired Fennesz comparisons because of an ambitious textural grandeur,though this came obscured by spare compositional style and atemperament informed by the deliberate pacing and structural rigor ofclassical music. One of If Night..'s pieces was dedicated toSteve Reich, and Akiyama's music does reflect an attempt to carry thepure variants and divine gravity of Reich's Phase or Ensemblepieces into digital interpretation. If the last record was ambitious instriking a solemn, Reichian pose against the computer's pixilatedshimmer, then Small Explosions is ambitious in a new way. Stillin chamber-glitch mode, Akiyama works within much more scatterbrained,dissonant territory, sketching disquieted spaces through overlays ofwhat sound like largely improvised events. The coalescence of fragmentshere is the artist's most subtle, often stratified by atonalcounterpoints and layers of at-home ambience. Sounds of sleepybreathing in the first track indicate Small Explosions's increased interest in sound-travel and the unreality of dreams. Several of the string heavy sections recall, for me, the Waking Lifesoundtrack in their floaty circularities and spirited-away atmosphere.Akiyama shows also a new reliance on bell tones which give the music asense of distance and foggy boundaries that was not present within theintimate, single-room simulacrum of If Night.. and previousworks. Despite being probably the artist's most pared-down andsilence-ful music yet, with even a reduction in the field recordingsthat colored other records, Small Explosions feels the most far-out and heavily transporting of all.
I was skeptical about the potential clusterfuck of a record featuringDJ Spooky, Dave Lombardo (from Slayer), and Jack Dangers, but thepresence of two of my favorite MCs of all time, Chuck D and Dälek,pushed me over the edge into "I've got to at least hear this"territory. Thirsty Ear Often, pairings like this come from well-intentionedmusicians who want to work together, but don't realize that the sum cannever equal the parts, so I braced for the worst. Happily, Drums of Deathmanages to avoid most of the cliches of supergroups and celebritymusical pairings of this sort, and instead boils down some signatureelements from each artist involved into a quite listenable whole. JackDangers' production is well balanced with Spooky's turntable antics,while the MCs simply do their thing over the rhythm section of Lombardoon drums and Dangers on bass. The Meat Beat head honcho proves thathe's still one of the best groove bassline generators on the planet,and DJ Spooky's cuts and sample selections work well to enhance ratherthan drag down the proceedings. It's Lombardo's drums that I can'tswallow all of the time, as they have an unshakeable "rock" sound thatdoesn't always serve the songs the way a more nuanced sounding kitmight. The grooves are tight if a little clangy on the cymbal end, butit always sounds like a metal drummer slowing down into a hip hopgroove rather than just an accomplished drummer gelling with hisbandmates. That's not to say the drums are bad—in fact almost everytrack gives sample hounds a free shot at an unobscured drum loop fromthe session, but I just wish the drums were somehow more processed andfitting with the primarily dub-leaning vibe. Chuck D and Dälek enhancethe record with vocal performances straight out of their standardplaybooks and there's enough guitar noise and metal riff sampling topossibly draw the the long-haired set out of their comfort zone alittle, which I have to imagine is the point with a lot of this.Skipping past the embarrassing Spooky on turntable/Lombardo on skinscall and response piece, and the oddly-lifted Jack Dangers sci-fisoundtrack pieces, Drums of Death winds up as a suprisingly funamalgam of styles and sounds that manages to overcome the threat ofnovelty, even if it never elevates to the heights of its contributors'individual accomplishments.
