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Friday, September 14th, 2001
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4:47p - Further Content
There follows the review of the third disc of the Ciphered Mix 5 set, AKA "Gaaaanz, Gaaanz Slowly".
Ciphered Mix 5.3: "Gaaaanz, Gaaanz Slowly" (75:12)
1. Stiff Man Syndrome: "Drakkhen" (6:16)
SMS is a genuine medical condition, apparently. It’s also a jazz act that Phil (who, once again, is the hep cat that gave me this 4-CD set of great music) played with in Vermont. This is the only song of theirs I’ve heard, and wow - it’s really very good. P. told me that it was loosely adapted from a brief piece of music taken from an old video game, which I wouldn’t have guessed at all. I’d never heard of the game, much less played it, and I’m used to video game music being godawful drec – banal tunes played with stupid sounds; hopelessly corny, often frenetic, and overall appalling enough to inspire facial tics. But this isn’t like that at all – and to the contrary, not only is it of a sombre, interesting and truly meditative mood, it’s beautiful, and one of the stand-out tracks from this disc. (Briefly indulge me for a moment as I follow a secant, here. In these pages I’ve oftentimes spoken of my frustration with ‘popular music’, the ‘music world’, the ‘scene’, and the lack of community among artists. In particular, it floors me again and again – and is at times very daunting, honestly – to think that there are so many truly good bands out there who are stuck with day jobs despite having the ability and the drive to do more than that, and despite making meaningful, high-quality music. And worst of all is when I see this happening with bands whose members I know, have spoken with, hung out with, played music with – people who are friends of mine. Then, I take it personally. This is a prime example: this CD is filled with the names and music of bands who are nearly without exception at least moderately well-known in independent music circles. Some more than others – Seefeel, Boards of Canada, and Mouse on Mars have all enjoyed a fair bit of acclaim. But one of the strongest pieces of music on the disc was composed and performed by a bunch of college kids in a band you’ve never heard of.) I think, if I remember correctly from what Phil told me, that the only chords and the basic rhythm were adapted from the game – everything else is original, either composed by he himself or improvised by the players. The chords, played on the keys, are soft and haunting, and accented by a touch of reverb and grounded with accompaniment on the bass. Apart from only a few delicate rolls on the ride, this sombre reflection carries the song alone for nearly a minute and a half before the drums are allowed to come forward – but only a touch – and are joined by a melody on the sax. Nadir’s guitar comes in as a fiery shadow in the background at about three minutes, and is the only wild element in the tune, which is otherwise very pensive and restrained. This is a great choice – I imagine it would be hard to produce the same effect live, but here on tape the balance of the instruments helps to give the song an undeniable air of carefully, deliberately contained (but barely so) power. I like the choice of title, too. I know it was also the name of the game which inspired the music, but it gives the song a certain context which it might not achieve as easily with a more obvious name, or a more frivolous one. There was an interesting story re. the production of the song (which, if I haven’t been clear, is superb), but I forget some of the details. Perhaps Phil will tell that story himself, if he’s so inclined. Lastly, the coda is particularly effective, and masterfully executed. Technically, it’s a simple fade, but aesthetically, it gives the sense of being much more ephemeral than that. It isn’t anything as abrupt as a cut, but it’s as if the song simply isn’t there any longer, as if it’s sidestepped through an open door, or disappeared behind a veil or a smokescreen. It furthers the magnificent spaciousness of the tune, and in a way that comes as both completely natural and as a surprise. From the beginning, the song relies on a vast openness, huge shifts in dynamic intensity, long pauses between the notes, and at times a cycling of the instruments – one picking up as two more fade out, for example. But understanding that on a cognitive level makes no difference. The tune possesses a real sense of mystery from the first chord, which it gracefully but firmly carries to its very end. It leaves you wondering not only where it’s set down, but - if you’re sensitive, and open to such things - wondering where you yourself stand, in relation to these many realms.
