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themawt71 · 02.12.2009, 12:08 PM

Track five: ROD POOLE'S GRADUAL ASCENT TO HEAVEN
One of the things I had written down in my notebook was something like "layered micro-tonal acoustic suite". I must admit that I had no intention of writing this solemn monument to the memory of my friend Rod Poole. A few hours into groping around with the fundamental track, done on open-tuned Taylor 12-string, I realized what was happening. The second movement is meant, with humble respect, to draw the unsuspecting listener into the spirit of Rod's brilliant solo guitar music, and attempts to pay homage to something I may have internalized from listening to Rod. It breaks off into a duet when the little open-tuned Breedlove guitar enters. The main guitar is an old, cheap Silvertone. The piece is blatantly programmatic. I won't go into too much detail, though. But I used a lot of instruments: a zither-like instrument called a Harmolin, Turkish 12-string with a canister for a body, a fretless guitar made out of a cigar box (Daddy Mojo), and I borrowed Weba's tenor ukelele, fresh from the repair shop (thanks, Weba!)... But I forgot to list the Dobro and Marxophone on the CD notes. I could go on and on, but suffice to say that as the piece neared completion (thanks to the computer world I could move whole sections around to make order out of chaos), I started to feel really strange. When it was done, it was a sonic monument, unsystematically microtonal, and it made me weep uncontrollably; for Rod's wife Lisa and for those of us who loved and admired him and who miss him so much, for the the condition and fragility of sentient life, and it made me curse the subhuman who stabbed my friend. I am not ashamed to admit that the piece seems to succeed. But it was an accident. I entreat you to investigate his music, recently available on:

Track six: THE DIVINE HOMEGIRL -
Originally, this song appeared on an old, now out-of-print disc by my original Trio. It's an attempt to write a rubato ballad in a major key that refers to songs like "Jesus Maria" by Carla Bley. This is just my old Martin acoustic and my old Jazzmaster in dialog, and the sound is rather like that John Abercrombie record mentioned earlier. The form was simplified to keep it shorter. It was originally inspired by a waitress at a Mexican restaurant named Gloria and by latina beauties in general, but this time I wanted to dedicate it to one of my best friends and sometime colleague, Carla Bozulich, one of the greatest singers/artists of our time and a wonderful human. She is, like me, from Los Angeles. My homegirl...

Track seven: X CHANGES(S) -
This one is, like so much of this record, an excuse to examine/have fun with sounds, timbres. A trio of acoustic string instruments trade short improvised areas with a duo of other acoustic string instruments (some prepared with false bridges, alligator clips, etc.). In some ways, it is like a partially premeditated version of the Acoustic Guitar Trio, the group I formed with Rod Poole and Jim McAuley, but I only realized this later (with a mild degree of embarrassment). I just love this type of sound. Maybe you do, too.

Track eight: THE NOMAD'S HOME
I orginally titled this "The Road To You" before being told that Pat Metheny and somebody scary have songs with this title. Ooops! Well, it was written in the studio and is a duet for nylon-string guitar and squareneck Dobro. I am a total Dobro tourist, I admit. But I have no shame. I recorded it anyway, and I want to note my love for artists like Jerry Douglas and so-called Hindustani slide players like Debashish Bhattacharya. But the piece, which sounds like a "closer" but couldn't be, is a meditation on the nomadic life of my friend Carla Bozulich. Does it mean "the nomad's home", as in the possessive of one's home, and if one is a nomad, what IS that exactly? Or does it mean "the nomad is home"? As a bit of a nomad myself, I like being home and wonder about how one can, as I do, thrive on this itinerant life as I seem to. And I like it when Carla is back in L.A....

Tracks nine - fourteen: ONAN (SUITE) -
This is a six-part suite of sound and song, a soundtrack of sorts to a lifetime of oddness, obsessions, alienation, and a make-believe melding of the Biblical story of Onan, who allegedly angered God by casting his seed upon the land rather than impregnate somebody or other, probably a cousin or something. I am fascinated by how this story has become proof to Fundamentalist types that God is against masturbation, and I guess He (give me a break!) is also, like Fundamentalists, against family planning, because Onan actually practiced coitus interruptus, consequently giving the word 'onanism' both definitions. I find this interesting for many reasons. The piece is, in some ways, tongue-in-cheek, yet serious, biographical yet also autobiographical. That's as much as I am going to say on THAT subject... But musically the piece has the ingredients (as noted by me and others) of Pink Floyd, garage rock, Sigur Ros, The Cure, Bollywood soundtrack music, breakbeats, and David Lynch sound design, among many others. The second-to-last movement is called "Seedcaster", the title of which is not only an obvious reference to Onan, but also to the inventor of the Quintronics Drum Buddy used on it, Quintron himself. This piece is basically two performances done in real time, one on the Drum Buddy, which includes not only that submerged-sounding beat but also the synth bass-esque and "wobble" sounds, and electric guitar and my usual effects/loops. Little bursts of electric sitar and rhythm guitars ping-ponging were added to spice things up. The last movement actually uses a drum machine of sorts: the "percussion" part of the Korg Kaossilator, and also the chord and bass sounds it can do. The solo is on electric 12-string, and I left in all the sloppiness because it sounded like the right kind of struggle, seemed to add a bit of extra excitement. This suite also has my voice through my favorite toy megaphone, the Megamouth, at various points, in an attempt to add creepiness, electronic/intestinal gurglings, and androgyny. The scenario is interrupted at one point by Onan, now imagined as a hippie guitarist, being taunted by a nightmare involving swirling psych and garage rock "licks", as well as the eventual addition of Metal and pure wank. I am hoping that by now your are starting to get clued into the morass of cross-references included in this suite, which I admit is, in a string of sonic indulgences called my "work", arguably the most indulgent thing I have recorded to date that I actually organized compositionally.

