Monday, May 13, 2013

Matthew Barlow / Andy Loebs - Northwest Passage

Exploratory atmospherics from Matthew Barlow and Andy Loebs, with Northwest Passage on Twin Springs Tapes. Glitched vocals, cavernous ambience, manic drumming and riffage, a single improvisational experience twisted and reformed in post production into a sort of reborn tape scene post rock. From soft reverberating percussion, to meandering schizophrenic strings, and melancholic folksy guitar, the album length c-45 is an expansive and evolving journey. This stuff feels poured over enough to mean something, but spontaneous enough to be still be alive. I was transfixed by the track Wounds And Scars, which combines a sort of ambient heaviness of thick sound walls and an absolutely broken up drum kit being played to death. Kind of sounds like all the deliciously strange interludes from Bowie's Outside spliced together and played on a quadraphonic stereo in the dark at 3am. And by the way, just what is in the water in North Carolina that could be causing such a prolific output of experimental music of late?

Hand dubbed edition of just 40. Individual hand written liner notes (how long must that have taken..), lovingly wrapped up with paper and string. Stream in full and grab via the Twin Springs Tapes Bandcamp.

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