Samamidon I See The Sign (2010, Bedroom Community)
RIYL = Bill Calahan, Nick Drake, Sun Kil Moon
Sam Amidon’s I See The Sign is one of the most delicate pieces of music I’ve heard in a long, long time. There may be no other way to state it. It floats fragile, like a paper boat, pushed and pulled in the soft eddies and simple current of a forest creek. A member of the tight knit Bedroom Community, Sam Amidon has enlisted the talents of fellow Bedromm Community members like Valgeir Sigurdsson and Nico Muhly (in addition to others) to assist him in perfecting his beautifully lush, awe-inspiring folk. While they aren’t the same tonally, there is an honesty in Amidon’s voice, a subtle, rootsy drawl, reminiscent of Bill Calahan. This rural air is probably also lifted from much of the old source material and lyrics Amidon has transformed and transplanted into I See The Sign. In addition, orchestral flourishes throughout are applied with perfect restraint, reminiscent of Joanna Newsom’s watershed album, Ys. Characterized by a quaint reverence and lyrical repetition, I See The Sign is the kind of album that will kill you peacefully, fold you up, and lay you to rest. Seriously, folk music doesn’t get more intelligent or more gorgeous than this.
Ben Frost Theory of Machines
(Bedroom Community, 2007)
Not the hyper aggressive, constantly tense minimalist project that Frost put out this year, Theory of Machines remains the masterwork from which that album is framed. The album is a massive slab of industrious noise/drone/electronics that balances the transitions between beauty and doom perfectly. A magnificently high minded album of pure mood.
Ben Frost By The Throat
(2009, Bedroom Community)
RIYL = Jasper Tx, Machinefabriek, Animal Hospital, Lawrence English
Ben Frost’s music carves at your nerves. On his last record, Theory of Machines, Frost created a tension filled industrio-noise masterpiece filled with delayed climaxes of other worldly proportions. It was one of the few records that I have heard that can be more aptly described as an experience than simply as music. You don’t just listen to it, you experience it. On By The Throat, Frost takes the experience of Machines up a notch; in fact, the album title says it all. There is something about this most recent Frost album that just devours you. Listening to this album has plunged me into a stark mindset, more claustrophobic and paranoid than I can ever remember feeling. The album art is actually a pretty successful portrait of the music Frost has created. By The Throat sounds and feels like a pack of wild beast, strung out, starving and circling you in preparation for an attack. The music is constantly teetering on the edge of that moment just before they lunge for your throat. I guess it is also important to note some of the contributors playing on By The Throat. Frost has pulled in a pretty impressive array of musicians including Amiina, The Arcade Fire’s Jeremy Gara, some Swedish metal band called Crowpath and fellow Bedroom Community compatriot, Nico Muhly. Yet, even with those big names, By The Throat is in every way a Ben Frost album and it is all the better for it. And, as a Frost creation, it is difficult to describe. There is definitely a compositional feel along with a lot of electronics, some field recordings and guitar torture. By The Throat finds a prefect middle ground between neo classical, drone and noise. And, while sometimes those genres can turn flat and flacid, By The Throat is an album that does not allow for passive listening. There will never be a time when you can just play the album in the background as the casual accompaniment for some frivolous activity. No, By The Throat is simply too emotionally confrontational and too aurally invasive to be an after thought. With growling and howling from instruments and real wolves alike, Frost's work burrows deep, digging its claws into your psyche. Frost’s composition boasts a ferocious muscularity and a grizzly aura that feels too real to be labeled as horror. Really, there is some mad gluttonous grit and terror at work here that provides just about as powerful a musical experience that one is likely to have. Make room in your top ten of 2009 and welcome the new king of compositional doom.
Samamidon All Is Well (02.2008, Bedroom Community) Verdict = Simple Atmospheric Folk
Samamidon is known by his parents as Sam Amidon but I doubt you could judge the audible difference judging by Amidon’s slurry vocal delivery on his third release, All Is Well. Pitched with an atmospheric Americana, All Is Well flows like a tiny backwoods river floating lazily under cover of forest tangle. The ride is lethargic and seems to be an audible muscle relaxer. There is a warmth of production on All Is Well reminiscent of Vetiver or Hem. With its immaculate production, All Is Well doesn’t contain even the slightest crackling distraction from the lush instrumentation which carries the mood of the album. It is as if each copy of the album comes with its' own personal chamber orchestra to play along. It is with this lonely personalized touch that Amidon’s minor key ballads sink in like a knife, cutting your heart strings clear. From start to finish an air of waterlogged, Midwestern hopelessness floods your heart. Amidon’s numb vocals add to that backwater feel and can take a bit of time to warm up to. It is beautiful though and there are a couple songs like “Fall On My Knees” and “Little Satchel” after the midway mark that ease the dreariness. Overall, All Is Well is a charmingly elegant album that is worth a spin.
Nico Muhly's debut full length contains compositional amblings through various themes and motifs. Hinting at Steve Reich, what Muhly has done here is make an orchestral album with muscle. While much of the modern classical landscape of contemporaries like Max Richter and Johann Johannsson are filled with minor-chord sob compositions, Muhly has created a flexible and organic suite of music that is a breath of fresh air amongst the stagnating frost. Muhly isn’t new to the indie music world having previously worked with Philip Glass, Bjork and Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy. With a pedigree of top notch production credits to his name it’s no wonder that Speaks Volumes is masterfully recorded. Crisp and resonating, Muhly has crafted an effort that is equally playful, adventurous and emotional rich. The pieces swerve from eternally building string efforts of "It Goes Without Saying" to the contemplative piano of "Quite Music" to the robust frolicking arrangements of "Pillaging Music" and back again. Speaks Volumes ends with the intensely beautiful "Keep In Touch," bearing vocal instrumentation from Antony (of Antony and the Johnsons) and cementing Muhly’s efforts as one of the most realized of the year. For the most profound effect; Speaks Volumes should be played on earmuff sized headphones and allowed to completely consume your attention. One of the most stunningly gorgeous and ambiguously narrative musical experiences I’ve heard in a long time.
Ben Frost Theory of Machines (2007, Bedroom Community) 8.5/10
Ben Frost constructs and then deconstructs ambient electronics. Theory of Machines’ 5 tracks play as a narrative of teaming beauty and destruction and must be heard as a whole. Isolating single tracks is like reading random chapters out of a book, you loose their relevance without context. Frost’s music is for machinery, for switchboards and factories, for oil consuming retrograde robot soldiers from the future. Yet with all this mechanics of it, Theory of Machines is not an industrial record. Frost’s techniques are rooted in Fenneszian textures, The Wind-Up Bird’s electronic blips and Michael Gira’s pure sonic power. Frost’s robots have pumping, bleeding hearts that flow to the surface after the chaos as in the album closer “Forgetting You is Like Breathing Water” where a beautiful string motif swells to its bursting point. Theory of Machines is power electronics of the most soaringly winning nature. Highly recommended for the adventurous.
Samamidon
Ben Frost