Track fifteen: CYMBIDIUM
The other drone piece with sruti boxes, this one also creates a vagueness between major and minor modalities. It is very simple, and features a rather Thurston/Lee-like repeating, open-tuned progression that repeats a few times and is over. Played on an old Harmony, it is dedicated to the memory of my mother, who died in December of 2007, the day before her 92nd birthday. She had a green thumb, which, after my father died and she got into gardening a bit, she was surprised to discover. Her cymbidium orchids thrived on "neglect", and would prolifically explode forth periodically. I cannot explain here what my mother is/was to me except to say that she is/was a real life hero, a woman of intellect, dignity, fairness, and style.Thanks again to Jeff Gauthier and everyone else who helps me and lets me keep doing practically anything that I can dream of. I hope that people out there can enjoy at least parts of it. It was, in my tiny brain, made with my obsessions/neuroses/dreams and my sweet friends in mind, but if there is universality in that, it must be because of that ineffable human connection that keeps everything from blowing up, don't you think?

About the art/photography: The artists Angela DiCristofaro (painter) and Peak (photographer) are treasured friends and, as an admirer of their vision and empathy, I am honored to see what they contributed to that thing you hold in your hand, the record cover (petite version).

NOTE: I hear that quite few CD trays have immediately fallen out/off of your CD package, the one I was just writing about just now with the fabulous artwork. Recalls/repairs are underway, but some may suffer. The Cryptogramophone IMPRINT is offering sympathy/discounts and will soon provide (YouTube, are you paying attention?) a little film about how you can repair yours, and I will show you the way! After I figure it out myself. Apparently, it involves Krazy Glue...

- Nels
Chicago, IL (02.09.09)

