By Nick Ostrum
Emerging out of a canceled-gig-turned-studio-session, Skin of a Drum is the quartet of Pavel Aleshin, Serena Pagani, Sascha Stadlmeier, and William Rossi. (Disclaimer: Rossi is a fellow contributor to FJB.) Pagani, Stadlmeier and Rossi play guitars, Aleshin electronics, and all four contribute various other effects, loops, objects, and processing and to which Pagani also adds her voice. Alexithymiais their first release and apart from a quick warm-up session, the first meeting of these four musicians.
Alexithymia is a psychological trait wherein a person has difficulty comprehending and expressing emotions. Given the fluid and ambiguous nature of Alexithymia the album, it is a perfect title. The paints a picture finely hued, but also enigmatic. First, the sounds are often indeterminate. One hears drone, glitches, whispers, gurgles, bubbles, fragments of guitar, heavy distorted chords, howls, synthesized (?) natural sounds, space sounds. This is soundscaping, but with an emphasis on collaboration – real time and in the production stages – and live, in-the-moment improvisation, the more human elements of that oft-sterile practice. That humanity is also embodied in Pagani’s vocals, which range from the almost unrecognizable to crisp near-operatics (about two-thirds in) and the array of guitar sounds that periodically pop out of and intermingle with the less placeable elements.
The overall effect is that of a storm and, given the title, an internal storm of inarticulable and maybe inexact feelings. In that ambiguity lies the pull of this release. It is not a perfect expression of love or anger or contentment. Rather, it is, by design, a confused excavation of some emotion(s), not quite identifiable, but clearly impactful and, in its inexact state, disruptive and unnerving. But then, near the end, a series of strums, then an all-out chordal melody, over which Pagani sings, breaks out, briefly evoking Fushitsusha’s blackened prom ballads (especially the stunning track 8 on3/4). The winds still gust until the end, offering a much welcome passage of reconciliation that confirms just how well-crafted and thought-out all this cacophony is.
Alexithymiais available as a download and CD from Bandcamp:
0 comments:
Post a Comment