Prima Materia
The Tail Of The Tiger

THE REVIEW

Perhaps having some theoretical connection with the more or less contemporary conceptual art, the performative frenzy of some of the unusual formations of those times (I'm talking about the '60s-'70s), if it added value to unrepeatable and irreplicable acts by making them unique over time, it makes it decidedly difficult to get a chance to hear them in 2012.

Luckily, an Italian label decided in 1977 to give physical form to these drones. Because they are drones (the collective was even born in 1973!), frighteningly similar to the "modern" ones of today, if it weren't for the small detail of being composed solely of overlapping voices - having listened to the record without knowing it, you would have been surprised, they seem like simple samples. The members of the group indeed, thanks to meditation or some particular concentration technique, were able to sustain breath for quite long periods (we're talking about tens of minutes, uninterruptedly); with great technical skill, moreover, covering each other, these voices, male and female, manage to produce decidedly powerful natural harmonics (the so-called Tartini tones: by playing notes at fifth intervals, in this case, G -key- and D or C, the human ear perceives a wave of amplitude equal to the subtraction of the two notes played... in practice a third self-generated note of a lower octave, the same that can be obtained in a large closed room by singing fifths from the four corners).

Working the diaphragm and pressing on the throat passionately. The heart of the pieces is thus in the resonances, in the very slow superimpositions borrowed from North-Indian/Tibetan singing, which make everything extremely evocative. Even if only for the fact that Prima Materia are Italian... let's be proud. And maybe let's listen to them as well.