2. A Forest Mighty Black: "Everything" (7:56)
I like A Forest Mighty Black, and the fact that they have such a great name only augments that fact. Actually, this is one of the better tracks of theirs that I’ve heard – I catch one of theirs songs streaming in on my Sonicnet station every once in a while, and though a lot of them have been pretty good, not many of them have been really good, like this one is. This is good, credible electronica. It’s isn’t techno (that’s Meat Beat Manifesto, in my eyes), and it isn’t any of the thousand faces of house music – it isn’t dance music at all, really, though I’d certainly dance to this. I wonder – what’s the evolution, here? Am I responding more to their seminal and formative earlier work, or resonating with their more mature, informed pieces? Not that it matters. Another thing that the song makes me wonder about is whether the artists (I think it’s just two guys, so you can really say ‘band’) have a video for this track, or dabble in any kind of multimedia outlet. That isn’t too far-fetched – Sonic Youth wants to start producing DVDs instead of regular ol’ jive compact discs, you know. I can envision sitting in a posh, vaguely sinister club very late at night, wearing sunglasses and bleached out hair and sipping impeccable, freezing-cold vodka. The room is full of smoke, sorcery, and Russian mafiosos, and this song is playing, and everyone gets it., everyone feels it. Or I can imagine a video for this song, to that same thematic effect, one that plays out like a short story, probably something by Henry, novel and potentially tragic in a way you couldn’t have predicted. It would begin in black and white and gradually, subtly shift into saturated colours. Or, I can picture some montage of fractals, compounding upon themselves and interspersed with subliminal messages like Do It Now. To be more concrete, the reason that I can envision all of those things is that for me, this piece of music tells a story, and is very literary despite the fact that it is an instrumental. I admire the build of the song, the way it circles at first, only to coalesce after a minute or more of musical insinuations which could lead you virtually anywhere. A wavering synth begins the track, fading in and out several times (with an odd and unexpected twist in the decay that you’ll miss if you aren’t paying attention or have the volume too low) over a course of twenty seconds before a looped sample of a low woodwind slowly fades in, along with a drone and some eerie sound effects. The drums follow, all suave and cool with brush strokes and rim shots for a while, and then, a moment later, the ride cymbal enters, a fast 4:4 with enough swing to make it a super-fast 6:8, which is how I tend to hear it. With the ride comes a loop of a bass – actually two loops, two basses; one of them an upright, the other a synth or a tweaked-out über-flanged electric. The bass line is somehow both dark and ebullient, and even though it’s a loop of a single measure, it manages to remain more propulsive than repetitive. I like the strings. I like the animal sounds – and though I can’t fully discern whether that’s a loon or an ape, I like the ambiguity. That’s what I like best about this piece – the utter ambiguity, the shifts and permutations in the overall rhythmic structure of the song, achieved by layering rhythms which all slightly vary from one another. I mentioned the ride cymbal; the bass is either a slow 6:8, or a dominant 4:4 that begins about a sixteenth note later than your ear might try to place it. The rhythm on the snare is 4:4, always accenting the “1” in a count of 1-2-3 1-2-3 1-2 :||; the high-hat accents “3” in a straight 4:4, but, like the ride before it, there’s enough swing that it’s in more of a 6:8 pattern, really – so the accent is really on “4” of rolling six-count. There’s some faint, sparse hand percussion in the mix, too, and with yet another divergent rhythm. And I adore, and am upended by, pieces of music with instruments playing in different but synchronous time signatures. There’s a particularly nice Tuatara piece like that, on the Breaking the Ethers album; there’s a beguiling but really fine piece by one of my old composition professors where the strings are in 4, and the harps, when they enter, are in 5. And of course, there’s Led Zeppelin’s fantastic song “Kashmir”: drums in 4, strings in 3.
