Relistening VIII - Death Ambient, Drunken Forest

One of the best albums I heard in this re-listening experience is the album of this collaboration of some amazing artists under the name 'Death Ambient'. I was very impressed by the first time I bought it more than 10 years ago, but since then I was able to listen more of Ikue Mori, Fred Frith, and Kato Hideki, who are the main members of the Drunken Forest orchestra. 

This album was released in Tzadik in 2007. It was the year I finished my military service and I was opening my ears to more experimental and electroacoustic music, such as Annie Gosfield, Sylvie Courvoisier, and also spending a lot of time listening to some of the great musicians of electronic music, such as PanSonic, Aphex Twin, Autechre and releases from Raster Noton. Also, it was time that I was trying to understand better the term of ambient music, and this was supposed to be an ambient music release, which made me even more confused about its definition. 

Listening again this album I'm not sure if it is a release or actually thinking of a performance or a collection of sounds and the techniques around them. 'Lake Chad' is a great intro, giving space to the musicians to show and identify their role in the album. Without much interaction between them, it feels like an opening for the artists to introduce what type of instruments and sounds they'll play during the album. 'Greenhouse' starts with Ikue Mori' sound effects and then peaks up gradually with Frith's string playing and electronics until it becomes less tense.

'Cocktail of Chemicals' is my favourite track of the album. Starts with a violin and Frith's guitar slow playing, and preparing the listener for something great. And this is again some electronic sounds, much more powerful and covering Frith's playing that is more like listening to the background. Sounding like a sudden injection going inside you, blurring the brain and the neurons, making you feel muted and giving body spasms. Even the sound in the ears at the end of the track is kind of echoic and muted.

'Thermocaline', is another example of the great sound explorations and the interchange between sound recordings, strings and natural sounds that reaches its graduals peak as the composition reaches to the end of the track. 'Dead Zone' is a bit different leaving a lot of space to the electronics and less on the musical instruments. To the listener, it feels like exploring an unknown and unfamiliar place that can imagine only by freeing the auditory senses. Like walking in a strange and abandoned land.

The remaining of the album is based a lot on the sound effects creating an airy space and what is missing is the outburst and the presence of string instruments, that are now moved to more like percussions, accompanying the mixes and sound recordings. The titles of the tracks and of course the name of the band have a strong influence by the elements of nature, but close to its destruction or at best its gradual deterioration. The second half of the album could be said that sounds more like to this degradation and the slow pace, less intense and presence of cello make a strong statement to this. As the album gets close to the end although it sounds like there more improvisation and percussion instruments, the 'Drunken Forest' track of the album is possibly the only track that follows a more particular melodic pattern, and not so much experimenting or improvising.

Inside the leaflet of the cd case, it refers to 'Opening your ears in a striking new world', and it is a very good description of this release. This album is definitely something that everyone should listen to. Whether as a study on sound effects and experimental composition or just using it as a score in a video, movie etc. It is definitely a masterpiece and the artists that are part of the Death Ambient leave their creative mark.

Relistening VII - Richard Skelton, Crow Autumn Bonus Disc

Starting with the name of the artist and the album release, I'm thinking that it might be a bit misleading. And this is for many reasons. First of all, Richard Skelton, all these years has been releasing his music under different names, such as Carousel or A Broken Consort, being the other two main names he has been using. Or to put it differently, he was using more extensively during his career. For the particular release, The Crow Autumn Bonus Disc is an album that followed after the 'A Broken Consort - Crow Autumn' with a very limited number of 100 CDRs that had a personal dedication for those very few people that bought it. And luckily, I was one of them! 

A lot of things have changed for Skelton in his personal life and also as an artist. As far as I know, he still lives in Cumbria and is inspired by the natural elements and hides his instruments in the ground and then performs with the instruments after being buried so that he uses these elements to his compositions. I also had the great pleasure to talk to him personally in one of the 'Small Publishers Fair' taking place in Holborn where he was presenting to the visitors his publications in his personal Corbel Stone company. It was also a few months later that I saw him performing for the first time on Queen Elizabeth Hall in London and later again on St. Lukes in Old Street with a small orchestra.

The first track of the album is from the A Broken Consort and is called 'Severance'. There is drone-like prolonged sound from string instruments and its duration is around 5 minutes. The way I hear it is like a good introduction for the next tracks of the album and what is about to follow. And the next track is from Saddleback and called 'Gerroa Thursday'. Compared to the first track, this one starts with a slow piano and on the background is the familiar string instruments are heard. The tune doesn't change much and is like a repetition of two instruments for most of the composition.

The third track is Heidika 'Limn'. It opens with an acoustic guitar and it kind of sounds like using fingerpicking. It is quite surprising because, from all the Skelton discography that I have, I have no recollection of listening to so much guitar playing in his compositions. In comparison to the first two tracks of the album, the pattern is similar to a repetition of two instruments only. And then is the 'Shape Leaves' track that is released as Richard Skelton, which is also the big highlight of the album, and also my favourite track. It reminds me a lot of these frozen and sudden dronish sound playing behind the track that becomes more prominent at the end and is hugely emotionally powerful. It's easy for the listener to create images of sadness, solitude, grief, or hope. It's definitely a composition that enables the listener to create their own stories or revive personal experiences.

The fifth track is called again Heidika 'Limn' and is a reworked version of the third track. It sounds more interesting than the previous version as it includes more instruments and the acoustic layers are richer and more complicated. And the last track, 'Daas', is a collaboration with the Dutch artist Rutger Zuydervelt, aka Machinefabriek. Someone would expect that this track would have more electronic or sound art elements compared to the rest of the album, and it isn't very far from reality. The experimentation is greater and there is more freedom in the way that the track is composed. The most interesting is the collaboration of those two, but for Machinefabriek it isn't the first name as he has collaborated in the past with Aaron Martin and many other artists in his latest release 'With Voices'.

One of the main reasons I chose this album to re-listen is because the last years I've been a bit behind on Skelton's career and his various projects. I wouldn't say that my perception of listening to Skelton's music has changed differently, as I always felt this internal need to hear some modern compositions and I was never disappointed. The most interesting in this re-listening experience is to look at his expanding and changing projects and his interests around the modern composition.

Bonus: A video of Richard Skelton with the Elysian Quartet from the Vimeo account of The Wire music magazine.