NICK STORRING - My Magic Dreams Have Lost Their Spell
Orange Milk Records
Nick Storring: electric cello, acoustic cello, violin, acoustic guitar, electric bass, electric mandola, hammered dulcimer, harpsicle, strumstick, sarangi, Yamaha CP60M stage piano, Fender Rhodes Seventy Three, Hohner clavinet D6, Hohner Pianet-T, toy pianos, toy balaphone, toy gamelan, glockenspiel, hand bells, singing bowls, melodica, harmonica, harmonium, tuning reeds, various flutes, xaphoon, Hulusi, Yamaha Venova, Nuvo DooD clarinet, practice bagpipe chanter, drums, percussion, found junk, voice, electromechanical treatment (spring reverb, talkbox, amps, tranducers).
Recorded in his home between 2014-2018. Mastered by Sandro Perri in winter 2019.
Since the turn of this decade, Storring has been architecting (this words seems somehow more appropriate than simply composing or recording) multi-layered soundscapes. A glance at the list of instruments at the top of this review gives an idea of the vast array of sources that he uses (I particularly like the reference to ‘found junk’ – because to a non-musician like me, much of the list felt like it could have fallen into the same category). To get an idea of his process, he tells us that to get the sounds of the strings on track 2, ‘Pretending you and I’, to an acceptable standard he mixed “ten overdubs of my acoustic cello on each part plus another ten of me playing the same material on my electric cello, plugged in direct”. This was from an ohestee page - https://www.ohestee.com/features/track-by-track/track-by-track-nick-storring-my-magic-dreams-have-lost-their-spell/ - which I stumbled on after spend many minutes tracking down the titles on this album. Each piece is named after a fragment of lyric from songs recorded by Roberta Flack. So, for example, the opening piece is called ‘Tides that defeat identity’ (which comes from the Stevie Wonder composed ‘I can see the sun in late December’). I won’t spoil the pleasure of uncovering the sources of the other titles here. But you can immediately guess two things from this. First, the phrases that he has chosen to name each piece carry with them a sense of cryptic poetry. Second, that the translation from the original lyrics to the song titles is one of extreme excision, to such an extent that the original song is lost. Not only this, the process of layering sounds creates patterns that bear little direct resemblance to either the mood or style of the original songs – so this is not a covers album. But what has been produced through this painstaking sculpture is an immersive and wholly engaging tribute to one of his musical heroines. Hopefully he will take in good spirit that listening to his tunes encouraged me to spend the evening listening to my own vinyl copies of Roberta Flack albums.
Reviewed by Chris Baber
Orange Milk Records
Nick Storring: electric cello, acoustic cello, violin, acoustic guitar, electric bass, electric mandola, hammered dulcimer, harpsicle, strumstick, sarangi, Yamaha CP60M stage piano, Fender Rhodes Seventy Three, Hohner clavinet D6, Hohner Pianet-T, toy pianos, toy balaphone, toy gamelan, glockenspiel, hand bells, singing bowls, melodica, harmonica, harmonium, tuning reeds, various flutes, xaphoon, Hulusi, Yamaha Venova, Nuvo DooD clarinet, practice bagpipe chanter, drums, percussion, found junk, voice, electromechanical treatment (spring reverb, talkbox, amps, tranducers).
Recorded in his home between 2014-2018. Mastered by Sandro Perri in winter 2019.
Since the turn of this decade, Storring has been architecting (this words seems somehow more appropriate than simply composing or recording) multi-layered soundscapes. A glance at the list of instruments at the top of this review gives an idea of the vast array of sources that he uses (I particularly like the reference to ‘found junk’ – because to a non-musician like me, much of the list felt like it could have fallen into the same category). To get an idea of his process, he tells us that to get the sounds of the strings on track 2, ‘Pretending you and I’, to an acceptable standard he mixed “ten overdubs of my acoustic cello on each part plus another ten of me playing the same material on my electric cello, plugged in direct”. This was from an ohestee page - https://www.ohestee.com/features/track-by-track/track-by-track-nick-storring-my-magic-dreams-have-lost-their-spell/ - which I stumbled on after spend many minutes tracking down the titles on this album. Each piece is named after a fragment of lyric from songs recorded by Roberta Flack. So, for example, the opening piece is called ‘Tides that defeat identity’ (which comes from the Stevie Wonder composed ‘I can see the sun in late December’). I won’t spoil the pleasure of uncovering the sources of the other titles here. But you can immediately guess two things from this. First, the phrases that he has chosen to name each piece carry with them a sense of cryptic poetry. Second, that the translation from the original lyrics to the song titles is one of extreme excision, to such an extent that the original song is lost. Not only this, the process of layering sounds creates patterns that bear little direct resemblance to either the mood or style of the original songs – so this is not a covers album. But what has been produced through this painstaking sculpture is an immersive and wholly engaging tribute to one of his musical heroines. Hopefully he will take in good spirit that listening to his tunes encouraged me to spend the evening listening to my own vinyl copies of Roberta Flack albums.
Reviewed by Chris Baber