3. The American Analog Set: "The Golden Band" (3:11)
Easy, gentle 4:4 time in Dm (I guess you could argue Am, but I don’t think so, especially with that little Dm ascension at the end of the track) - just a vibraphone with a lot of echo and some faint percussion. Just when you think these cats couldn’t get any better, they add vibes. AmAnSet is still one of my favourite bands. And not only are they all really sweet people, they make consistently superb music. Like this. AmAnSet gets the ‘space rock’ tag slapped on them a lot, and I guess that’s as accurate as often as anything else – but pieces like this, and other material on the album this was taken from (The Golden Band), and the preceding two-song disc for Darla (Late One Sunday and the Following Morning) are basically trance music. At least, they’re the analog side of trance music. To be blunt, music like this is both more powerful and easier to genuinely trance with than nearly all of the derivative technophonic swill that people like to call ‘trance’ just because there’s a sampled sitar or a modulated, affected vocal line singing in Hindi or the same boring two-note bassline looped five hundred times.
4. Spool: "Ebo" (14:43)
I’m not sure why, but I’ve had a hard time writing about this track. The words have been eluding me, and I don’t have anything definite or concrete to say about the song. It’s pleasant – I enjoy it while it’s on. The whole time that it’s on, I should amend; after all, it’s nearly fifteen minutes long. It’s another electronic (well, mostly electronic) instrumental, and I could readily and justifiably call this piece background music, or even nondescript, but at least to me, those synopses conjure up negative connotations, and even though I could make a case for either, I don’t like the terms. I don’t like things that aren’t distinct, that are generic. And this piece, ultimately, is very distinct. It isn’t that it’s nondescript, it’s that it’s non-intrusive. It’s demure. It’s lulling, but it has a strange sensuality about it, too. It’s maybe a little like M. Schmickler’s music, recorded as Pluramon. It also reminds me a little of the softer side of Tortoise. As I type this, I’m listening to the song right now; it is the sixth time today I have listened to it, and though I’m (perplexingly) no closer to getting on the outside of this song, I haven’t grown tired of it. That, right there, is a feat in and of itself. To remain interesting throughout even one listening is a feat, when we’re talking about a piece of music of almost fifteen minutes in length. And to retain that ability through six consecutive listenings, and to retain a measure of mystery even under scrutiny, is very, very rare. I’m aware of a contradiction that arises in me because of this song. Normally, I like music which I find stirring, rousing, upsetting (I will take as given the fact that anyone who’s read more than five entries in this journal knows what I mean, now, when I say that.) I think it’s completely possible for a piece of music to be all of those things, and yet sensitive, understated, and on some levels even restrained. When a piece of music is both of these, it’s sometimes very beautiful; I could name you many examples of pieces of music like that. But first and most immediately, I like music which engages me. This track, as is true for the scant few other tracks I’ve heard by Spool, does not truly engage me – but I get the decided feeling that that was never at any point their intent. Instead, they seem like patient, animate things that are perfectly content to slowly and almost accidentally emerge from the shadows and insinuate themselves into your subconscious. They don’t hide, and they are by no means boring – rather, it’s as if a degree of their talent, and thus, what makes them special (if I may be so twee) is their uncanny ability to go nearly unnoticed but on the most primal of levels. They do not obfuscate themselves – rather, they seem to become so intimate a part of their surroundings (i.e., your psyche – yes – ) that they remain unnoticed by virtue of becoming native, or seeming to have always been there.
