It’s not essential that you understand very much about how a piece of music was made, to enjoy listening to it. Whatever myriad of factors the music may have been exposed to, on some basic level, all that matters is what comes out your speakers, and what’s channelled through your ears.
I’ve always deliberately tried not to delve into the overtly technical or musical side of things. I don’t want to listen to music to unpick its inner workings. Not focusing on what effect pedal, tuning, software, or what the lyrics necessarily are, this mystery all just adds to a sense of initial magic. These aspects might slowly reveal some gentle curiosity as my interest grows, but I’ve always been fascinated by music that at least initially works at face value.
I just want to be a listener, completely open to whatever I hear.
So naturally, exploring more experimental music quickly leads towards all sorts of complex and beguiling listens. I’m quickly, extremely far from home…
Just intonation regularly gets mentioned and Terry Riley’s Shri Camel, was my first encounter with this tuning system, as a teenager. Whilst it was clear this music was constructed differently; my background research quickly hit a wall of numbers and equations beyond my understanding. I didn’t need to understand this – but just adored the strange directions these sounds pushed and pulled my brain.
Around this time John Zorn’s Tzadik label became huge for me, and Arnold Dreyblatt’s Animal Magnetism was one title I worked hard to track down, in the pre-internet and student budget days. A recording of a tight ensemble playing hugely dynamic, pulsing, driven, exhilarating music and naturally all constructed in just intonation. Not much later Dexter’s Cigars reissued Dreyblatt’s even earlier Nodal Excitation (billed wonderfully as The Orchestra of Excited Strings) which was a far more stripped back, and fundamental block of weirdly intoxicating sound.
Horse Lords, a four piece from Baltimore are a later-day band broadly built on the foundations of Dreyblatt’s work, as well as other avant-garde luminaries. Over a growing stack of releases, their technical abilities and knowledge has translated into breathtakingly animated, living, breathing avant rock. Solo projects like Owen Gardner’s stunning Sammmusik, or Max Eilbacher’s equally superb 7 runs (in arc mental styling) as further examples of the sky-high quality of their output.
So, it would be fair to assume that a creative summit between Dreyblatt and Horse Lords immediately forms and sparks in your imagination. As part of RVNG’s stunning series of albums pairing older artists with younger, that share a sonic and cosmic compatibility, hence – FRKWYS Vol. 18: Extended Field.
Over 4 tracks and 40 minutes, Extended Field is a meshing and interweaving of Dreyblatt’s and Horse Lords laser sharp sounds.
The opener, Advance is a slowly intensifying fade-in. Strings buzz and shimmer, before drummed and metallic elements flood in. The music is both speeding up and stretching as it eventually dissolves into a sublime shaking wobbliness.
Immediately, the title track Extended Field is locked into a bristling grid of trumpet, guitar and drums. Patterns rise; sound fits into the spaces around other sounds. Everything is in a cycle of both changing and remaining static. It’s clear over time, this fizzing ball of music is spinning like a 3-dimensional form. Things get more abrasive, funkier and louder as your reach a pure form of head nodding bliss.
Suspension is the sound of everything boiled into a single shard in endless transition. A time-lagged sunbeam, a thread of carbon fibre, soul and mathematics, all rendered in pinpoint accuracy. Sound handled by experts, but released into the air like magic.
The closer, Impulse Array goes even further, a joyous procession tumbling into a cubist barn dance. Electronic sparkles soar before the whole thing eventually tumbles into a fire balling layer after layer of spiralling, dancing beauty.
In the dozens of times we’ve listen to Extended Field, it’s that strange but clear sense this music ticks a fundamental box. This is music that revels in the purest of joy, it’s not about anything other than itself. How various instruments, players and chunks of music can be the same and different in any given moment. An entire environment that is only drawn in forms that dissolve and talk to each other – a democracy in sound.
Extended Field is clearly rooted in a deeply academic form of sonic handling. But like both Dreyblatt’s and Horse Lords work, as they have already proven countless times, it’s also the gateway to music that’s utterly human, and never less than spectacular.
A Venn diagram of excellence.
Extended Field is out now on RVNG Intl. on vinyl and digtal here and here
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