Thursday, January 03, 2008
non-horse & horse head
split c40
[2007, jk tapes]
non-horse is brooklyn, new york's gabriel lucas crane, who also spends some of his time supporting james toth (wooden wand) as a member of vanishing voice and he's been involved with dufus. on the flipside is the los angelean group horse head... i don't know too much about them, but one member moonlights as vikkkings and operates the friendly biceps imprint.
non-horse's seventeen and a half-minute live performance, feggic shoam, is quite an offering. samples, as well as digital and analog manipulations, appear to be crane's bag. like i said in andrew chadwick's review, someone who puts together audio collages is only as good as his source material. well, for non-horse, that's a half truth, since he's not putting his full weight towards that style. (while that material is good) it's balanced out beautifully by a colder ambient howl, wafting about throughout the track. the background will get a boost from the various affected samples being used (especially the female vocal ones) as a great job's being done to work within a narrow scope, while still branching out and incorporating a myriad of different sounds. crane really hits his stride nine minutes in when he starts marrying the experimental sounds with instrumental ones. after a nice use of choppy guitar pieces he deftly moves into a beautifully haunting soundscape, now tweaking the sound of the guitar chords to transform them into something more befitting of their new setting. the affected vocal sample with the drone was wonderful, and i really wish there was more of that, but no such luck. what we do get for the rest of shoam is a good, slow and simple chord rhythm and even a faint jazzy saxophone amidst the foggy atmosphere. very fucking nice.
my problem with horse head on this cassette (their sound seems to vary, as their contribution to the free beasts compilation is nothing like the songs on this split) primarily lies with their completely disposable singer. he's used sparingly enough (i guess), but that just makes me wonder: why have vocals in the first place? these guys' music easily outshines the messy vocal work. the first three horse head songs are instrumentally great (in that they've got infectious elements to them), but the left-over mid-90s emo manner of talking-singing clips the band's wings, so to speak. while the majority of the time hh maintains a downtempo and plodding playing style (lead by a nicely capable bassist), they will show off some flairs for jamming on tracks like dinosaurs and under the noon sky. the remaining two tracks on this side are less rooted in traditional rock structure. the ninety seconds of untitled gives us an all too brief glimpse of what this band would sound like sans vocalist, but they squander the opportunity by seemingly phoning it in, losing the rhythmic chemistry they showed off so well in the onset.
apparently, horse head is related to tan dollar, and now comes my good news: this band is better than that one. i'm guessing here that it's the same singer, but the lyrics are far less absurd. they just come off as being youthful in this instance, instead of the detriment that i found them to be on lazy rivers. i do think that both have a bit of potential (horse head more so) and it's a matter of bringing all of their components to an even keel, or, at the very least, a level that isn't quite so skewed.
Non-Horse - Feggic Shoam
Horse Head - Under the Noon Sky
[2007, jk tapes]
non-horse is brooklyn, new york's gabriel lucas crane, who also spends some of his time supporting james toth (wooden wand) as a member of vanishing voice and he's been involved with dufus. on the flipside is the los angelean group horse head... i don't know too much about them, but one member moonlights as vikkkings and operates the friendly biceps imprint.
non-horse's seventeen and a half-minute live performance, feggic shoam, is quite an offering. samples, as well as digital and analog manipulations, appear to be crane's bag. like i said in andrew chadwick's review, someone who puts together audio collages is only as good as his source material. well, for non-horse, that's a half truth, since he's not putting his full weight towards that style. (while that material is good) it's balanced out beautifully by a colder ambient howl, wafting about throughout the track. the background will get a boost from the various affected samples being used (especially the female vocal ones) as a great job's being done to work within a narrow scope, while still branching out and incorporating a myriad of different sounds. crane really hits his stride nine minutes in when he starts marrying the experimental sounds with instrumental ones. after a nice use of choppy guitar pieces he deftly moves into a beautifully haunting soundscape, now tweaking the sound of the guitar chords to transform them into something more befitting of their new setting. the affected vocal sample with the drone was wonderful, and i really wish there was more of that, but no such luck. what we do get for the rest of shoam is a good, slow and simple chord rhythm and even a faint jazzy saxophone amidst the foggy atmosphere. very fucking nice.
my problem with horse head on this cassette (their sound seems to vary, as their contribution to the free beasts compilation is nothing like the songs on this split) primarily lies with their completely disposable singer. he's used sparingly enough (i guess), but that just makes me wonder: why have vocals in the first place? these guys' music easily outshines the messy vocal work. the first three horse head songs are instrumentally great (in that they've got infectious elements to them), but the left-over mid-90s emo manner of talking-singing clips the band's wings, so to speak. while the majority of the time hh maintains a downtempo and plodding playing style (lead by a nicely capable bassist), they will show off some flairs for jamming on tracks like dinosaurs and under the noon sky. the remaining two tracks on this side are less rooted in traditional rock structure. the ninety seconds of untitled gives us an all too brief glimpse of what this band would sound like sans vocalist, but they squander the opportunity by seemingly phoning it in, losing the rhythmic chemistry they showed off so well in the onset.apparently, horse head is related to tan dollar, and now comes my good news: this band is better than that one. i'm guessing here that it's the same singer, but the lyrics are far less absurd. they just come off as being youthful in this instance, instead of the detriment that i found them to be on lazy rivers. i do think that both have a bit of potential (horse head more so) and it's a matter of bringing all of their components to an even keel, or, at the very least, a level that isn't quite so skewed.
Non-Horse - Feggic Shoam
Horse Head - Under the Noon Sky
