Hailing from the hot bath of alternative talents that
is Brooklyn currently, Terrestrial Tones are no other
than Animal Collective’s
Dave Portner (Avey Tare) and Black
Dice’s Eric Copeland. The two formations have
always been close, often touring together and sharing
recording studios. With Terrestrial Tones, Portner and
Copeland have devised a truly hedonistic project away
from their respective commitments. Freely indulging
in sonic experimentations at home, with no other intention
than see what the result could sound like, Copeland
and Portner have, over the last couple of years, developed
a truly unique sound.
This, their third album, the first released on Animal
Collective’s Paw Tracks, follows in the footpath
of the uncompromising noise experimentations of Oboroaed
/ Circus Lives (Uunited Acoustic Recordings) and
Blasted (Psych-o-path) and continues to draw
the map of an intriguing sonic landscape. Recorded entirely
while the pair were sharing an apartment in Paris during
the summer of 2005, Dead Drunk collects seven
textural compositions where vocal samples, orchestral
outbursts and various noises are thrown in, reduced
to simple components and given some vague structure
again. Although the resulting compositions give away
very little as to the provenance of the sound sources
or their original context, the pair create a rather
evocative collection with Dead Drunk. There
is something quite bohemian and dilettante about the
aspect of this record, which suits the free-spirit attitude
of the pair and gives some context to the whole piece.
The album kicks off with the rather chaotic Car
Fumes before diving head first into the dense collage
of The Sailor, a tentative pop song wouldn’t
it be for the strident abrasions and mashed up overall
setting. Plow Man share with some of Animal
Collective’s earlier recordings a taste for
hypnotic incantations but here, the Tones layer the
chant under a thick blanket of mechanical noises. While
the short interludes Gargoyles and Magic
Trick appear almost bear and uncomfortably straightforward,
Future Train and This Weekend Wow
make no concession to easy listening. Although the latter
appear gentler than the former, in parts at least, both
tracks utterly challenge the preconception of noise
improvisation by actually burying real melodic elements
in the sonic pile-ups that form the main body of each
track.
With this new collaborative effort, Portner and Copeland
define once more their sonic environment but refuse
to draft any map for listeners to follow. Instead, everyone
is invited to set their own agenda, settle their own
arguments and draw their own agenda. Dead Drunk
is a captivating and magnificent junkyard of sounds
and ambiences like no other.
4.5/5 |