There is now a live document of this duo that actually rivals theirstudio output. Two live recordings from October and November of 2004compose this record; both have the timeless feel that Potter andBradley's music almost always has, but now the live environment istransformative, cohesive, and wholly coherent. ICR Both recordings centeraround a metallic center that floats, sometimes soundlessly, throughevery shift and turn. Haphazard sounds often leap and stutter inperfectly flawed ways, unannounced, but appropriately and not without acertain dynamic effect. Listening to the November recording, I'm struckby the sound of rainfall, giant caverns, low mist hissing like a snake,and the images of monstrous architecture long forgotten populate everyhollow shuffle of electronic vibration. I'm tempted to say that Potterand Bradley went somewhat psychedelic that day, their time-laped soundphotography catching all manner paranormal phenomenon and, in a lot ofways, it is hard to escape that idea. The low rumble and sitar-likeblosoms that shapeshift on each song sound completely cosmic, betrayingtheir computer and electric origins. Most surprising, however, were thesymphonic flourishes and wooden bells that hit at the last moment onthe November piece. Bradley and Potter have found a way to take theirbest studio work and translate it into a live environment withoutsounding entirely too busy or far too worried about any one sound. Itsounds as though they went into these performances almost entirelynaked, armed only with the notion of some textures and a nice, solidtheme. The minimalistic and generally open feeling of this record setit apart from their other work, but also show that a live experiencesuch as this can be just as good, if not better, than what's done in astudio. Only 200 copies of this release were pressed, each coming in ahand finished sleeve and signed by Potter and Bradley. It's anamazingly vivid and unfortunately rare recording of this duo at theirfinest.
While I wasn't paying attention, Finland seems to have become the newIceland. All the new underground acts worth knowing about these daysseem to hail from the sub-arctic climes of Helsinki, Tampere orJyvakyla. Fonal Instead of the likes of Mum and Sigur Ros, I must now contendwith decidedly more difficult names to spell like Kemialliset Ystavatand Paivansade. The music itself is a bit more difficult as well,varying expressions of an idiosyncratic, indigenous folk music, all ofwhich seems to share a sense of organic looseness and a fractured,experimental nature. The scene has recently gained internationalmomentum because of a predictably bandwagon-jumping feature in a recentissue of The Wire, but Finland's interest in homegrown experimentalpsychedelia has an inheritance that reaches back to the 1960s, withPekka Airaksinen and The Sperm, all the way to more recent years withbands like Circle. Tampere's Fonal Records has been the main outlet forthe Finnish underground since the mid-90s, and this beautifullypackaged new album from Finnish psych mainstay Islaja is a greatexample of the kind of quality on offer from the label. Islaja is asinger who draws on elements of traditional Finnish song, but shareswith her labelmates a penchant for whimsically esoteric arrangements:fractured melodies, complex layers of shambolic percussion, sampledbirdsong, droning bits, enticing compositional fragments andoverlapping, multitracked vocals. At first listen, Palaa Aurinkoonsounded unstructured, underproduced and generally unfocused, butslowly, over the course of the album, I latched onto Islaja'shauntingly childlike vocals as a guide through the sub-arcticwilderness, and came to understand the unique ways in which thedisparate pieces of the puzzle fit together. Throughout the album,there is a lovely sense of gentle chaos, with instrumental parts,percussion and vocals placed willfully askew in the mix, without overlymassaging them to fit a specific, rigid song structure. This loosenessshares much in common with the Incredible String Band or any number ofnewer psych-folk acts, but Islaja's expressions are uniquely affecting,the exotic timbres and phrasing of her mother tongue, as well as thedense evergreen forest that the players seem to inhabit, lending apeculiarity all her own. Everywhere there are the signs of a wintercoming or winter just passed, a communal group of musicians squattingon the permafrost soil to rifle through a bottomless bag of stringedand woodwind instruments, harps, keyboards and assorted noisemakers,trusting instinct and a momentary impulse to create impressionisticarrangements around Islaja's warm, whispery vocals. The music istop-notch throughout, but perhaps because of a compounding effect, thealbum seems to get stronger as it goes, reaching an apex with the lastfour tracks, each of which are particularly emotionally affecting. Theswansong "Rukuos" ends the album on a wistful note, an enchanting vocalduet matched with harmonium drones and ravishing flourishes of flute. Palaa Aurinkoonjustifies the hype surrounding the Finnish scene, a gorgeous andfragile souvenir from a strangely inviting sub-arctic forestwonderland.
