| $25.21
new to stock as of
may 25th, 2010
threads:
guitar-themed
electro-acoustic-improvisation
experimental-instruments
digital-musics
live-electronic
| | |
| | | thin wrist (usa) #tw-la lp kevin drumm “self-titled” double long playing record set - untitled (1) (7:36)
- untitled (2) (3:03)
- untitled (3) (9:57)
- untitled (4) (5:28)
- untitled (5) (9:47)
- untitled (6) (3:41)
- untitled (7) (17:09)
- untitled (8) (8:24)
- untitled (9) (11:17)
| may 2010 release ; out-of-seemingly-nowhere & absurdly production-value-oriented double-vinyl reissue of kevin drumm’s watershed debut full-length, replete with a newly-discovered set of era pieces released here for the first time (an entire new sidesworth of pointillist crackle !!! listen to the sound-sample for a taste) ...
regarding the music ::
... classic 1997 release, featuring “guitar”, “recorded directly to tape in fall, 1996” ...
upon its release (and even now, still, to some extent) this was a divisive title, not quite fitting in w/ the time’s reigning “lowercase” aesthetic, nor the harsh noise, metal, or digital music scenes with which kevin eventually found allegiance ... consisting instead of scrabbly figures run through an upper-threshold gate, then processed with heavy filtering and gain-based effects. there are certainly parallels between some of the harsher segments of “sheer hellish miasma” ; the final track’s 17 minutes of glacial drift hedged with at first subliminal, then overbearing dat-tape distortions reminds of some of his more recent collaborative work ...
a great album, a challenge for sure, but i’m amazed at how much more permissive we’ve all become to what was undoubtedly the most “out-there” thing any of us had ever heard back in ‘97 ... |
... comes in a (frankly, incredible looking / feeling) embossed glossy gatefold sleeve with new artwork (wax-damaged macro-images of the guitar used to ... generate this music) with two separate double-sided inserts (detailed below) ; plus, and i know this is like stroking a charged mare at this point, but the reference-quality cut c/o dubplates & mastering’s rachad becker is beyond good, revealing detail that i hadn’t even noticed in the digital 1/1 cd version ...
high praise to both c. spencer yeh for the vision to press this “un-cuttable” music to wax & peter kolovos for the epic “archival quality” realization ... highly recommended !!! |
| | thin wrist press release... |
|
thin wrist recordings presents the expanded and definitive double lp edition of kevin drumm's groundbreaking first album, originally released in 1997. featuring some of the most fiercely abstract and organic guitar work ever heard, drumm's debut is both jarring and completely alien. dubbed by some as the greatest prepared guitar record ever recorded it prefigured (and continues to trump) almost an entire decade or so of contemporary "out" music that would follow. beautiful and completely essential.
this edition includes an entire fourth side of previously unreleased recordings from drumm's personal archive, all recorded in the same era as the original album. it also includes entirely new artwork featuring the body of the actual guitar used to record the album.
the album comes housed in a heavy textured gatefold jacket and includes two full color inserts. high quality 2 x 180 gram vinyl pressed at pallas germany and mastered by rashad becker at d&m berlin.
looking back at kevin through his formidably individual tunnel of works, it's hard to remember that his first official recorded statement would be caught sneaking into bed alongside history's milestones of "solo instrument improvisation." or that, in turn, it also would be caught trying to sneak out of the house built by father jazz, into a backyard that still hasn't quite been fenced off yet. those running around chicago chasing down the sound in the mid-90's should've already known about this guy and his contributions both in and out of the relative spotlight. for those far from the city winds, thankfully they might've gotten the message in the form of this missive. in the afterglow of later love letters titled “sheer hellish miasma” and “imperial distortion”, it's absolutely overdue that this first musty green postcard be dug out, polished off, and framed.
judged by its understated title, "self-titled" aka "guitar" is incredibly literal -- what you hear is what you get. in the simplest considerations, the ensuing connotations and possibilities are wide open; the real-time velocity of urgent decision and movement are wrapped in a clearly-mapped compositional endurance that continues to stand firmly in the relative spotlights of this day. no surprise then, that even all these years later, we would still be trying to figure out exactly at which table kevin should squarely sit.
they say that every kid who heard this record immediately went out and grabbed a busted guitar with a scratchy selector switch, ready to subject their friends to fuzzy pauses of amp hum. i know of at least four.
-- c. spencer yeh, spring 2010, brooklyn ny |
 |
|
|
