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LP
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DAK 023LP
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"C & PM -- two adepts of improvisation again alight their paths with esoteric flame. The emotional tenor of their masterful double LP release Four Infernal Rivers (MIE 027LP) is maintained: frightful urgency blends with a kind of poised resolve, the auditory version of a thousand-yard stare from an aloof predator. The guitar based sonics in evidence here on Songs of Éliphas Lévi Zahed congeal into a monolithic viscous clarity. 'The Will' is marked by vibrant strings slowly coaxed into vocalese. A few minutes in, a trap door delay takes the listener instantly to the tripping basement, forced to navigate a respirant rug in near total darkness. Tunnel vision tiny dot of light then dilated to max. Blinding flashes of a green horizon. Fuzz plumes are heard staggering into the distance, slowly passing over the hill of setting sun. 'Astral Light' piles on the pastoral waves as it glides along the edges of a shimmering ray. These tracks have been dedicated to the legendary ceremonial magician, Éliphas Lévi, the one who illustrated the Goat of Mendes for all to see plainly. This man of constant sorrow cut his teeth in socialist circles in Paris but later focused on more obscure routes of societal impact. In one of his books, he arranged 22 chapters to match the major arcana of the tarot. Lévi brought cartomancy into the realm of Kabbalah and the larger magical tradition. In his system, the will becomes interlaced with astral light - allowing for influence from far remote locales. Another version of what was known in neo-platonic circles as the pneuma, the field of transmission for extenuated mind force. Near the end of his life, Lévi hid away a catalog of ethereal songs written in the major and minor keys of Solomon. 'The Imagination' is where magic stakes its claim. Within the mind's eye, where images can hold fast and bind the viewer. Splatter tones draw out a tumbling duel, infernal internals. Molten pickup sound but enhanced, like drinking direct from the tap of voltage control. Faith based magic -- even faith based on lies, can be efficacious." --Dave Shuford
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2LP
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MIE 027LP
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"Tom Carter and Pat Murano, two figures with decades of history behind them, offer Four Infernal Rivers, their new double long player. Four Infernal Rivers illuminates their interlocking styles in a light that blurs their individual identities. The music breathes its own life, and consistently eschews the normal meanings of its own potential descriptors. To think and act intuitively across 80 minutes in real time, without falling into boring or wasteful modes, should be taken as a remarkable accomplishment. The album title is as descriptive as it is suggestive. 'Four' is the number of tracks. Easy. 'Infernal.' It's a harder one to parse out, harder still to live up to, yet the record's hellish qualities come from the fact that it seems like it could never end. Its fiendishness stems from a tone which is consistently ominous and ever-portending. 'Rivers' is spot-on. Close your eyes, draw up an image of a river, and the music pulls instantly into focus. It's not so much a soundtrack to a film or a scene, but rather an auditory evocation of something that is ever-present. To invoke water is to invoke the most crucial ingredient of life (insofar as we describe it) on this planet. A river is one and many things, an aspect of a system larger than itself, full of majesty and terror. One need only think of the rivers of Herzog's Aguirre or Fitzcarraldo, of Conrad's Heart of Darkness or Ballard's The Day of Creation, to understand the gist of what is being presented. The rivers forged by the duo are menacing and imposing, full of risk and danger. In an age when the entire aim of underground artists seems so geared towards either mimicking or revolting directly against the tides of mainstream culture, it is nigh-impossible to know where to turn. If this record has anything to say about it, it might be that the most valid instances of possibility are to be found in adhering to no preconceived method, in swimming with a current of one's own making. It sways between an understanding of musical history and a disregard for its confines. There is interplay that doesn't apologize for or attempt to live up to anything. It is music born of elements that have always existed and still cannot be grasped. Both spacious and immediate, moments exist either to be seized or to be let go. What might in another setting play out as a tension between dissonance and melody here lives entirely outside of those concerns. There is comfort and compatibility in this music, a sense that neither player would ever step on the other's toes, while still feeling the freedom to explore whichever tributary they might come across. Ideal traveling companions, then. 'It's after the end of the world, don't you know that yet?' June Tyson asked long ago. Some of us do and some of us don't. Those of us who aren't quite sure make records like this." --Matt Krefting, Easthampton, MA, April, 2014
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LP
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KEL 014LP
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Tom Carter and Pat Murano (Decimus, No Neck Blues Band, etc.) first began to play together at the behest of Jason Meagher, to be recorded as part of his Natch series. These recordings were captured during those same sessions on March 17, 2012 up at Black Dirt Studios. Here's what Jason had to say about the session: "We could talk about an improviser's ability to listen to the other players around them and how important it is to crossing the line between jamming and spontaneous composition. But instead, we should dwell for 49 minutes on the idea of a person being at the top of their game. It is not an expression used in music very much, but it applies here. A musician can have many peaks at various points in their relationship to sound. At these moments, they are masters, wizards, conjuring other worlds almost immediately. This session documents a moment when two such musicians crossed paths." Limited to 300 copies.
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