isolationism

Here is a good definition from Wikipedia: 

Isolationist ambient music, also known as isolationism, can be differentiated from other forms of ambient music in its use of repetition, dissonance, microtonality, and unresolved harmonies to create a sense of unresolved unease and desolation.  (here)

This is a genre that I've only sampled.  I'm aware that there are record labels that specialize in this kind of music.  This is one of those genres that really stretch the limit of what we traditionally define as music.  It's basically long pieces of industrial drones, hums, feedback, found sounds, loops, etc., that set an eerie and/or unsettling mood.  The soundtrack to David Lynch's Eraserhead is a great example.

The following list is a handful of albums that loosely fall under this category.

Lull - Moments
This is Mick Harris from Napalm Death.  He basically pioneered this genre.  Moments is one continuous piece spread across 99 tracks.  Nightmarish.

Kevin Drumm - Imperial Distortion
A two disc set of incredible drones.  Kevin Drumm usually releases Merzbow-esque harsh noise releases.  He has also collaborated with Ken Vandermark as a member of the Territory Band.  However, I especially like this release.  My favorite track is "More Blood And Guts" from the first disc.


Jim O'Rourke - Terminal Pharmacy
This is a mysterious album.  For the first piece, "Cede", three musicians are listed but it mostly sounds like a collage of slowed down recordings and electronic drones wafting in and out, dropping out suddenly, and occasional bursts of static.  It might not really fall under the category of "isolationism", but it produces that same effect of "unresolved unease and desolation".  Jim O'Rourke is a musician that almost never fails to impress me despite how eclectic his discography is.

Axel Dörner & Tony Buck - Durch Und Durch
One forty-minute improvisation for percussion, laptop, and trumpet.  They maintain a steady and fascinating current of crackling noise and drones.  This has been a favorite of mine for some time.

3 Albums

Jazz
Adam Rogers/John Patitucci/Clarence Penn - Sight (Criss Cross)
I've only seen Rogers with Chris Potter's Underground.  He's usually playing a Strat with a twangy tone and a bit of overdrive.  Here he's playing a Gibson ES-335 with what sounds like the tone knob dialed back.  The general sound of the group is slightly off-putting: the bass seems under-miked and the guitar tone sounds muffled and indistinct.  However, the playing is outstanding.  Rogers has an impeccable technical facility and a very advanced harmonic sense.  Check out "Kaleidoscope" and Woody Shaw's "The Moontrane".  "Kaleidoscope" is very Holdsworth-esque as Rogers overdubs himself soloing on a bed of harmonically rich and slightly chorused chords.  I would love to hear just the back tracks of the chords and rhythm section.  "Moontrane" is a tune I personally love to call out during jam sessions because the chords pull you in very interesting directions.  It's fun to hear Rogers slither his way through this tune.

Bill Evans/Chuck Israels/Paul Motian - How My Heart Sings! (Original Jazz Classics)
For some reason I've been particularly drawn to Paul Motian's playing on this record.  The first tune, the title track, they are playing in 3/4.  Paul is using brushes and creating a gorgeous wash of sound from his cymbals and snares.  He's very active during Bill's solo, with nice tight triplet figures between the snare and hi-hat, working in a beautiful washy ride halfway through.  He only uses sticks on two tunes: "Walkin' Up" and "34 Skidoo".  He has a very gentle touch, and I particularly love the way he works in those gentle explosions with the hi-hat.  I wish more drummers would play like him.


Rock/Pop
Eric Johnson - Ah Via Musicom
Wow, this is a cheesy album.  I checked this out at the local library because I keep running into articles in guitar magazines (there are piles and piles of guitar magazines where I work) obsessing about Eric Johnson.  I can definitely tell why guitar players love this man.  He has a soaring guitar-hero tone and can really shred.  However, this is one of those "for guitarists only" albums.  It has that glossy eighties  sound and really lame vocals.  Also, it's not a progressive rock style - it's very much a poppy 4/4 formula.  I enjoyed it though.  The instrumental "Cliffs of Dover" is worth checking out.

Support Independents

 

From the October 14th Downtown Music Gallery newsletter:

The King is Dead! God save Jimi Hendrix!

