The Answer Is In The Beat

Ben Monder: Amorphae (ECM, 2015)

December 12, 2015 at 7:33 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

ECM debut from a hard-to-define American jazz guitarist. As with many ECM recordings, the production is spacious, letting the minimal instrumentation (sometimes just Monder’s guitar, often plus drums and occasionally synthesizer) fill the room with sound. The late Paul Motian plays drums on two tracks, including a very loose interpretation of “Oh, What a Beautiful Morning”, but Monder’s stunning guitar playing is clearly the star of the show. At times haunting, other times more contemplative, he does a lot with a little. Pete Rende adds subtle yet crucial synthesizer textures to “Gamma Crucis” and “Zythum”, the latter of which is an ambient dronescape with softly shuddering drums beneath it. Is this even jazz? The concluding solo piece “Dinosaur Skies” consists of dark flurries of guitar similiar to Rafael Anton Irisarri, and when it finally lets up, it feels like Monder has stepped outside of jazz entirely. An incredible album.

The Kendal Mintcake/Patrick Cosmos: split tape (Big Sleep Records, 2015)

December 6, 2015 at 7:08 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

I received a review copy of this tape a few months ago, and soon after I drove to Chicago to see Autechre and I found a copy of this tape at one of the two branches of Reckless Records that I visited. Turns out that Patrick Cosmos is from Chicago, so it’s not that much of a coincidence, but the chance of across two copies of a non-local tape that’s limited to less than 100 copies is usually pretty slim. Anyway, the name Kendal Mintcake somehow made me expect some sort of Elephant 6 knockoff band, but instead it’s solo synth stuff. There’s definitely something bright green (but not Emeralds-y) about his work. It moves slowly and there’s a cloudy haze to it, but there’s also pretty upfront, pronounced exploratory melodies. It ends with a curious feedback wave loop. The Patrick Cosmos side is immediately more amped-up, noisy, droney, and melodic, as well as having some weird grinding texture underneath. This side is one long cosmic dream, while the other side is four shorter (but inter-connected) parts. Probably still available at Reckless Records, but if you’re not in Chicago, there’s always Bandcamp.

Phantom Horse: Different Forces LP

December 6, 2015 at 6:17 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Umor Rex has been unearthing quality oddities for a while now. Without looking too far into the backstory of this one (except to see that they put out an album on Dekorder a few years ago), this is top-notch Krautrocky minimal electronic stuff. It starts out a bit nebulous, but then it settles into Berlin-school arpeggios and eventually there’s trippy beats and seagull-like clarinet. The beats are usually pretty light and unobtrusive, but they’re as steady as the calm, percolating rhythms. The 15-minute “Belegte Welt” has the strongest pulse and the most adventurous guitars and ping-ponging, almost 8-bit-sounding synths. All of this is swell, it definitely evokes the Krautrock sound without sounding retro or directly copying anyone.

Ruhe: Patriarchs CD-r (Eilean Rec., 2015)

December 6, 2015 at 5:40 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Glacially slow-moving sustain-heavy ambient piano melodies which flare up into soft yet dark static drone. Definitely a brittle, homemade feel to these recordings, especially the decaying tape manipulation. Very personal and intimate. On a few tracks, folky vocals call out under the piano haze, but they seem like they’re trapped in some sort of ember. Very subtle effects added to the piano, sometimes a few notes here and there seem to be playing backwards. Seems really basic and simple in some ways, but there really is a great deal of care put into the craft of these songs. Has some similar ideas/moods in common with Ian William Craig, the last Grouper album, or any number of current piano-based artists (Nils Frahm, Max Richter, etc.) but still clearly using its own techniques. “Guide” is maybe the most upfront lovely/sad piano melody. “Shelter” ups the static/hiss content considerably, although it fades away after a couple minutes, leaving eerie backwards loops. Then the hiss returns with more layers of snowflake-like pianotes (I meant to type “piano notes” but somehow I squished those two words into one and it fits somehow) along with sunken vocals. “Restoration” is another sort of underwater lullaby with delicate guitar notes joining the shifting pianos. Crickets join “Beams”, and the pianos feel like a single star shining incredibly bright in a sky under a field in the middle of a dark forest. The CD-r appears to be sold out, but there’s always Bandcamp for all your digital needs.

Ross Manning: Interlacing LP (Room40, 2015)

December 6, 2015 at 5:35 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Room40 debut by an Australian experimental artist who has done numerous installations and exhibits throughout Australia. A pretty wide variety of different works for homemade instruments and cracked electronics. “Led Vert” starts out as scanner-like drone and then layers on some flittering, buzzing electronics, sounding a little bit like a more smoothed out, less noisy version of some of Aaron Dilloway’s works. “Sinew and Cats” is grounded in a slightly more aggressive buzz, with a bit more sour, piercing sounds weaving in and out. “%” seems to be a field recording of a bunch of noisy homemade contraptions. Apparently he’s using an electric fan and connecting it to a bunch of small objects with a rope, so it has a constant fluttering rhythm which triggers incidental melodies. “Expand Scatter” is closer to the first 2 pieces, but a bit more of a wider range, going through heavier noise/static passages to more chiming ones, with lots of signal interruptions. “Silhouettes” is the longest piece at nearly 10 minutes, and it balances an uneasy drone with all sorts of bizarre mechanical sounds. Sounds like a lot of household machines going haywire, maybe some evil elves ransacking the studio when the composer’s not around. It’s actually pretty warped and trippy.

