Right now it's Process, _Shape-Space_, on FatCat. A moody, humble
meditation on the basic 4/4 drive. Slower than a lot of minimal techno
(I tapped one at 112 bpm, and none seem to top 120), the tracks build
gradually in texture and complexity. Most simply hint at the 4/4
structure, using sampled grinds, clicks, and dub-hits in place of kicks
and snares and cymbals. Dark, just like I like it, but still warm(!)
and ultimately moving. The official blurb from the FatCat site
(
http://www.fat-cat.co.uk/artists/process.html) is actually quite
accurate in its praise. I absolutely love this release.
Also, not that new but growing on me is Kit Clayton's _Mimic and the
Model_. At first I was a bit nonplussed after expecting something along
the lines of _Repetition and Nonsense_, or the more dubbyquirky _Nek
Sanalet_. But listening to it in the car (taped from the vinyl) lately,
I was drawn to the warm melodic menagerie of bleeps and blurps and
implied rhythms, reminding me of a more playful Higher Intelligence
Agency, knowing that the beats are supposed to be there, but actually
prefering that they aren't.
Both of these releases (along with the new Mira Calix) have managed to
work their way into that soft spot somewhere inside where all my
melancholy and emotional pangs reside, something that a lot of other
music fails to do.
Perhaps I'm still on a high after seeing German free jazz bassist Peter
Kowald (
http://www.kowald.de) two nights in a row, his forty-minute solo
a mesmerizing tour-de-force of spiritually and emotionally charged
energy, straight from the source. Yikes. It's overwhelming, sometimes,
to be under the influence of such powerful music.
So now, I'll sign off, put on _Live From a Shark Cage_ by Papa M, and
get lost.
G.
np: Papa M, _Live From a Shark Cage_
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