Though they are also from Finland, Pharaoh Overlord have scrupulouslyavoided getting lumped into the "Finnish Underground" category typifiedby Es, Kemialliset Ystavat, Avarus, etc. This is largely because theirbrand of churning, plugged-in post-Krautrock shares little in commonwith the often amateurish, willfully obscure acoustic noodling of theirgeographical contemporaries.Riot Season Pharaoh Overlord is the so-called "stonerrock" side project of legendary Finnish post-rockers Circle. With theirthree albums thus far - #1, #2 and a live album called Battle of the Axehammer- Janne, Tomi and Jussi have indulged their penchant for progressivepsych-rock that had previously only been hinted at in their work asCircle. Where those previous albums were notable for their hypnoticguitar riffs and the frequently caustic wall of feedback and reverb ala Acid Mothers Temple, this new full-length is marked by its relativetameness (except for "Autobahn," which I'll get to later). Instead ofblistering electric solos, the album emphasizes the trancelike rhythmsection, creating a series of propulsive motorik jams that enforce theprimacy of rhythm, structure and the infinite beat. Tomi Leppanen'smesmerizing drumming is highlighted on this album, the inheritor of atribalistic simplicity first honed in on by Jaki Liebezeit. Tomi'sincredibly drums form a complex counterpoint relationship to Jussi'svirtuosic bass and Janne's subtle, dynamic guitar melodies. In manyways, this album is the closest that Pharaoh Overlord have gotten tothe sound of their other project Circle, creating a post-rockamalgamation that traces its evolution back to Neu! and Kraan ratherthan Tortoise or GY!BE. Rather than partake in a lot of showboatingstylistic shifts or wanky guitar solos, Pharaoh Overlord insteadconcentrate on a group sound, building an unstoppable forward momentumwith the canny (and Can-y) use of extreme repetition. "Test Flight" and"Blackout" are both outstandingly trippy and trancey, but both exerciserestraint to such a degree that when a fuzzy, third-eye guitar solobursts forth into the mix, it creates an adrenaline rush of sound.Quiet restraint and focus are pretty much the watchwords of #3,until the 13-minute polyrhythmic excursion of "Laivaus 17" gives way to"Autobahn," which switches gears and brings the album to a grindinghalt, a ten-minute wallow in the sort of metallic grind, subharmonicbass frequencies and crawling doom made infamous lately by Sunn O))),Boris and their various copyists. It's an odd stopgap in an album thatis otherwise bright and energetic, full of precision, dynamism andsparkling production. Where Pharaoh Overlord shine is on tracks like"Octagon," when the seemingly effortless creation of rotating,interlocking concentric circles of rhythm and melody resembles TerryRiley or Steve Reich's rhythmic explorations, with a newfound sense ofstoned bliss and psychedelic awe.
Thankfully Autechre have slowed down the rate of their output to onealbum every two years, with less EP releases in between. This hashelped allow them to create albums with only minor adjustments to aformula that has made them one of the best acts making electronicmusic. Untiltedis heavy on fractured rhythms and has very little of the whirlingambient sounds that featured prominently on some of their previousreleases. Warp The eight tracks on work well as rhythmic studies, withrepetitive patterns shifting gradually, sometimes several times withinone track. The opener "LCC" rushes out of the gate with rapid-firebeats sputtering out of the speakers, only to switch to half-timeshortly after the three minute mark. This tactic recalls the shift fromstraight 4/4 to a pronounced shuffle feel that took place half waythrough "Cipater," the opening track on 1997's Chiastic SlideLP. While some tracks, such as "The Trees" and "Fermium" recall themore straightforward feel of their early work, others are almostarrhythmic and are similar to their recent work, sounding like theirmachines are careening out of control. "Augmatic Disport" is a case inpoint, and begins with four minutes of beats made up of successive fastrolls, which is followed by three minutes of more sparse, disjointedphrases that sound as if they are being hiccupped up by the machines.The one and a half minute section that concludes this track is one ofthe albums truly divergent passages. During this section the jarringrolls and bursts of activity fade away to reveal a straight 4/4 patternthat clearly references the techno of their past. This is the closestBooth and Brown have come to creating chilled out techno since 1994's AmberLP, and the fact they only hint at it after eight minutes of heavyrhythmic bombardment makes it all the more effective. Naturally, thefollowing "Iera" sends us swiftly back into 2005 with its stop-start,slightly off kilter kick and click patterns. The fact that more than afew of these tracks bear titles that are actually in plain English(some of them even common words) is another noticeable reference totheir past, as this practice has not been used this extensively since1995. Although Autechre tracks often create an image of a straightfaced duo, 15 minute closer "Sublimit" shows that they do possess asense of humor. After several minutes of repetitive beats, a sectionensues during which downright silly sounding horn stabs are introduced.These, plus the low, thuddy snare sound with which they are duelling,obviously reference the nascent days of hip-hop. While Booth and Brownhave been vocal about the influence of early hip-hop on their music, Ican't help thinking they're having a laugh here. Although they are nolonger breaking new ground, Untilted is still an enjoyable listen due to the sheer talent the duo possesses.
