1. |
Dyscalculia
07:05
|
|||
|
I have struggled with dealing with numbers throughout my life. In retrospect, it seems like I have attempted to work my way out of (or around?) this challenge by making up musical 'numbers' games, or exercises, for myself.
The main theme of this song is one of those exercises, involving 12-tone counter lines for bass and melody (or right and left hand) in 15 beat cycles. The contrasting aggressive and more grooving sections reflect the initial frustrations of trying to keep the numbers from dancing in my head, and then learning to just let go and let them dance.
–devin hoff
|
||||
2. |
Echolocation
06:44
|
|||
|
This was written mainly during spring 2020, the first outbreak of COVID. I had spent the previous few years gigging hard and playing mostly pretty dense, “complex” music, a lot of it atonal or atonal-ish, a lot of it involving difficult charts. All of a sudden that seemed too busy, too obsessed with technique, and emotionally un-relatable in this time of slowed-down apocalypse. I spent a few months that spring in LA, and went for long walks and drives out of town since there wasn’t much else possible. Due to both the conditions of the pandemic, and the spaciousness of the western landscape, I started to hear things differently. Long gestures and ideas, repetition, and deeper attention to tonal harmony/big resonant chords with intense blues/country type bends, all became more important to me.
I think of this as an Americana tune… not in the corny/idealizing sense, but in the sense that it’s rooted in American music, people, and landscapes— the good, the brutal, all of it.
References: Ask the Ages-type Pharoah Sanders + Sonny Sharrock, David Torn, Earth/Dylan Carlson esp. The Bees Made Honey in the Lion’s Skull, Alice Coltrane's Kirtan:Turiya Sings
–Ava Mendoza
|
||||
3. |
Interwhining
06:50
|
|||
|
A forest or jungle has many beautiful trees and vines that twine around each other, or intertwine. A music scene has many musicians that whine around each other, or interwhine! When people get together and complain in a way that eggs each other on relentlessly, I call it Interwhining. The tune has sometimes 2, sometimes 3, separate lines that interlock and writhe around each other in this way.
On the melody (starting 1 minute in), sax and guit start in unison playing a descending, loosely diminished line. And then in counterpoint, they play an ascending, loosely whole tone line. This repeats. “This guy did this thing” they both agree descending. Followed by two independent, simultaneous ascending complaints “And then he did this other thing too afterward!” at the same time as “But this festival did this even more messed up thing!”
References: James Blood Ulmer, RSJ's Decoding Society, Betty Davis
–Ava Mendoza
|
||||
4. |
Babel-17
05:44
|
|||
|
Babel–17 is named for the novel by Samuel Delany which, to oversimplify it greatly, deals with the powers of language. Spoken and written language can be beneficial as well as dangerous, and inevitably alters our consciousness by giving us the words we think with. Music is arguably a language with similar powers to shape how we think and feel.
Musically this is based on layers of 12-tone melodies, or sentences, which follow a 5 note (quintuplet) cue to snap into a gestural, harmolodically-influenced bassline-as-melody. The contrasting tempos of the solo sections reflect the implications of the previously stated quintuplet line, used as a cue by the soloist that they are wrapping up their remarks.
–devin hoff
|
||||
5. |
New Ghosts
05:01
|
|||
|
New ghosts are always being born, as people die. This tune is to welcome, mourn, celebrate, remember, and otherwise honor them.
The tune features two simple melodies, each of them kind of a tone row that is played 2-3x with some ornaments/variation. The improvising is totally open. My improv approach is to extrapolate on the tone rows, mostly in an intervallic way.
References: Albert Ayler, Dylan Carlson/Earth, Interstellar Space-era Coltrane, Bill Orcutt
–Ava Mendoza
|
||||
6. |
Diablada
04:44
|
|||
|
The title comes from a folk dance that happens at Bolivian carnival every year... performers dressed as devils dance and act out a fight.
In Andean culture, the devil is often celebrated/honored, and isn’t considered to be simply “evil” in the traditional Christian sense. Thru religious syncretism, the Christian devil mixed with several Andean— Inca and pre-Inca— deities. Anchancha (Aymara), Muki (Quechua), and Tiw (Uru) are a few of these. All of them have to do with the underworld, and literally with being inside the earth. Because of this, they rule the mines and mining towns, which were/are a huge part of Bolivia. El Tio is the modern-day deity of the mines, and he combines aspects of the devil and the other deities just mentioned.
The Diablada comes from the mining regions of the country—Oruro and around northern Potosi. My great-grandma came from a mining family in this area, and the folklore has always felt close to home.
The tune is the spirit of the dancing, playing, fighting devils/spirits with underground superpowers, filtered thru my Ornette Coleman/Ronald Shannon Jackson Decoding Society type lens. I should note that there is traditional music that goes along with the Diablada, but the tune doesn’t really reference it.
We play the head once with sax + guit unison on the melody. The 2nd time, I play the melody and James improvises at the same time. I wouldn’t call it a solo necessarily, but he creates an improvised counterpoint to the head. Both the head melody and my guit solo start modally, and then veer off from there into a more harmolodic approach.
Additional References: Betty Davis, Mulatu Astatke
–Ava Mendoza
|
||||
7. |
The Stumble
06:52
|
|||
|
The Stumble reflects my fascination (as do all of the pieces I contributed to this record) with how the influences of visceral post-punk or extreme rock music interact with those of electrified avant-garde jazz, or 'free funk'. Growing up listening to groups like Kira- and Bill-era Black Flag, Ronald Shannon Jackson’s Decoding Society, Prime Time, and Unwound gave me so much inspiration and a life-long love of the sense of daring and excitement in these various and complimentary sounds. This is by no means uncharted territory, but deeply personal and aspirational for me nonetheless.
Musically it is just a whole tone-y 7/4 ostinato with an altered melody on top, in a humble homage to some of Thelonious Monk’s ‘simpler’ songs.
–devin hoff
|
||||
8. |
Ten Forward
06:09
|
|||
|
Ten Forward is of course another sci-fi nod, this time just a couple of ostinatos in 5 (or 10 ;) for us all to dance or jump around to as we seek new life (or new lives).
Alternatively: dystopian party music.
–devin hoff
|
||||
If you like Echolocation, you may also like:
Erang’s dungeon synth masterpiece “A Blaze in Time” comes to cassette via Dungeons Deep Records.
go to album
This Chicago (where else?) post-rock group builds wafting atmospheric ambient out of slow drums and a shimmering churn of droning guitars.
go to album
Vol. IX: Music for Cello and Nyckelharpa
by benjin
A fascinating musical conversation between the cello and its lesser-known cousin, the nyckelharpa.
go to album
Lovely, stirring folk from Portland where quiet, bare guitar provides a backdrop for gentle vocal melodies.
go to album
On the Apple Island
by Daisies Net
Composed over a 6-month period in Tasmania, Emma Stokes' latest offers contemplative, bedroom-pop reflection on illness and healing.
go to album
Twin Rocks
by Berke Can Özcan featuring Arve Henriksen & Jonah Parzen-Johnson
Istanbul-born performer and instrument-builder Berke Can Özcan returns with an album of kaleidoscopic compositions.
go to album
I Survived, It's Over
by Rich Ruth
An absorbing Americana album with rich ambient textures.
go to album
