Piece-ing and Layering

Alice Coltrane – Journey in Satchidananda - Journey in Satchidananda (Impulse! 1970)


Squarepusher – Iambic 9 Poetry – Ultravisitor (WARP 2004)


Battles – Ipt-2 – EP C (Monitor 2004)


I spent the afternoon wading through a sea of sawdust while helping a new friend of mine shoot some extra footage for a project he is working on. The woodshop, the renown Bauhaus Institute run by an amiable and quirky German master craftsman, had a character all it’s own. Located unassumingly on a not-so-elegant street in North Chicago, flanked by a number of authentic Mexican restaurants and Asian dry cleaners, the Institute was an older warehouse stacked to the roof with countless varieties of wood, circular saws, half-made furniture and enough sawdust to asphyxiate a pair of asthmatic lungs (like mine) in a matter of seconds. Add in the fact that the room was softly lit by a series of slightly damaged, overhead frosted windows, and the word texture repeatedly flashes in large, bright red capital letters as far as descriptions go. I listened to the award-winning furniture maker and artist, Berthold Schwaiger, talk about his work for a few hours, and never have I been so inspired by woodworking. He approaches every project individually, enlisting century old math theories and philosophical ideas into each one of his pieces. To give you an idea where he was coming from, his office bookshelves were stacked with obscure art collections, D.H. Lawrence novels and trigonometry textbooks. From his adjacent window, he watched his young apprentices behind his graying beard and with one good eye, the other permanently staring to the left.

Because of my audio production background, I tend to see music the same way he would look at furniture, in pieces and layers (especially sample-based music) finely chosen and crafted into a seamless final whole. A good musician should compose music the same way Schwaiger would create a bureau or a chest: 1. Know your customer, don’t just take assignments, sit down with each particular customer and get to know them, come to understand exactly what they have in mind and use that as your starting point. 2. Select the perfect materials, individually choose every single piece of wood so that the grain, flow and natural beauty will accentuate the overall piece of furniture. 3. Devise an unconventional method, don’t just repeatedly use the same process, draw inspiration from a variety of sources and incorporate them into your work. 4. Don’t rush and make sure the product will withstand the test of time. Schwaiger was also insistent that each piece of custom-made furniture would take on a life of its own, outliving the initial buyers and creating it’s own legacy. I believe that a good piece of music should meet these criteria as well, except maybe not the first one word by word, maybe replace ‘customer’ with ‘idea.’ So I chose three songs, built mostly in layers, where I think the artists met the parameters and succeeded in creating a song that not only takes on a life of it’s own, but can (or have) withstand the test of time.

Alice Coltrane – Journey in Satchidananda - Journey in Satchidananda (Impulse! 1970)
Alice Coltrane is without a doubt one of my favorite musicians, sometimes I think even more than her late husband, John. Always deeply spiritual and infusing ethnic Eastern instrumentation into her compositions, the songs project an earthy drone, a meditative tunnel if you will. This is the title track to my favorite album and its built in a series of thick layers. Cecil McBee’s extremely deep bass, remaining the somewhat consistent anchor throughout, roots the track. The other consistent sound is the rhythmic drone of a tambura, and unfretted string instrument usually found in India; it adds a definite character to the song. Glittering bells and tambourine accentuate Rashied Ali’s sparse drumming, and Pharoah Sanders adds a welcomed solo on soprano sax. Ms. Coltrane plays the meanest harp I have ever heard, meticulously and passionately plucking the strings to create an indefinable sound. Each layer complements the next, combining to form unprecedented depth.

Squarepusher – Iambic 9 Poetry – Ultravisitor (WARP 2004)
Firstly, this song sounds nothing like Tom Jenkinson’s early music. Coming from an experimental IDM background where each manic drum skitter and synth blast came quicker than the next, Jenkinson’s much calmer ‘Ultravisitor’ was a breath of fresh air. Utilizing his jazz drumming background, his father was also a jazz drummer as well, he created a much more ambient and thoughtful album than his previous urgent outings. This song is the best example of what Jenkinson can do with acoustic instrumentation if he gives it time to grow and breath on it’s own. Beginning very quietly with a soft bass line, the song progressively builds layer by layer into a rampant array of scattered jazz drumming, brooding synth pads and echoing organs. This is without a doubt my favorite Squarepusher song, and makes a case for breaking into my all time top 10.

Battles – Ipt-2 – EP C (Monitor 2004)
I wanted to include something a bit different into the mix, something utilizing not only layers by unconventional design and math as well. Battles is the closest thing you can find to musical mathematicians. Featuring John Stanier of Helmet/Tomahawk, Ian Williams of Don Caballero/Storm & Stress, David Konopka of Lynx and always-inventive solo artist Tyondai Braxton, Battles is essentially a math-rock super group. This song can be found on EP C and is a prime example of what unorthodox design can bring to music. The drumming is played through one speaker, then reversed and played out of the other speaker after a slight delay. A simple guitar riff is added on top of that, then also reversed, and just like that, and incredibly interesting song is created. There is nothing too complicated here, but the overall effect is compelling.