Monika is the label founded by Gudrun Gut, formerly of German post-punknoir quintet Malaria!, a group that enjoyed renewed interest lately,after Chicks on Speed turned their song "Kaltes Klares Wasser" into anelectroclash anthem. Monika And while Chicks may sometimes appear capable onlyof recycling the past, Gut's accomplishments with Monika place heramong progressive artists never content to let nostalgia or pastreferentials guide their work. Hints of punk's subversive wit and DIYaesthetic enter the Monika sound, but the musicians seem lessinterested in countercultural rejection than in promoting reforms to aunifying pop language. Nearly all take advantage of the electronicmedium, but never as an end in itself, the computer never more than anelaborate editing desk, a treatment for whispered vocals, amplifier ofincidental melodies or siphon of city sounds. Monikans are almostuniformly female, urban and stylish without appealing to trends. Allmaintain a pop sensibility, though even the most twee (Figurine,Florida, Burka Band) are never so naïve that ironical detachment isrequired for their enjoyment. The sleek and minimal German electroniccode exists only as subtext for this music, its creators poised totease out quietly overwhelming melody and sundry pop eccentrics withenough ease and regularity to suggest that perhaps Monika shouldhead-up the Kompakt Pop Ambientseries so the title might gain some meaning outside of signifyingbeat-less microhouse throwaways. This is new and vital pop music,relevant in both past and present contexts. The archetypal Monika groupmight be Contriva, a trio that began as a subtle and melodic post-rockunit but, by the time of their first record Tell Me When, hadshifted within this basic structure to create a fragile and confidentinstrumental pop treasure, its musicianship still visible but findingtranscendence from studied post-rock-isms through the arrangement oftimeless and suggestive pop figures across an electronic song-line. Monika Forceis the label's second budget-priced sampler, special not only becauseit is a great label introduction (compiled by Gut herself) but alsobecause it compiles many of the marginally available remixes andvinyl-only tracks even a previous Monika enthusiast may not have on onedisc. Some of the label's best tracks like Manuela Krause + Pole's"Mein Freund de Baum" and Barbara Morgenstern's "Aus heiterem Himmel"are included here in their 12" and 7" mixes alongside newer classicslike Contriva bassist Masha Qrella's wonderful "I want you to know,"also in a b-side mix. Morgenstern, my favorite Monika artist, evenincludes an admittedly weak bonus video for her song "We're all gonnafucking die." In absolute justification of its title, Force is the prefect place to begin submission to the new Monika world order.
