MELOCHE / ARCHER / ROBAIR / HODNETT – The Sincerity Of Light
Discus: Discus68CD
Chris Meloche: electronics, guitar; Martin Archer: electronics, keyboards, woodwind; Gino Robair: electronics, percussion; Lyn Hodnett: voice
Canadian guitarist Meloche is a regular visitor to the UK and often hooks up with Archer for gigs and musical experiments. For example, Meloche and Archer feature on the glorious 2006 Outward Sound Ensemble’s ‘Thunder in a clear sky’. In 2016, Meloche left a CD with some ethereal loops and drones that he had been developing and this forms the basis of the three pieces on this set. Archer contacted US percussionist Robair to see about a trio performance. Robair sent back a recording of electronics and percussion pieces of his own. From these, Archer assembled the background to the three parts on this CD. Knowing that the various noises were created artificially doesn’t prepare you for how lifelike the sounds are on the first and third tracks, much as if what you are listening to are recordings of birds, insects and animals in some tropical rainforest. This organic nature of the sounds is played with and emphasised by Archer’s woodwind and Hodnett’s high frequency vocal improvisations. The second track struck me as sounding very much like a slowed down version of dub Reggae, with echoey horns and a teeth-shaking bass line (although, here too, the electronics produced noises of an organic rather than artificial nature).
Martin Archer’s press release provides a neat description of how he responded to the mix of Meloche’s sustained drones and Robair’s percussive electronics, and how he set up his equipment so that the sounds of the woodwind instruments are translated through a midi converter to trigger a ‘cloud’ of recordings of Hodnett’s vocals improvisations. If you’re still with me so far, then this is definitely a CD you’ll like as much as I do. There is, of course, a challenge in detecting the source of the various sounds that are merged together – but there is far more pleasure in simply letting the wash of sounds work their magic. Archer’s intention was to create a set of pieces that could be performed live – this would, I think, be spell-binding and definitely the sort of thing that would take centre stage at a festival like Supersonic.
Reviewed by Chris Baber
Discus: Discus68CD
Chris Meloche: electronics, guitar; Martin Archer: electronics, keyboards, woodwind; Gino Robair: electronics, percussion; Lyn Hodnett: voice
Canadian guitarist Meloche is a regular visitor to the UK and often hooks up with Archer for gigs and musical experiments. For example, Meloche and Archer feature on the glorious 2006 Outward Sound Ensemble’s ‘Thunder in a clear sky’. In 2016, Meloche left a CD with some ethereal loops and drones that he had been developing and this forms the basis of the three pieces on this set. Archer contacted US percussionist Robair to see about a trio performance. Robair sent back a recording of electronics and percussion pieces of his own. From these, Archer assembled the background to the three parts on this CD. Knowing that the various noises were created artificially doesn’t prepare you for how lifelike the sounds are on the first and third tracks, much as if what you are listening to are recordings of birds, insects and animals in some tropical rainforest. This organic nature of the sounds is played with and emphasised by Archer’s woodwind and Hodnett’s high frequency vocal improvisations. The second track struck me as sounding very much like a slowed down version of dub Reggae, with echoey horns and a teeth-shaking bass line (although, here too, the electronics produced noises of an organic rather than artificial nature).
Martin Archer’s press release provides a neat description of how he responded to the mix of Meloche’s sustained drones and Robair’s percussive electronics, and how he set up his equipment so that the sounds of the woodwind instruments are translated through a midi converter to trigger a ‘cloud’ of recordings of Hodnett’s vocals improvisations. If you’re still with me so far, then this is definitely a CD you’ll like as much as I do. There is, of course, a challenge in detecting the source of the various sounds that are merged together – but there is far more pleasure in simply letting the wash of sounds work their magic. Archer’s intention was to create a set of pieces that could be performed live – this would, I think, be spell-binding and definitely the sort of thing that would take centre stage at a festival like Supersonic.
Reviewed by Chris Baber
