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In two words, it's a matter between minimalism and ambient + the rhythmic alphabet of the most abstract Can + Cluster and Eno when transitioning to a gaseous state.
Ah, there's even the penguin peeking out.
…
So for the Quieto, this is the album of the year and, as we know, the Quieto only features stuff quite far from any rock idea.
Rock, go figure…
Rock mostly rehashes or recycles, but it's also true that right now in the background, while I'm writing, I have the latest Chelsea Wolfe, a pretty good album, in my opinion...
And anyway, let's say that for me it's not so much the album itself, but those guys; please, go on YouTube and watch how they perform live.
You'll see ordinary guys doing strange things with their instruments, in a circle, with the audience also in a circle.
You'll see that strange magic, between improvisation and control, of those who guide the sound and are simultaneously guided by it.
Silence, concentration, trance. Words spoken without any pompousness. This isn't people showing off; they seem more like workers at their jobs than musicians, or eternal children playing.
Well, listening to the album, you won't be able to see them.
...
In decalogue form
(One) Build a machine to chase away evil spirits and one to catch dreams.
(Two) Take a guitar and do everything that one usually doesn't.
(Three) Write the number and formula on the blackboard, empty your pockets, find the hidden sound.
(Four) Keep in mind that out of ten parts, nine are science, and one is magic.
(Five) Find a musical phrase, multiply by two by three by five.
(Six) Divide everything into small parts, rub two sticks together to create a spark.
(Seven) Think of all those words that start with an M, meditation, mercury, murmur...
(Eight) Accept the purposelessness of sound as the deepest mystery.
(Nine) Find a suitable name for the need, the penguin is already taken, Easter Island isn't.
(Ten) “Children play, adults joke.”
...
“Northen” is an interlocking between geometry and clouds, a mirror game inside a tidy room, the blue sky when space opens.
Sometimes the rhythm comes from all sides, sometimes you close your eyes for a moment. When everything flows, you might see the abstract side of things.
And so decades of listening and dreaming come to mind, an almost hypnotic affair.
…
Ah, these guys are complete alchemists, eggheads with brains that spark sparks, if not outright explosions and firecrackers.
The guitars, for instance, they don't use them like we normal folks do, oh no! They lay them horizontal and hit them with sticks, knitting needles, and mallets. Stuff that sounds like a kind of mechanical rain, or oriental chimes, all a bouncing on the glass, just so you know, all a jingling.
Not to mention all those invented instruments, for example, the strange robotic arms that dance on the guitar strings and kind of do whatever they want…
...or that funny middle ground between a banjo and a typewriter, stuff that would have made my technical applications teacher go nuts.
Finally, throw in the wind...
…
Yes, exactly, the wind...
With a pole, two silver bowls, and three fishing lines, our little wizards built an Aeolian harp and placed it on the roof of the tallest building in Liverpool with a recorder next to it.
And it reminds me of La Monte Young when he was perched on large oil tanks where he listened, rapt, to the sound of about twenty transformers from the nearby power plant.
It must be nice to capture the wind and blow it over that thing we call music…
…
Finally, I'll tell you that the album is almost entirely instrumental. The only voices are played through the speakers of a smartphone and then amplified by the guitar pickups. The result resembles a robotic auto-tune, and the quieto says it's moving stuff…
Trallallà...
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