5. Boards of Canada: "Nlogax" (6:50)
As for the drum machine loop at the beginning of this song: it is unaccompanied for nearly a minute. For the first forty seconds, it is completely static. It is typical. It is boring. I do not care for it. And I’m doubly critical of it, because come on, this is Boards of Canada, and they’re capable of much better. Fortunately, the track becomes interesting (at last) once the synth parts come in. The synth, during its first two minutes, sounds very retro, very eighties, in a way that I find quirky enough to like, but which I’m not sure is intentional. Imagine Danny Elfman and Thomas Dolby going to see New Order. The song is quirky, true, and that’s nice and everything, but it doesn’t become really self-sustaining until about three minutes into the piece. By that point, the synth has become a little deeper, a little broader, and little more substantial (but where’s the frigging bass in this track?). And the faint, tweak-scratched samples are neat, but they’re also very, very common. Sure, having a weird voice stuttering and ejaculating warped syllables (Eh-eh-Eee-eee-eee, ah-ah ah-ah!) is neat, and it sounds cool and so forth, and you can even make it sound eerie if you drop it into some crazy electronica in a minor key. But, that’s been established for a long time. What year did the Dust Brothers produce Paul’s Boutique for the B-Boys? Say it with me: 1989. That’s how many years ago now? Over twelve, that’s right. And were the Dust Brother the first to go on vinyl with a sillyass voice saying Eh-eh-Eee-eee-eee, ah-ah ah-ah!? Nope. That’s one of those things that, if you’re gonna do it, that’s fine. Like Scott B says to me all the time, “Well, if it makes you feel good, do it!” But, you’d best do it in some original fashion, or chances are it’s going to sound derivative. It’s the same thing as I said a week ago, when I was talking about the tired old subject of “losing your mind” that comes up in so many rock / blues / pop / country / jazz / folk songs. You can’t say anything like “I’m gonna lose my mind!” in your lyrics any more, because the phrase is tired, and it is completely and utterly played out. No, if you want to impart that feeling (which of course you can still do – raw emotion never gets played out), you have to do it in an innovative fashion, preferably one that can really convey a sense of that same feeling to your listeners. Perfect example: Cerberus Shoal’s brilliant and lovely song “Broken Springs Spring Forth from Broken Clocks”, from their first album …And Farewell to Hightide. That song has only has about eight lines, repeated with slight variation in their individual phrasing and the way they follow one another. But when Chriss Sutherland sings “Is this morning? Is this noon? It is night…” – you feel that sense of precariousness, that imbalance, and you can make your own implications. You don’t have to be insane to lose your mind for a moment – you can be exhausted, demented, under chemical influence, in the grip of an instinct such as fight-or-flight, slow to wake in the morning, ill, grief-stricken, in a rage, having an orgasm, meditating, in unfamiliar surroundings, or even simply confused about something. And we’ve all lost our mind for a moment here or there. It happens. It’s no big deal. Sometimes it’s terrifying. Other times it’s liberating. Whatever – give us the sensory impressions, and trust us to make our own equally-relevant interpretations of them. That was a divergent point, but I hope you take my meaning – which is, of course, that the same is true musically. In this case, if you want an off-the-wall sample, capture the sound of someone doing the hoovering, pitch-shift it up a third, and put a ping-pong delay on it. Then, rather than plain old boring Eh-eh-Eee-eee-eee, ah-ah ah-ah! one more time, have something different. John Wayne saying “Anytime, pilgrim!”, but split up and fractured in that same way. Your local weatherman saying, “We’re in for a cold one tonight!” six times in a row. Bill Cosby saying “baby”, but routed through a keyboard and played as a melody. Those are just examples. Feel free to use those. Back in college, I took a few classes on playwriting. I was in several drama productions. It was sometimes frustrating, but often educational and even enlightening, to sit with experienced playwrights and directors while they reviewed an exercise, a scene, a complete script, and made the cuts. “This is superfluous,” they’d say, or “This isn’t what matters.” I learned that if something wasn’t clear, it was little more than a weighted limb that diverted attention from the storyline and clouded the dramatic action. All clouds and no clarity, all twists and no true course, makes for a disappointing jumble, even if the piece has real potential. And the same principle applies here. This is my take: the track has a lot of potential. Boards of Canada is a fine group, one who’s proven themselves capable of quality music. This track needs four things: 1.) Some low end. For the love of God, some bloody low end. 2.) Some real drums. The drum sound here is dull, simply put. It has nothing going for it. 3.) See above: do something about that sillyass sample. 4.) Cut the first minute and fifty seconds. The long build of bobo drums only emphasizes the fact that they’re hopelessly bobo. Begin with the reversed-clap sound and the synth; as it is, that’s where the tune at long last gets interesting.