It's TRULY DISGUSTING that the two-faced major record companies scratch their heads in public, lamenting the continuing mass disappearance of the traditional mom'n'pop record stores, and pretending to try to stem the tide with their piddling 'Record Store Day' campaigns [an excuse to peddle mostly vapid one-day-only collectors' items], whilst all the while the same publicly outspoken executives freely allow their distribution warehouses to sell to the public at BELOW THE PRICES THE SAME ORGANIZATIONS ARE WHOLESALING TO THE STORES they're supposedly trying to save, and make deals with major franchises for exclusive editions of products that most retailers have no access to, and the true collector would not want these lesser editions they foist on us. And then they wonder why they're losing overall wholesale sales; wonder why giants like EMI are about to go into receivership??? JUDAS PRIEST, indeed!!!

Latest Case in point? The new Hendrix Winterland 4 CD box - which we could only offer with a meager profit at $45 [IF we chose to carry it, which we won't], while meanwhile you can buy an exclusive 5 CD version from Amazon AT BELOW what the 4CD version costs stores!!!

We won't carry it, knowing it is cheating our customers in more ways than one, and some of those ways would force us to look like we're the one doing the cheating of our clientele!

Some context:  I did a quick check and as of now (late December), this 5 CD package costs $40 on Amazon, which includes free shipping.  The Downtown Music Gallery is a tiny shop founded, owned and run by Bruce Lee Gallanter tucked in a basement in Lower East Manhattan.  For a tiny shop, they have the most incredible selection I've ever seen, specializing in underground jazz, avant-garde, contemporary classical, and rare CDs and LPs.  They also have the entire Tzadik catalog in one display.  We need to support shops like this.  And this means *gasp* buying CDs at reasonable prices.  I'll talk more about the fascinating empire of Amazon -- meanwhile check out and buy something from DMG (the relatively primitive and bare-bones website with its email/phone ordering system really puts things into perspective - namely how utterly creepy Amazon can be with their one-click purchase functions and recommendation algorithms).

Allan Holdsworth | 0274

Allan Holdsworth - Sixteen Men of Tain (Eidolon Efformation)

I've fallen in love with the first track on this album, "0274".  The tune itself is basically a string of chords played on guitar and synth, accompanied by acoustic bass and drums.  I especially love Gary Novak's drumming on this.  This is followed by a mesmerizing liquid guitar solo - one that sort of defines Holdsworth's playing, and a surprise trumpet solo by Walt Fowler.

Again, this entire album is fantastic - my personal favorite of Holdsworth's.  He sort of nailed the perfect combination for himself: those strange and airy chords that he likes to explore and soar through with his solos, accompanied by the luscious sound of an acoustic bass.  The latter is the magic ingredient, as I'm not a fan of the post-Jaco rock-fusion electric bass sound on most of his recordings.  He hasn't released an album since.  I sort of hope the next one continues the sound he achieved here.


"0274" (from 1999's Sixteen Men of Tain)


This is an example of the "post-Jaco" bass that I'm not crazy about (although I love Holdsworth's playing on this):

"Peril Premonition" (from 1989's Secrets)

The Sixteen Men Of Tain:

Ikue Mori & Oval: More w/ Less

These are two albums from two unique computer musicians who like to do more with less.


Ikue Mori - Labyrinth (Tzadik)

A fantastic collection of song-length (averaging between 3 and 5 minutes) pieces, mostly comprised of heavily processed percussion samples.  For anyone curious about her methods, there's a nice short interview with her at the Squid's Ear.  She explains her evolution from a live drummer moving on to drum machines, and then finally arriving at a laptop.  Interesting to note that most of her sounds are taken from her old drum machines rather than sampled from acoustic sources.  This is also what I love most about this record: she limits herself to the use of electronic drums and really hones a unique and playful aesthetic.  Unlike other electronic artists like Lithops, early Oval (see below), Richard Devine, Pimmon, and Autechre, who seem to go to great lengths to obscure the origin of their sounds and sources, her techniques are more straightforward and in many ways much more enjoyable to listen to.  Also, there's a wonderful written piece of hers included on Arcana Vol 1, where she describes her approach to sound design as if she were sharing a food recipe.

