TIP OF THE TONGUE 30 JANUARY 2011
Pauline Oliveros/Eliane Radigue/Yoshi Wada/Sun Circle
Attention Patterns
Black Pollen Press/Important Records Blkpln-01/Imprec-263
2xLP + Book
OUT OF STOCK!
Major double LP set - stunningly packaged - that joins the dots between a bunch of 20th century thinkers at the forefront of modern minimalist composition, curated by Che Chen, previously the editor of the beautiful multimedia zine O'Sirhan, O'Sirhan, previously stocked by VT. Each artist gets a full side of vinyl to themselves and the set comes packaged in a letter-pressed sleeve with a large book that features lengthy interviews/writings from all the participants as well as fantastic archival snaps. Deep-listening composer Pauline Oliveros takes up the first side with a zoned high mass for slow-droning accordion and vocals that has the sacred, psychedelic/liturgical feel of Fursaxa and the higher-minded power of The Theatre Of Eternal Music's endless navigations of Now. It's a 1977 recording entitled “Horse Sings From Cloud” recorded live in performance in France by Daniel Caux. Radigue's piece is more spectral. “Biogenesis”, from 1973, uses Arp synth and recordings of the human heart beat to generate an elemental womb-like environment. Legendary Japanese drone thinker Yoshi Wada takes up side three with a 2010 piece in collaboration with his son Tashi Wada (whose 2010 LP on Yik Yak blew a bunch of minds) with Yoshi back on bagpipes and audio generators and Tashi using reed organ and harmonium to generate monolithic cloud forms. The set concludes with Sun Circle, the duo of Greg Davis and Zach Wallace, playing “For Yoshi Wada”, a piece scored for harmonized mizmars, khaen and percussion that combines ritual ethno-orchestra reed drones with doomy martial percussion ala Outside The Dream Syndicate to stunning effect. Released in an edition of 600 copies, this is easily one of the most consistently mind-blowing navigations of the nowhere zone ever assembled on wax, and it's a beautiful thing to behold. Highly recommended!