This is supposedly volume one of a series of CD/double-LP No New York-styledcompilations from Monika, all featuring 4 new female artists, eachallowed one-quarter of the running time, one vinyl side. I'mimmediately doubtful that the label will be able to maintain this levelof quality control over a larger series. Monika Each of these women not onlysounds like a brilliant new discovery, but each seems to both alongsidethe other three, but neatly within Monika's intimidating history. Theseare bedroom assemblages that beautifully support the title's rejectionof the solitary woman as locus for sentimentality or dependence. Allfour operate through the synthetic rearrangement and augmentation ofincredibly intimate recorded moments, be they hushed, after-hoursvocals, noodled guitar or nocturnal street and room ambience. Theresult is a very global sound, borrowing folk tropes from severalcultures (artists are Western and Eastern European and South American),weaving absurd post-modern fantasy tales, marshalling abstractpolitical statements, and dragging tense emotional ballads intoexpansive geographic space. Each artist contributes four to six tracks,within which each oscillates between more abstract cut-and-pasteselections and conventional hook-built songs, creating a successfuldynamic between potent atmosphere or sketchy ambience and charged popsongs that rival some of Monika's best. Rosario Bléfari and ÈglantineGouzy show particular mastery for microtonal percussion programmingcapable of piercing the music's small spaces, introducing the sounds ofthe street into a song's rhythmic milieu, or skittering around a smoothvocal. Despite the wealth of surrounding matter, the vocals do becomethe focal point for each artist's contribution; their voices so uniqueand expressive that they demand center stage, at least two of thempulling off Spanish and French rapped lyrics after crooning with nakeddelicacy in the previous tracks. Gouzy shuffles from creeky, Bjorkiannaïveté in "Nurse Song" to a complementary, provocative and playfulstyle in the obscure "Zone A." It's impossible to pick a favorite amongthese four artists, or to adequately represent even one of them in asound sample. Each is at once a great melody-maker and uncompromisedsculptor of diverse sounds, making this, my favorite compilation so farthis year, a hard first volume for Monika to top. - Andrew Culler
For the cross-generational group of indie psychedelic rock fans that I like to call the Terrascopers, last year's Ta Det Lungtby Swedish group Dungen was a revelation. This is not to suggest thatmany others before Dungen hadn't also explored the same generalpost-Beatles territory, but merely that no one had done it with quiteas much aplomb and effectiveness as Dungen, at least not since theglory days of Elephant 6 groups like Olivia Tremor Control. Subliminal Sounds Amidsttheir infectiously mannered vocal harmonies (all in Swedish) andbackwards guitar symphonies, Dungen also interspersed unexpectedpassages of blistering acid guitar. Where Ta Det Lungt was a study in balance and dynamics, 1999-2001—Dungen'srarely heard first album, newly reissued on CD with bonus materials—isa far more untamed and problematic proposition. Made up of threelengthy tracks that each move through a number of jarring, Faust-stylemovements and rapid transitions, Dungen's debut is a mess, but aconsistently enjoyable one at that. Marked by its patchwork tendency tocrossfade into something quite different every few minutes, the albumfeels quite a bit hairier and proggier than its successors. In additionto the baroque psych-pop stylings familiar for the group, each track isalso chock full of odd passages of Jethro Tull flute solos,effects-heavy experiments in psychedelic ambience, free-form folkmeanderings, piano and slide-guitar duets and a myriad other musicalgestures too varied in their approach to encapsulate here. The overalleffect is of a group of talented musicians who couldn't decide howexactly to gel together and execute a single, coherent musicalstatement, so instead opted for maximum eclecticism, throwingeverything at the wall to see what would stick. As such, it's far froma satisfyingly conceptual whole, but other than that, it hardly makes awrong move for entire 18-minutes-plus length. The opening track startswith a recognizably Dungenesque vocal harmony backed by droningbackwards guitar, before fading into an extended instrumental jazz-rockpiece, a brief section of Comets On Fire-style synthesizer acrobatics,and a shimmering wall of drones with sampled birdsong. All of thisbefore the song has reached the halfway mark. A comparison could bemade with Xhol Caravan, who used similar tactics on their classicrandom radio-dial turning Motherfuckers GMBH. Like Xhol, Dungendon't seem to take themselves too seriously, juxtaposing breezy lightpsych-pop with third-eye sitar attacks, pausing every now and then foranother sunshine pop chorus. 1999-2001 is the kind of albumthat could very easily have digressed into turgidity and tedium, buthappily remains afloat as it coasts through a kaleidescopic variety ofwhimsical and hallucinogenic changes.
