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The No-Neck Blues Band Gitanjali 45 RPM 10" vinyl record OQ'EBAL 004
side A: Long delayed, this 10" is one of two vinyl releases from recording sessions at the Chummery late in 2006. The Chummery was the Seattle home to Sun City Girls, Sublime Frequencies, Abduction, and The Sea Donkeys. In fact it was the last residence of Charles Gocher who passed away in there only a few months after this session. Making full use of the Girls' diverse collection of instruments, including an upright piano and Alan Bishop's gamelan, NNCK improvised throughout one day and night, with all proceedings being documented byÊa custom 16 channel mobile unit assembled by Ri Bi Xibalba. Together with live concerts in Vancouver, BC and Seattle the previous evenings, the recordings total over five hours. Distilled from this are the best of the Chummery recordings split onto two separate releases. The first is this 10", mastered at 45 RPM for the best fidelity, and pressed on 110 gram of vinyl. Using sundry stringed instruments from SCG's world travels as well as their own traveling set of instruments, the music has an air of delicate yet mysterious Javanese court music - a contrast to what SCG did with many of those same instruments. Of particular prominence on this record are the plaintive sounds of the erhu gliding through. Made up of seven members, NNCK's sound is never crowded and comes off like a well oiled machine moving with one group mind. When they put aside their individual selves and enter the music, the result switches over into organic creation. This record will be followed by an LP called Gitanjali + The Nascent Stigma. Despite the similarity in title, the two records contain completely different material from the same session. It is a record in two parts, much like their "A Tabu Two" released as two separate LPs on the New World of Sound label back in 1997. This marks the 20th year of NNCK's activity, the first document of which appeared as a super limited 7" on Thurston Moore's Ecstatic Peace! label. Since then they have gone on to be represented by The Shadow Ring's Dry Leaf Discs, Ecstatic Yod, SER/SERES, John Fahey's Revenant, Kill Rock Stars sub-label 5 Rue Christine, Staubgold, Les Disque Victo, Locust Music, Alga Marghen side label Planam, Kelippah, and their own Sound@One imprint. They have toured North America and Europe although have rarely played live the last few years. Members of NNCK have been involved in a wide range of other musical projects including Angelblood, Sabbath Assembly, D. Charles Speer & The Helix, Enos Slaughter, Rhyton, Suntanama, Coach Fingers, K-Salvatore, Izititiz, Malkuth, Test, Key of Shame, Decimus, Raajmahal, and Ki. |
also available from Art Into Life, Eclipse Records, Forced Exposure, Fusetron, Metamkine, Out of Print, Unrock, and Wall of Sound.
Volcanic Tongue had this to say about it: The recording is immaculate, with a slow, dosed, hazy quality that makes for one of NNCKÕs most supremely beautiful settings. ThereÕs a heady/distant Javanese gamelan feel to the slowly circling percussion and off-kilter melodicism and a great far eastern folk jag that could almost be Chie MukaiÕs legendary acid folk group, Che-SHIZU at an early free-flying apex. Something unhurried about this, something particularly heavenly in its construct, that makes it one of the most consistently rewarding spins of NNCKÕs two decade career. |
