2013 - my year of Dave Stafford

As I look back on 2013 the year is overwhelmed by Dave Stafford. 

To recap, I first got in contact with him early in the year to discuss Scape, the Brian Eno music creating app. After a few exchanges of email and blog-comments I thought I should listen to some of his music. And download and listen I did. At this stage I have the following in my library

1.08 GB of Dave Stafford non-eternal albums
2 Bindlestiff albums
A Scorched By The Sun album
2 Pure Ambient samplers compilations
1.03 GB (22:35) of Drone Forest

And then the Eternal albums - growing collections of tracks created by Dave using different Apps
Fairlight Pro - only 6 tracks, just under half an hour - there are lots more but this format didn't grab me (Similarly I have none from the Scape collection as I have the App)
Nanostudio - 4 tracks, 36 minutes - I really like this set and am awaiting more. Complex.
Mixtikl - 61 tracks at over 22 hours. (Plus another 1:20 of outtakes). When put down like that it is a big thing both in size, time and (almost) money (at 50p a track it adds up, but when taken by time quite cheap). Created with an aleatoric app these pieces vary in length, mood, ambience, beat etc. There are some elements that recur, but each piece is different (unless a remix/reconceptualisation) and equally attractive. I find that I put it on random selection most nights and also quite happily jump out of a track before the end without guilt as I know the tracks aren't leading to a climax or a resolution but seem more like visitations from a music that is playing eternally somewhere.

And now we have a new album
classical - only one track so far, but a tweet this morning promised another on the way. The one so far is a Concerto for guitar and oboe. This is some of Dave's most composed music. It has a stately baroque mood (I was reminded of Walter/Wendy Carlos' Switched on Bach [She was Walter when I bought mine, so is still that in my mind] partly because of the tones but also the structure). Amazingly it was all created on the guitar (roland guitar synthesiser), but that is not a factor in what makes it so good: it is just a great piece of music.

All of this music (except Drone Forest) is on his Bandcamp page so you can try before you buy (worth doing - his styles vary from album to album to format - check the blog for various reviews along the way)

http://davestafford.bandcamp.com/

Other highlight

Bowie's - The Next Day: played very regularly
Fripp soundscapes - have continued to expand the collection
Podcasts - I have probably reduced music listening due to increased podcast consumption - and very few are music related!
Just bought Archive 828585 from Cabaret Voltaire from BigPond ($15 for the 3 disks) - a nice addition to that period of the Cabs.

Bindlestiff: pianoforte

Sneaking in by subterfuge, another comment on Dave Stafford. I will not deliver a full review here as I will be repeating myself too much and some may be concerned that I am a little monomaniacal here. So, Bindlestiff LOUD and quiet. 

Bindlestiff existed from 1992 to 1996 in California and is Dave Stafford on guitar & loops and Bryan Helm on synths, keyboards and loops. These two disks are part of a small set of releases, and both emerged from a heady period of recording before Bryan left town. (They recorded 6 albums before falling into silence until the transatlantic file exchange album Dreamtime that was reviewed in April). 

The prime objective was to record Quiet. This is a collection of gentle ambience, but during the recording the pair also played around with new jams or other tracks which were more active and these tracks became LOUD. Together they create a nicely balanced, broad  ambient collection. And it is interesting to note that virtually all of the tracks on the 2 albums (or the double album) are live takes. The following is a look at some of the tracks - somewhat representative. 