6. Stonemen Hiss: "Untitled" (6:36)
I really like tasteful, well-composed ambient music. It’s the sort of music that quite often (but for no concrete reason I can name) gives me a feeling akin to being blessedly warm in an otherwise bleak and freezing climate. It’s music that is paradoxically cold in its starkness and warm in its expansiveness, at the same time. Sometimes, I’ve heard examples of that which are pieces for tape, or pieces which feature solely canned drums and digital synth - but those examples are rare. For me, that feeling is much more readily and gracefully conveyed through other means – analog synths, live instruments instead of samples, an air of humanity rather than the comparatively boring music made by machines. Like the Seamonster1 track back on the first disc of this set. That was an ambient piece with real beauty and grace about it. And this, too, is another example. And once again, just as was the case with Seamonster1, Stonemen Hiss is a band I’d never before heard of, though after this song I want to hear more. As are all the tracks on this disc, this is another instrumental. It fades in with a drone quavering around a D – several cents on either side of a true D more often than not, and occasionally bending up to Eb or down to Db. For the first minute, this drone, along with a few stark harmonics ringing on the guitar, is all you hear. At a minute, in the background, a guitar fades in; at two minutes, a second guitar follows. In between, the keys come in – it sounds like a Mellotron – and plays for only a few measures. However, the rich and warbling Am chord it lands on is what gives the song its warmth. When the keys leave, and it’s only the guitar(s) and the drone carrying the song, it becomes so cold again; it’s actually made me shiver. The Mellotron(?) comes in again later in the song, repeating its earlier part, after which time there’s a brief undercurrent of static – probably a crackly sort of feedback. It ping-pongs across the sound field for several seconds, then dies away. The guitars follow, and you’re left with the drone, which fades out as it faded in. The track has an almost morose quality about it, but one which is not unpleasant even though it makes me slightly ill-at-ease. It’s as if the music is brooding over some terrible seriousness or impossible weight, and briefly talks aloud about the sensation before sinking back into itself, leaving you to wonder what the outcome will be. You’re given a vignette with no ending, and shown something that seems settled only for the moment, as though perhaps there is no real resolution to be found, or that these are subjects best not considered too much at any one time.
7. The Album Leaf: "We Once Were (One)" (4:27)
As you might expect, there’s a follow-up to this song called “Once We Were (Two)” – and I heard “…(Two)” before I heard “…(One).” After I heard this one, I was kind of disappointed; I didn’t like it as well, and it reminded me of a less-enjoyable remix of its successor. Kind of ludicrous, that – if this one is One, it was likely composed and / or meant to be listened to before Two, which of course comes afterwards. Just now, I listened to the two songs back-to-back, three times in a row. And that way, they seemed a much more natural and cohesive pairing, and “…(One)” became more interesting to me. There really isn’t much difference between the two – the songs are both just a hair flat of being in D(m), but well sharp of Db(m); they’re nearly exactly the same length (the second being eleven seconds longer); and the melody is the same, a wistful progression played on a low and echoing electric piano – a Rhodes, maybe? The difference is, this track is little more than that melody. Very, very faintly in the background is a simple four-count on what sounds like a high-hat with some flange and with the low-mid-ranges amplified and / or the treble and bass turned nearly all the way down. There’s also a very, very faint counterpoint being played on another synth, in a higher register, with more of a glistening, bright sound. At first listen, I thought that this song was brighter, overall, than “…(Two),” but now I don’t think so. I think that instead, it’s more stark, more open and spacious, more…I want to say barren. And that makes it seem brighter because there’s less in the foreground; there’s less in the light. On the follow-up, the main difference is the second synth line is brought forward to the point of being on equal ground with the melody, and there are drums; not just the high-hat, but rim-shots and graceful, demure rolls on the snare, faint crashes. The sense of space conveyed in “…(Two)” is the sort of space on might feel in a vast forest – there is tremendous space, and a sense of boundlessness, perhaps, but within incredible density and texture. It is the same song, but more determined, more forward, more full. I like both – but I like them best when paired with one another. But, this is an admirable surrogate context for this piece – it’s more capable of standing on its own, without the support of “…(Two),” because it dovetails nicely with the serenity of the preceding Stonemen Hiss track and the more active Seefeel track which follows it. Read on -