02.12.2009, 12:08 PM	#12
themawt71 the destroyed room Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: chicago Posts: 570	Track five: ROD POOLE'S GRADUAL ASCENT TO HEAVEN One of the things I had written down in my notebook was something like "layered micro-tonal acoustic suite". I must admit that I had no intention of writing this solemn monument to the memory of my friend Rod Poole. A few hours into groping around with the fundamental track, done on open-tuned Taylor 12-string, I realized what was happening. The second movement is meant, with humble respect, to draw the unsuspecting listener into the spirit of Rod's brilliant solo guitar music, and attempts to pay homage to something I may have internalized from listening to Rod. It breaks off into a duet when the little open-tuned Breedlove guitar enters. The main guitar is an old, cheap Silvertone. The piece is blatantly programmatic. I won't go into too much detail, though. But I used a lot of instruments: a zither-like instrument called a Harmolin, Turkish 12-string with a canister for a body, a fretless guitar made out of a cigar box (Daddy Mojo), and I borrowed Weba's tenor ukelele, fresh from the repair shop (thanks, Weba!)... But I forgot to list the Dobro and Marxophone on the CD notes. I could go on and on, but suffice to say that as the piece neared completion (thanks to the computer world I could move whole sections around to make order out of chaos), I started to feel really strange. When it was done, it was a sonic monument, unsystematically microtonal, and it made me weep uncontrollably; for Rod's wife Lisa and for those of us who loved and admired him and who miss him so much, for the the condition and fragility of sentient life, and it made me curse the subhuman who stabbed my friend. I am not ashamed to admit that the piece seems to succeed. But it was an accident. I entreat you to investigate his music, recently available on: Track six: THE DIVINE HOMEGIRL - Originally, this song appeared on an old, now out-of-print disc by my original Trio. It's an attempt to write a rubato ballad in a major key that refers to songs like "Jesus Maria" by Carla Bley. This is just my old Martin acoustic and my old Jazzmaster in dialog, and the sound is rather like that John Abercrombie record mentioned earlier. The form was simplified to keep it shorter. It was originally inspired by a waitress at a Mexican restaurant named Gloria and by latina beauties in general, but this time I wanted to dedicate it to one of my best friends and sometime colleague, Carla Bozulich, one of the greatest singers/artists of our time and a wonderful human. She is, like me, from Los Angeles. My homegirl... Track seven: X CHANGES(S) - This one is, like so much of this record, an excuse to examine/have fun with sounds, timbres. A trio of acoustic string instruments trade short improvised areas with a duo of other acoustic string instruments (some prepared with false bridges, alligator clips, etc.). In some ways, it is like a partially premeditated version of the Acoustic Guitar Trio, the group I formed with Rod Poole and Jim McAuley, but I only realized this later (with a mild degree of embarrassment). I just love this type of sound. Maybe you do, too. Track eight: THE NOMAD'S HOME I orginally titled this "The Road To You" before being told that Pat Metheny and somebody scary have songs with this title. Ooops! Well, it was written in the studio and is a duet for nylon-string guitar and squareneck Dobro. I am a total Dobro tourist, I admit. But I have no shame. I recorded it anyway, and I want to note my love for artists like Jerry Douglas and so-called Hindustani slide players like Debashish Bhattacharya. But the piece, which sounds like a "closer" but couldn't be, is a meditation on the nomadic life of my friend Carla Bozulich. Does it mean "the nomad's home", as in the possessive of one's home, and if one is a nomad, what IS that exactly? Or does it mean "the nomad is home"? As a bit of a nomad myself, I like being home and wonder about how one can, as I do, thrive on this itinerant life as I seem to. And I like it when Carla is back in L.A.... Tracks nine - fourteen: ONAN (SUITE) - This is a six-part suite of sound and song, a soundtrack of sorts to a lifetime of oddness, obsessions, alienation, and a make-believe melding of the Biblical story of Onan, who allegedly angered God by casting his seed upon the land rather than impregnate somebody or other, probably a cousin or something. I am fascinated by how this story has become proof to Fundamentalist types that God is against masturbation, and I guess He (give me a break!) is also, like Fundamentalists, against family planning, because Onan actually practiced coitus interruptus, consequently giving the word 'onanism' both definitions. I find this interesting for many reasons. The piece is, in some ways, tongue-in-cheek, yet serious, biographical yet also autobiographical. That's as much as I am going to say on THAT subject... But musically the piece has the ingredients (as noted by me and others) of Pink Floyd, garage rock, Sigur Ros, The Cure, Bollywood soundtrack music, breakbeats, and David Lynch sound design, among many others. The second-to-last movement is called "Seedcaster", the title of which is not only an obvious reference to Onan, but also to the inventor of the Quintronics Drum Buddy used on it, Quintron himself. This piece is basically two performances done in real time, one on the Drum Buddy, which includes not only that submerged-sounding beat but also the synth bass-esque and "wobble" sounds, and electric guitar and my usual effects/loops. Little bursts of electric sitar and rhythm guitars ping-ponging were added to spice things up. The last movement actually uses a drum machine of sorts: the "percussion" part of the Korg Kaossilator, and also the chord and bass sounds it can do. The solo is on electric 12-string, and I left in all the sloppiness because it sounded like the right kind of struggle, seemed to add a bit of extra excitement. This suite also has my voice through my favorite toy megaphone, the Megamouth, at various points, in an attempt to add creepiness, electronic/intestinal gurglings, and androgyny. The scenario is interrupted at one point by Onan, now imagined as a hippie guitarist, being taunted by a nightmare involving swirling psych and garage rock "licks", as well as the eventual addition of Metal and pure wank. I am hoping that by now your are starting to get clued into the morass of cross-references included in this suite, which I admit is, in a string of sonic indulgences called my "work", arguably the most indulgent thing I have recorded to date that I actually organized compositionally. Track fifteen: CYMBIDIUM The other drone piece with sruti boxes, this one also creates a vagueness between major and minor modalities. It is very simple, and features a rather Thurston/Lee-like repeating, open-tuned progression that repeats a few times and is over. Played on an old Harmony, it is dedicated to the memory of my mother, who died in December of 2007, the day before her 92nd birthday. She had a green thumb, which, after my father died and she got into gardening a bit, she was surprised to discover. Her cymbidium orchids thrived on "neglect", and would prolifically explode forth periodically. I cannot explain here what my mother is/was to me except to say that she is/was a real life hero, a woman of intellect, dignity, fairness, and style.Thanks again to Jeff Gauthier and everyone else who helps me and lets me keep doing practically anything that I can dream of. I hope that people out there can enjoy at least parts of it. It was, in my tiny brain, made with my obsessions/neuroses/dreams and my sweet friends in mind, but if there is universality in that, it must be because of that ineffable human connection that keeps everything from blowing up, don't you think? About the art/photography: The artists Angela DiCristofaro (painter) and Peak (photographer) are treasured friends and, as an admirer of their vision and empathy, I am honored to see what they contributed to that thing you hold in your hand, the record cover (petite version). NOTE: I hear that quite few CD trays have immediately fallen out/off of your CD package, the one I was just writing about just now with the fabulous artwork. Recalls/repairs are underway, but some may suffer. The Cryptogramophone IMPRINT is offering sympathy/discounts and will soon provide (YouTube, are you paying attention?) a little film about how you can repair yours, and I will show you the way! After I figure it out myself. Apparently, it involves Krazy Glue... - Nels Chicago, IL (02.09.09)
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