Quiet offers a drifting ambient experience - the washes of synth togther with synth and guitar loops are not inactive - this isn't minimal ambient although in some of the loops (and in LOUD as well) there is a hint of classical minimalism in the keyboard repetitions. These often provide a delicate bed for the other components. On a track like Simple truth there is a musicbox looping throughout while keys push chords slowly through. Unusually Dave plays a straight guitar (described as jazz) rather than the ebow drones which appear in most other tracks. The pieces vary in length - 5 are less than 5 minutes, 3 are 7 or 8 and there are 2 long ones (11:30 and 23:30). So there is a mixture of short excursions as well as long explorations. Pacific gravity builds beautifully, a three note bass loop, over which Dave and Bryan gradually add different keyboard sounds (there are no guitars on this - thanks again, liner notes on Pureambient) - long tones, chimes, washes - building density. And all the while the bass loop loops on. Some tracks came as surprises - Hibernation was found on the tapes and Dave isn't totally sure how it formed! But is is a lovely drift. The album ends with Into blue - a long ambient piece with that trick of seeming static but being full of activity when you listen closely.

Suspend your disbelief opens LOUD, one of 8 tracks that clock in at under 4:15, with a guitar ebow solo over rapid Glassian bubbles below (which are not looped). It says the album is not really loud, anything can be cranked up, but fast. And its sensibilities stray more into the prog rock (! - see post on what is prog) in terms of the moods and structures. Passage by day is one of the resurrected from the sessions tracks - over a very fast drum loop long guitar notes slide.Another jam - A remarkable experience - has a bright percussive drum/synth loop for the guitar to wind its way through. A strange seaside organ experience underlines Sleep it off - a lovely light touch - basically all Bryan with Dave twiddling some knobs.One of the longer pieces  - Fantasia - is a wall of sounds building and layering becoming dense and complex, catching itself before chaos overtakes it. Followed by the driving wildness of Heavy water - these tracks are asking to be played loud. The density and intricate nature of the music here is amazing.

I can see why Dave remembers this collaboration with such affection - the interplay between the two musicians is subtle and delightful, creating albums which entrance, excite, intrigue and please. And like all good ambient music it avoids the unfortunate tendency of some to wander into anodyne new age territory. 

1994 is a Bindlestiff year that was recorded but not released. Dave has a plan to go through the master tapes and create an everexpanding virtual album. This would be added to as new tracks were remastered and couple eventually be enormous. While the mechanism of paying for it have to be determined (I think a track by track sale could lead to excessive credit card international costs; you could sell bundles or subscriptions: now the first albums are up I have found that Bandcamp has a basket, so you can buy an unlimited number of tracks at once.) it represents an interesting appropriation of the limitlessness of the Internet to create new music distribution models and reinvent the concept of the album (Perhaps Dave & I are members of the last generation who appreciated the aesthetics of the album (sides, sequence) and still clings to the concept of listening to an album.) 

My final point is to note that I have purchased all of the releases by Dave mentioned on the blog (other than the previously pointed to free compilations from pure ambience (link at the side)). This is not because they are cheap - 5 pounds a disk is very good value though - but because I have found (as the varied reviews across the last few months will attest) varied, exciting and interesting music which spans deep ambience through ambient guitar and into experimental/art, yeah even progressive (though what that is is debateable), rock music. At various times over the few months that I have known this music I have played different albums at different times for different reasons - and always enjoyed and appreciated it. And you can't ask for much more than that.

And another final point - for some reason I want to call them Brindlestiff but I don't know why.

Dave Stafford (2) Dreamtime and Sky Full of Stars

In my ongoing introduction to the works of Dave Stafford, 2 more albums - I am not reviewing in either chronological order, nor the order of my discovery, but rather in pairs that work together. These two albums belong together in my mind for structural and musical reasons, as well as being recent releases. 

We'll start with Dreamtime which is actually by Scorched by the sun and was released in January this year through bandcamp. SBTS is Dave Stafford with Bryan Helm - and while this is the first release by this 'group' Stafford and Helm go way back to 1989 where as alumni of guitar craft they formed The dozey lumps and Luxury yacht (1 album a piece) but more significantly formed Bindlestiff which released 6 albums in the 90s. These albums are well sampled on the 2 free pureambient compilations available on the site, and vary in ambience and intensity, but all very listenable. 