Damien Jurado dabbles thoughtfully in Americana, making the whole ofour country's midlands his playground. His songwriting has always beensharp (lauded and even appropriated by artists like Neil Halstead) andit loses none of it acuteness on these most recent twelve songs. Secretly Canadian As aprelude to this album, Jurado released "Just in Time For Something," anEP which featured five songs of the most lo-fi, scratchy recordingquality possible. It was a beautiful listen, full of demo-qualitybrilliance and hearing it felt like being let into the songs at theirsynthetic moment of creation. Contrariwise, On My Way to Absenceis further down the evolutionary scale for Jurado's songs. Thearrangements are fuller, with pianos, drums, trumpets, strings, basses,and even a wandering glockenspiel. The recording is more technical,exhibiting none of the bedroom qualities so lush in the EP. If youlisten carefully enough, though, you can still hear the nascent stagesof the songs in their more mature versions here. Frustratingly, I findmyself doing this through most listens of the album because Iappreciate Jurado's songwriting without the adornment of addedinstruments around him and his guitar. For those with such low fidelityfidelity, Jurado rewards us with two songs ("Northbound" and "Fuel") ofpure man and guitar (though not sounding particularly lo-fi).Curiously, most of Jurado's spare songs lyrically have something to dowith automobiles, including songs from the EP (like "Engine Fire").Perhaps this is symptomatic for the musician who tours widely without adecadent or decent tour bus. My pickiness aside, there are some finesongs with full-band treatment. "Night Out For the Downer" is thesinuous tendon which connects both this album and the EP, having thefull-band version on the album and the acoustic version on the EP. Thesong actually succeeds here better than it does on the EP, which seemsto contradict a lot of what I have offered so far but I say it's theexception which proves the rule. Honestly, it might be the glockenspielwhich wins me over for the album version. The album's best effort isthe opener "White Center." In the verses, Jurado's voice pleasantly andplayfully mimics his guitar before giving way to the stringed choruses.The entire album is a mix of lullabies and gentle rockers, sometimesfurther hybridizing into Frankensteinian "rocking lullabies" like theinfectious "Simple Hello." In the liner notes, Jurado thanks hisproducer/engineer/bandmate Eric Fisher and claims "without you my songshave no life." I would disagree. Jurado's songs do indeed have lifewithout the complement of the studio. It's just a different life:smaller, more modest, and less apt to stumble with a torso too largefor its feet.
For Surrounded By Silence, the fourth full-length release as Prefuse 73, Scott Herren picks up the thread from where 2003's One Word Extinguisherleft off in terms of pushing the envelope of musical beats forming intosublime compositions divided with interesting interludes. Havingpreviously collaborated on some tracks with MCs, this time out Herrenhas invited a bevy of singers and MCs such as Beans, Aesop Rock, MastaKilla and the GZA, who turn up to further enrich a good deal of thedisc's 21 tracks. Warp Records The laid back, steady beats and charming sound swirlsof "Hide Ya Face" are ignited by the spit-fire commentary from MCsGhostface and El-P for some musical juxtaposition at its finest.Throbbing bass drum and downbeat handclaps support "Pastel Assassins"in its mix of sampled woodwinds and nylon string acoustic guitar alltopped with the gorgeous vocals of NYC sisters Claudia and AlejandraDeheza. Machine beats and sampled harp-pluckings form the backing trackof "Now You're Leaving," featuring the rhymes and soulful vocals ofBrooklyn MC/producer Camu. Based on a brief relationship, Camupoignantly sums it all up with the chorus of "Now we met / We kissed /You're breaking up / Now that's it / Now you leaving / Now I'm gonna bemiserable for the rest of my life." The full-length instrumental"Gratis" is the stand-out, deep groove and slick sample arrangementtrack that I've come to expect after hearing "Perverted Undertone" on ...Extinguisher.Herren skillfully blends trumpet and string section layers into themelodic element amidst treated Clavinet tones and beats for one of mymany favorite tracks on this disc. Now based in Barcelona, Herrenproduced much of these tracks in NYC for the convenience of tapping theMC community for its talents, although hints of Spanish influence(i.e., nylon string guitar, ethereal female vocals) seep into thesprawling urban mix. What I love about Prefuse 73 is how Herrencontinually manages to pursue and re-invent all the interesting facetsof his personal brand of hip hop without trying to re-do or out-do hisprevious discs. Currently touring North America, I'll be lookingforward to seeing if Herren and company can pull off tracks from Surrounded By Silence with style and conviction. Although, based on past live experiences, I have no doubts about it.