SOUNDTRACK: PACHA: Affaires Étrangères [CST090] (2012).
Pacha has the second of three discs released as part of Constellation’s Musique Fragile 02 set. Pacha is the solo work of percussionist Pierre-Guy Blanchard and this disc is made of rhythm-heavy instrumentals, propelled by Middle-Eastern synth lines and sprinkled with guitar, bass and oud along with the odd looped field recording. It’s like electronic music with an Arabic pop fixation. And the instrumentation is really interesting:
“L’Aeroport De Charlo” is mostly thumping drums and a buzzy synth. There are some synth solos with distinctively Middle Eastern tones. I like the way the basic rhythm alters throughout the nearly 5 minute track. About half way through it turns to nearly all percussion a great rumbling drumming with one middle eastern instrument playing over the top (it sounds like a buzzy clarinet). “Macedonian Mind” has some great, complex drumming behind a simple synth riff. The music feels slightly menacing as the synths are quite buzzy, but the drums are just a lot of fun. The middle of the song uses that Middle Eastern sound with a melody line (I can’t tell if its voice or instrument or what) that works perfectly with the main Rockies riff.
“Modern Malaise” opens with a vocal choir, singing while there’s a simultaneous, seemingly unrelated bass line. And then a very cool funky section with more great drums and a kind of sneaky sounding riff. As the song progresses some spacey synths enter the song amid a clatter of echoing drums before it all resolves to that initial cool riff. In “La Gare De Podgorica” slow synths play over some complex drumming with a bunch of what sounds like hand drums. “Tunel” has some great hand drumming and low droning synths. And then comes the most middle eastern sounding riff of the disc. This track is my favorite–catchy and funky with some great hand drumming. The keys sound very later 60s.
“Ankara” is a fast song with complex hand drumming and an almost drone with vocals samplings, and a lot of the instrument listed below (Omar Dewachi plays saz and oud) and a warbly synth line. It is one of the longest songs on the disc and has the most going on it. “Starcevo” opens with some deep hand drums and what sounds like violins or maybe sampled voices or both. It’s kind of a disconcerting track with the drums the only thing keeping things steady. “Le Soviet” is played on a bunch of synths with a kind of carnivalesque feel to the sound. There’s a Middle Eastern riff and some interesting solos that sound almost classical.
From the Constellation site:
Blanchard received a BA in music in 2003, majoring in percussion performance, and then escaped the ‘new music’ trajectory by traveling extensively and immersing himself in Middle Eastern and Balkan traditions, studying under various masters and playing with a wide range of regional groups. During his periods back in Canada he performed as guest percussionist for Black Ox Orkestar … has also performed regularly with Sam Shalabi’s jazz/psych/arabic orchestra Land Of Kush. … Constellation re-sequenced and remastered the Affaires Étrangères CD-R for vinyl and is proud to be giving this album a more substantial life. It marks Blanchard’ first attempt at a definitive musical statement of his own and we think it succeeds wildly.
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Musique Fragile Volume 02 is the second in our series of limited-edition, artwork-intensive box sets featuring three full-length albums by three different artists, available on heavyweight vinyl and as a digital bundle. The vinyl set will be limited to 500 hand-numbered copies, lovingly designed and hand-assembled:
[READ: October 31, 2016] Quirk’s Quest 1
This story threw out so much disconnect for me that I never really determined if I liked it.
The artwork is adorable–the characters look like Fraggle Rock creatures–soft and furry with big round ping pong ball eyes. Even the bad guys (much taller with four eyes) don’t look all that fierce.
And yet.
In the first 30 pages, these monsters kill and eat some of the cute Fraggle Rock creatures. What?!
This book looks ostensibly like a children’s book. It is really cute. But the diary entries of the Captain are written in a cursive that even I had a hard time reading (particularly because the captain’s named is Quenterindy Quirk and he is sailing on the H.M.S. Gwaniimander (hard enough to read that, imagine trying to figure it out in cursive!).
So just what’s it about? (more…)
I Just Read About That... 