For various reasons there was a musical hiatus, but eventually Bryan sent Dave a link to a site with 12 pieces in it (as noted by David Byrne in his book, transcontinental collaborations are now able to spawn news ways of working). The basis for an album! When he started to work on the pieces, adding his layers, Dave initially fell back on his role as the guitarist in the duo (Bryan was keyboards) but it didn't work. And then he realised that his m-tron mellotron e-synth would work perfectly. He then set to work adding his parts (he has hinted that a bonus release of his and Bryan's components) to the 12 tracks, all bar some piano on the first part, played using the m-tron; then adding a mellotron solo in the middle of the album, and mixing the tracks so that the 11 'seams' are, while not invisible, at least not obvious and so the track unfolds as a single mutating and modulating piece. And it does work very well - this is true furniture-music {coincidence - while looking at the pureambient site I came across a single of a cover of Bill Nelson's furniture music: my reference here was of course to the original Satie quote} ambient where you can have it as background music but that repays closer listening. The album opens with an active ambient piece and closes with vocal tones singing a melody to layered synths. In between there are layers of drones and loops, notes and sounds drift through the mix - a descending riff, a call, some atonal, edgy loops - a mellotron flute, the satisfying intermission solo. And while each is part is an ambient gem, as they are sewn together to make a complex quilt the album becomes a complete experience that is more than the sum. Other than for musicological reasons, or that old faithful completism, I don't think the two halves of the album should be released as it is the combination that works (my first though was, hey yeah, that could be interesting, but I changed my mind).

Fast backwards to 2011 and Dave releases Sky Full of Stars. This was my fourth purchase, bought because it was described as a mellotron album - all keyboards (and bought before Dreamtime). While many of his releases are guitar/loop based I seem to be jumping about sampling his whole range (the looping will be in the next review). But when I first played it I was a little confounded - I had expected Epitaph-like flute or choral tones, the sort of things that bought 60s & 70s progrock to life! But here were long held tones layered, building density and texture. And then I was dumbfounded as, as I said to Dave in a two word review, it is simply beautiful. What the synth retains from the original is a warmth and depth of tone - and apparently you can recapture the sound of the original as Dave has used those on Dreamtime and Gone native. These pieces almost glow, and I have played them through my sound system to gain the full value from the tones. In New day dawning the deep resonances give a solid quality to the sounds. Elsewhere the tones pulse, drift, ring and just sing: there is also a sense of stately majesty throughout the album. There are tunes - The other half of your soul has a melody dancing slowly over the drones - and long evolving pieces (the title track is almost 18minutes based around some delightful backward tones - the shorter pieces tend to be more active). But if you like tonal drifting keyboard ambience with occasional pulsing, you will love this: as with many great albums it is really indescribable. Other than Simply beautiful

Mystified - Thomas Park - Treetrunk

It's like a game of checkers - one position leads you to another. A while back I blogged about the netlabel Webbed Hands, particularly the Rain series. Three in the group particularly captivated me - by Mystified. Which led to a wider search across the web.

First of all there are some other Mystified (real name Thomas Park) releases on Webbed Hands, some solo and some collaborations. But there is also a pointer to his own label Treetrunk which is based in the wonderful Internet Archive (and which I had also obliquely visited while completing my K M Krebs collection). Mystified's home page has some, though limited, information on both himself and the label. (and there's the now obligatory MySpace page - I must be getting to old, but I don't get the social networking side - but it does give you a chance to listen).

Mystified's music is an interesting mix of ambient and techno styles. Following the minimal structure of his entries in the Rain series, releases such as Constant or Free Passage focus on subtle changes in the layering of ambient noises (some dense, others more minimal). Seen also in Texture (with Stephen Phillips) and Intrigue (with Flores). To my mind this is one of Mystified's greatest strengths - some of the earlier releases, such as Electronic Ragtime are closer to the world ambient genre and are less 'unique'. Though are then used to great effect when combined with radio sounds and samples in Screams in Space

However, in addition, Mystified is also a phonographer and many of the releases are based around found and recorded sounds - Nocturne, Cavern of Tile, Mutescape (which mellows the sounds of the city) or South City Spring for example use these as the primary component, while Audio Paintings uses other components as well. These (and a compilation I included in the Webbed Hands review) are great examples of the power of phonography/sonography.