Don Howland: Life is a Nightmare LP (12XU, 2015)

December 6, 2015 at 5:31 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Second solo LP from a former member of Bassholes, Gibson Bros, and a bunch of other bands. Really distorted, trebly lo-fi rock that seems to have some sort of country blues influence but mostly just sounds like noisy lo-fi rock. Lots of reverb on the vocals, but they’re still way behind the guitar (and so are the drums/drum machine, and keyboards). Very difficult to discern the lyrics. I’m guessing they’re probably not very happy, based on the titles. Reminds me of Country Teasers/The Rebel, even though it doesn’t sound like them/him (actually “Never Win” kinda does), but if you’re into grouchy, noisy lo-fi rock like that, this could be of interest to you. “Watch You Go” has more of a stomp to it than other tracks. More than anything I just really like the album’s title, and the music fits pretty well. If you can identify with this type of fuck-everything racket, it’s up on Bandcamp.

Long Distance Poison: Lama Nada tape (Hausu Mountain, 2015)

November 29, 2015 at 9:46 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

LDP take their longform lunar modular/analog explorations to Hausu Mountain on one of their most recent tapes (it’s hard to keep track of this prolific group sometimes). The two sidelong space probes take a while to unfold (in typical LDP fashion), but eventually sputtering beats vibrate into vast unending space while everything shimmers and reflects dust. Second side “Eardian Mana” is more varied and twitchy, sometimes verging on malfunctioning or overheating, but it’s all controlled and eventually it edges back to the steady, slowly evolving rhythm. Just wait for that end sequence. Available on Bandcamp.

Prairie: Like a Pack of Hounds (Shitkatapult, 2015)

November 29, 2015 at 8:32 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

It’s officially end of year list season, so (for music geeks like me) it’s time to frantically find music that came out this year that I missed. If you’re in a similar mindset, this is an album you shouldn’t overlook if you’re into strange, dark, unpredictable music. I’m digging through mountains of promo CDs from my job (long story) and this one ended up in my possession, and I put it on without any expectations and was floored. It starts out as dark, broken drone with field recordings, then goes through intense, decaying guitar loops and backwards textures, ending up with some murder folk and shredded guitar noise. This CD also includes the entirety of Prairie’s earlier EP titled I’m So In Love I Almost Forgot I Survived A Disaster. A lot of that EP sounds like Fuck Buttons, but it’s way better, partially because Fuck Buttons is such a terrible band name. Seriously though, Prairie is doing some pretty incredible dark ambient noise folk and shouldn’t be overlooked.

Linear Downfall: Sufferland (self-released, 2015)

November 29, 2015 at 7:57 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

This Nashville-based group has collaborated extensively with the Flaming Lips, but this is the first I’ve heard of their music. Of course, this band’s music is trippy, but it’s also harsh and noisy and violent and schizophrenic. It alternates between sweet and fragile, and thrashy and noisy, echoing some Digital Hardcore bands as well as early Crystal Castles. I missed this group when they played in Detroit this past weekend (I wanted to go, Warren Defever was opening!) and I can only assume they had trouble fitting all their synths on the tiny PJ’s Lager House stage. The synths are always buzzing and on the verge of malfunctioning, and sometimes the beats or rhythms seem off balance. There’s all sorts of rhythmic explosions and glitches, and some of the vocals sound vulnerable and scared. Some of it gets pretty unhinged. There’s some heavy Krautrock-like rhythms, and at one point there’s strange gospel-ish vocals floating around in space. Very unpredictable, bewildering album. Also, like Hit to Death in the Future Head, it ends with at least half an hour of some hard-panned repetitive noise that nobody needs to listen to all the way through. Other than this loop, you can hear/buy the album at Bandcamp.

Exhaustion: Phased Out 12″ EP (12XU, 2015)

November 25, 2015 at 8:32 pm | Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Melbourne-based hypnotic repetitive noise-rock. Kind of reminds me of what HEALTH used to sound like. Mark Barrage, an incredible, unique experimental noise artist, is on this recording, so that grabs my attention immediately. “Phased Out” starts out fast and pounding and rhythmic, but then breaks down into formless feedback halfway through. “Colleague” starts out slow and low, with drilling guitars and moaning vocals, but eventually works up a frantic tempo without really changing much otherwise. The second side consists of remixes of the first side’s tracks, but they transform them so much that it’s hard to even hear the resemblance between the remixes and the originals. Mikey Young’s mix of “Phased Out” has a low-bit, thumping electronic beat and lets the lyrics shine, revealing a repeated chant of “crashing down”. A few hints of the original’s piercing guitars appear, as well as some new synth lines. It takes a little longer on this mix for the rhythm to dissolve, and even when that happens, there’s still some looped vocals left over. “Colleague” is remixed by Rites Wild, an incredible Australian darkwave artist who released a great album on Not Not Fun in 2012, and some more tapes as Regional Curse afterwards. Her mix is appropriately slow, minimal, and haunted, and ends with serrated guitar noise echoing in the background underneath the slow, dusty beats.