"Day of Locusts"

---

Oval - O (Thrill Jockey)

His first record in quite a while might also be my personal favorite.  The entire album uses a very similar approach:  layers mangled guitar-like sounds that glitch and pop wildly over beautiful chords.  There's a very natural feel to this album, almost like an "Oval goes acoustic" project, which, strangely enough, is somewhat true.  The description on Thrill Jockey's website is pretty illuminating:  As someone who, at points in his career, seemed more interested in his methods rather than the resulting music (deliberately scratching cds and using their unpredictable loop-points as a foundation, developing extremely custom and bizarre software, etc.), he apparently scaled down his methods dramatically for this album, using only a stock PC with its included music software and tried to push those limitations to its boundaries.  What's intriguing about this is that it still sounds very much like an Oval album, but stripped down to its essential components.  His sonic vocabulary is very limited, but he manages to achieve a similar aesthetic as Ovalprocess or SO with the unpredictable glitch and whirlwinds of harsh noise coddled by warm drones and semblances of melody.  I especially like the 2nd disc, which is a collection of 50 1-minute "ringtones" that uses the same sound source (a weird acoustic guitar hybrid) in creatively concise variations.
My only complaint is that for many tracks on the first disc, he incorporates very fake-sounding drum sounds playing very generic-sounding drum beats (the kind of drumbeats one might encounter on a cheap keyboard with pre-programmed play-along tracks).  This was most likely intentional, and it has grown on me a bit after a few listens, but it still catches me off guard everytime.

This is an example of Oval around circa 2000:
"04" (from OVALPROCESS) 

Here is an excerpt from 2010's O:
"Panorama"

Jazz Conversation with Jim Hall

Peter Evans: Post-Bop Meets Post-Classical

I saw these guys (sans computer) a few months ago at a tiny venue in Brooklyn called iBeam.  It's Peter Evans on trumpet, Carlos Horns on piano, Tom Blancarte on bass, and the amazing Jim Black on drums.  They played a mind-blowing set of futuristic post-post-bop and avant-garde improv set to these ultra-modern classical-esque arrangements.  Peter Evans is one of the most technically astonishing trumpet players I've ever heard.  He has flawless classical chops, an impressive range, and an immense vocabulary of extended techniques and noises.  Also, he writes absurdly ambitious and difficult arrangements that the group executes without much stress.
I finally picked up his album Ghosts, which also includes fifth member Sam Pluta on computer.  His contributions range a wide gamut of approaches.  At some points, he records the other members in real time, spiting it back and heavily manipulating it; at other times, he's throwing out shards of pure sound and glitch during the noisy and abstract portions; sometimes he's merely adding various effects and delays to the instruments; and occasionally he takes a standard DJ role and plays samples in the background.
I will say that at times the computer can be too much, and things get too cluttered and distracting.  Also, it can obscure the impressive musicianship of the acoustic musicians.  There was one point at the iBeam performance where Peter was circular-breathing a single note while the others were engaged in some ferocious free-jazz, making for a compelling contrast.  However, during the same piece on disc, Peter is being soaked with delays and electronic harmonizations to the point where the entire band sounds like a big atonal mush.  But, by and large his contributions are very fascinating, and this record is highly recommended.

This is their rendition of the old Victor Young standard, "I Don't Stand a Ghost of a Chance With You".  If you listen closely, you can hear what sounds like an old record of the same tune wafting in and out of the background.
"Ghost"

This is the beginning of the improv section to "323":

"323"


Here are some examples of Peter's arrangement style:
"Articulation"

"Chorales"

Marc Ducret | Rampe

From Tim Berne's Souls Saved Hear (2004). This is a Ducret original for the trio Big Satan with Tom Rainey on drums.

I love the raw Fender Strat tone that Marc uses on this. It seems as though most modern jazz guitarists today are unsatisfied by their natural guitar sound and like to muffle it either by using the neck pickup with the tone knob way down (Jim Hall, Pat Metheny), maxing it out with compression/distortion (Kurt Rosenwinkel, Allan Holdsworth, early Bill Frisell), or drenching it with muddy chorusing (John Scofield, early John Abercrombie). I understand this appeal: they try to get away from the twangy/folky sound associated with country and rock, and instead want to better resemble a horn. However, Ducret's sound is very exhilarating to me.

I can't imagine Ducret's tone working within a traditional hard-bop context, but I love what he does on this album. It sounds like he's using a Strat playing through an overdriven mid-sized amplifier, although I think I hear some light chorusing. I apologize for the sound quality of the clip below -- it's a copy of a copy of a copy, so the compression has rendered the drums to a blob.

"Rampe"