There is also more standard keyboard/tonal ambience such as Music for Infants and Clockwork. These pieces have an aleatoric feel that relates to Mystifieds aims to create fractal music: seen in Fabrication and a series called Fractal Diner (1 - 3 on Treetrunk; whose releases are primarily by Mystified) that feature slowly modulating delicate ambiences (there is also Fractal Reflections on Webbed Hands). Many of these reminded me (positively) of Brian Eno.

As an introduction two mixtapes are available - Oddities (a collection of pieces released across various labels and formats) and Big Shoulders (an homage to Chicago and composed over tracks created over an extended time)- which make a good starting point.

While most Treetrunk releases are by Mystified (in the normal way of weblabels) some others have also been released, including K M Krebs, Akashic Crow's Nest, Edward J Poley, Tim Doyle and the very flexible Tribe of Astronauts - all of whose interests seem to intersect with Mystified's.

This is all free music - varied but with a underlying strength and focus. I've enjoyed all the pieces I have downloaded - and now have all of Treetrunk (except number 7: one complaint is that there is no 'master list' of releases and an Internet Archive search hasn't brought it to light) and all the Mystifieds from Webbed Hands (including collaborations) - and find them very satisfying particularly for the deep minimal ambience that pervades many of them. (Mystified has also had many real releases, but I haven't heard any of those). Anyway, my advice is to try some Mystified: it's free and I am sure you will enjoy most if not all of it.

PS doing an internet archive search on Mystified I realise I have a lot more to collect - at least another 20! Expect an update eventually

K M Krebs

Part of what will be an occasional 'composer' series, stimulated by something like stumbling over their webpage! Over the years I have come across people in various places and releases - let alone pseudonyms - and like the idea of pointing to their catalogue. K M Krebs first hit my attention as 833-45 with a number of releases on No Type. I found a few of these, then he sent me a couple of CD-Rs and then recently he popped up on Con-V a couple of times so I went looking for more. I found a few, which I'll touch on in a minute, but also found his home page. It includes a very nice blog covering his own releases, pointers to interesting web labels/albums, electronics and general stuff.

The most straightforward description of much of his work would be pointillist ambience - small elements looping modulating and layering to create long sweeping pieces. Those elements are percussive electronic syntheised sounds and occasional voices or sonography. The works ebb and flow through your audio space. This side is exemplified by The Light Will Fill the Darkness... which was originally released on Mystery Sea but is now downloadable, the drifting electronica of the Fog sequence or his Rain 1 release for the Webbed Hand Netlabel series (833-45 has also released one, and more on the series at a later date, probably).

Then there are some more electronic works like Live at Muliplex 11, the two Jade Furnace releases comprising short pieces that are available to listen to or sample, or An Orange Radio. And a 'narrative' work on the SineFiction no-type sublabel

As 833-45, the more abstract electronic side (though it is all leaning to abstraction rather than melodic or rhythm drive) is to the fore, creating with radio emissions and pulsations to create a more scientific industrial ambience. It was in this guide that most of his work for No-Type was produced, though Solar Cycle which I reviewed as CD-R has been net-label released also. That was meant to be 833's last release, but it is continuing.

Anyway Krebs is a fascinating artist to follow across the net - but for those who don't have the time, patience or downloads - there is a wonderful opportunity at the home page: a DVD collection of all the net works of Krebs in his various incarnations, some of which are no longer available. I haven't heard them all as my listening comes from years of trawling plus two cd-rs, but I can recommend what will be 20+ hours of satisfying listening.