Bob
Drake
13
Songs And A Thing
(ReR)
Bob
Drake keeps on travelling his very personal route. 13 Songs And A Thing
is his fourth solo album, following Little Black Train (1998),
Medallion Animal Carpet (1999) and The Skull Mailbox And
Other Horrors (2001): all albums of substance, each offering
something worth listening to in its own individual way, each deserving
one’s time. Whether one will like what one will listen to will depend
on whether one’s categories coincide with Drake’s, an American musician
with a very long career who’s nowadays mainly occupied as a producer
and engineer in the studio he owns in the south of France.
Without
a doubt, Drake is an omnivorous listener: even a superficial listening
session in the company of 13 Songs And A Thing will reveal traces of
progressive rock, some elements of Fred Frith in his "Balkanic"
and "punk" mode (let’s say, Skeleton Crew or some of his earlier
solo albums), definitely more than a pinch of country/blues, some reminiscences
of Henry Kaiser, a timbral harshness (and a refusal of setting in a
"square" groove for more than a few bars) that’s quite obviously
beefheartian. This makes total sense provided one remembers that Drake
was a big part of the "progressive/Rock In Opposition" US
group Thinking Plague – and then of Hail, that group’s duo offshoot;
and also his collaboration with another "progressive/RIO"
US group, 5uu’s. That all those influences show up in his work is not
by itself a bad thing – ignorance is very seldom a blessing. His composing
and playing (Drake is a formidable multi instrumentalist), however,
are not the whole story: the timbral treatment of the instruments (just
listen to the drums) and their placement in the recorded aural space
tell us of a long and meticulous work of a very high quality (and let’s
not forget his work on …A Mere Coincidence, the Science Group’s album
from 1999).
OK,
now about 13 Songs And A Thing. On the surface the "Thing"
– the very long (almost thirteen minutes) track #12 – sounds just like
a lot of sounds (percussions, voices, guitars and who knows what else)
but is in fact perfectly organized; I just wonder how many times I will
actually listen to this THING. Much better are the "13 Songs",
of a very varied nature. Drake opens the record with the paraprogressive
Chase (composed by Dominic Frontiere), rearranges Pechan And Willy –
a beautiful page by Stevan Tickmayer – and with a wise perception of
the "weights and balances" factor follows the monstrosity
of Building With Bones (those thirteen minutes) with the brief and light
And The Sun, a piano improvisation plus glass, tapes and other sounds
from the early ’80s.
Is
everything ok, then? My problem with all Drake’s solo records – and
this one is no exception – is that I always get the impression that
I’m listening not to an "aesthetics" – but to a "point
of view" on the materials. Of course, it’s obvious that all aesthetics
incorporate a point of view. But I have often the impression that his
point of view doesn’t fully manage to translate into an individual aesthetics.
Maybe I’m not postmodern enough? In any case – as always, but this time,
especially so – the reader is invited to judge for himself.
Beppe
Colli
©
Beppe Colli 2003
CloudsandClocks.net
| March 15, 2003