8. Seefeel: “Ruby-Ha” (6:07)
This track marks a return to a more warm sound, mostly due to the timbre of the organ. Love that organ. It’s kind of funny – there’s a varying alternation between music with a “warm” feel and music with a “cold” feel on this disc. It’s also distinct in that it has this warm feeling despite being mostly electronic. (Here’s a breakdown, to recap: Tr. 1, Stiff Man Syndrome: Warm. Tr. 2, A Forest Mighty Black: Very Cold. Tr. 3, AmAnSet: Warm. Luscious. Tr. 4, Spool: Exactly room temperature. Tr. 5, Boards of Canada: Cold, but not a natural cold. Like being kept in a refrigerator. Tr. 6, Stonemen Hiss: Warm. Tr. 7, Album Leaf: Cold, but part II of the song is warm. Tr. 8, Seefeel: Warm again.) And here is an example of a good sample; even though it’s just a woman’s voice saying “Ah,” it’s interesting, and it’s pretty, and Seefeel has done well with it. I like the drums, too; the high-hat is pretty common, but it works, and the ‘snare’ is pleasantly odd, and the ‘bass’ sounds more like a low burble on a synth, one with a fast attack and fast decay. Overall, the sound is one very distinct to Seefeel, though comparatively subdued here. Not as great as “More Like Space,” or as strange as “Charlotte’s Mouth,” but calming, lulling, and pleasant.
9. Landing: "Hovering" (3:12)
(Warm.) This reminds me a little of Mercury Rev. Lots of guitar textures; long droning tones, gentle feedback, slow two-note trills, little runs with a lot of echo and delay. A perfectly apt title – the music floats in, hovers and builds up around you in transient, shifting layers of sound. The drums (seemingly far beneath, the one earth element in the song) add some forward motion while at the same time giving the track its only semblance of groundedness - and then, while you’re focusing on the horizon, smiling, you realise you’ve floated altogether away. Very pretty. It could be a longer piece, but there’s no reason for it to be. It presents a beautiful soundscape, and leaves you wanting to hear more even as it fades away again.
10. Mouse on Mars: "Go Card" (3:56)
(Not cold, but cool. An electronic autumn.) I think a little bit of Pram, here, and also a DJ with whom I was a member of a short-lived DJ collective for a while, by name of DJ Kjell. I like M on M’s music; it’s light hearted and playful while at the same time being something of real substance – like that witty friend of yours who always makes such astute and well-phrased observations. You know the one I mean. I keep waiting for the drums to come in and turn the track into some really excellent and well-made jungle – but they never do. They never do. I’m going to remix this song myself, just to set it to a beat; I want to hear it that way, too, although the sounds, the noises in this song, are so intriguing and beguiling in all the best ways that if this was a jungle track, you’d have to be careful to not muddy it up and hide all the elements that make it such a gem. The weird single-note bleats from some synth that sounds like a cross between a melodica and a bassoon. The shrill, super-fast vibra-slap sound with the rapid decay. The high, bell-like vibes, like a leaky armonica. The staccato chords, and the watery, rubbery bass notes. It all comes together in a really quirky, unusual and very appealing way. I still want to make a remix, though…
11. Datacide: "So Much Light" (11:58)
This track is so soft, and so subtle, that I feel like I have to suspend my judgment until I can listen to it on headphones a few times, which I have yet to do. So far, I can say that it’s intriguing, and that there seems to be a lot going on in there, including some very intense, incredibly rich and very unusual textures. I want to hear it more closely and more intimately; I don’t think cranking the speakers all the way up would serve to engender any further appreciation for the piece.
Three discs down, one disc to go. I won't be posting that last review (or much of anything else, either) until the other side of this weekend, though.
current music: Datacide: "So Much Light" (3 louches | share your thoughts)
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