Gorgeous!. This was how The West was won (in the imagination at least)! I am especially excited by pt. 1.
I am reminded of a few American folk artists and, most acutely, a specific work: the famed archivist Harry Smith and his hand-painted films "Early Abstractions" - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wYJ51nSXRQ
These, alongside the the "minimalism" of Le Monte Young and (to a lesser degree, but still) some of Terry Riley's compositions, wash over the pixels of Blader's images and form a sort of secondary soundtrack that braids itself into and out of the primary aural delights selected with such exquisite precision for our pleasure and edification.
Finally, I think back to the more contemporary work of some folks that I had the pleasure of a passing acquaintance with back in the (early) glory days of SF laptop music: MATMOS. Their album, "The West," might seem a facile comparison given the resonant title, but it is haunting and "Western" in a way that reaches across The Rockies, over the deserts and, finally, exhausting itself, washes over the sand-blown beaches from Baja Malibu to up past the wooded greenery of Ukiah (where much of "the magic" of The West still transpires daily).
I am transfixed. I think my eyeballs just annealed to the screen of my overpriced consumer electronics!
b.
Reader Comments (1)
Gorgeous!. This was how The West was won (in the imagination at least)! I am especially excited by pt. 1.
I am reminded of a few American folk artists and, most acutely, a specific work: the famed archivist Harry Smith and his hand-painted films "Early Abstractions" - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-wYJ51nSXRQ
These, alongside the the "minimalism" of Le Monte Young and (to a lesser degree, but still) some of Terry Riley's compositions, wash over the pixels of Blader's images and form a sort of secondary soundtrack that braids itself into and out of the primary aural delights selected with such exquisite precision for our pleasure and edification.
Finally, I think back to the more contemporary work of some folks that I had the pleasure of a passing acquaintance with back in the (early) glory days of SF laptop music: MATMOS. Their album, "The West," might seem a facile comparison given the resonant title, but it is haunting and "Western" in a way that reaches across The Rockies, over the deserts and, finally, exhausting itself, washes over the sand-blown beaches from Baja Malibu to up past the wooded greenery of Ukiah (where much of "the magic" of The West still transpires daily).
I am transfixed. I think my eyeballs just annealed to the screen of my overpriced consumer electronics!
Best,
Kevin