John Hassell/Brian Eno "Fourth World Vol. 1 - Possible Musics" CD (Editions EG): Scott Foust called this "superbly creamy and the perfect music for a hot night" in Swill Radio's recent update. We're hitting the hottest days of the summer in early September in Pennsy which is fucking atrocious, but anyway I needed some music to make it all better. I've always associated Eno discs with the library, so I trotted over and sure enough they had this. I've never tried to penetrate any of Eno's work before. An old roommate would always play some album by him, or at least a song, that was just a flurry of baby chicks tweeting. Drove me nuts, haha, and I wrote him off! Actually, I do own "The BBC Sessions" bootleg LP that Il Cane Lento released, but that's rock 'n' roll - and really good too.
The disc itself is rather disorienting, but in a slow and subtle method. Percussion is soft and constant, but the fogginess of the album convinces me its sporadic. Vocals, that could be male or female, are disembodied through effects and become something closer to a flute playing lackadaisically. Or maybe that's a synth? What is obviously a synth holds a similar space – that "lazer wind" noise that only works sometimes. And it does here. The "hot night" association is correct though. There's a presence of sticky, humid equatorial breezes happening during the whole album. The sinuses are thickening up, the sweat is rolling out of all the pores, the raised temperature in the brain making everything a little hazy, spirits entering the mind. Almost like a strange world music made up of all the "wrong" instruments. It's a pretty interesting and enjoyable listen. I think I'll savor this one for some time before I try anything else by Eno.
Michael Francis Duch "Tomba Emmanuelle" LP (Sofa): There must be some great power emanating throughout the Emanuel Vigeland's mausoleum. This doesn't even touch the surface of performers there, but I feel privileged to have heard this LP as well as Huntsville's "Past Increasing Future Receding" LP and Nicola Vinciguerra's "Plays Tomba Emmanuelle". Each of these three offer sounds of immense expansiveness (redundant, yes, but...). MFC's offering is the most monosyllabic of the bunch, but this does not mean the most mundane. Instead, I would say it captures the atmosphere (admittedly I've never been there – I'm going on assumption) more accurately than the others I've mentioned. A solo double-bass drones for the first half of the LP, somehow replicating itself constantly through the reverb in the room. It becomes a trio, but through only one hand. The natural acoustics of the instrument seem to fade away for the greater part of the whole album and we are left with something otherworldly. I could easily be convinced this were an Eleh recording at various points. I cannot even begin to fathom the melding of these sounds with the drab and overwhelming paintings that cover the whole space. The high ceilings swallowing up an ocean of sounds and relaying them back to the hearing field with a new, fascinating presence. Almost as if they've exited this sphere briefly, to visit the figures in the walls while being given new life. I sense a lot of thoughts on death and temporality being unavoidable were you to witness this. Listening to the record isn't too far in and of itself.
