Former Fushitsusha drummer and long-time
KK NULL collaborator (in duo ANP) Murayama brings us this
intriguing, professionally-pressed CD of solo work, employing only a
snare drum and (maybe) a cymbal throughout. Given the instrumental
limitations, this is a pretty minimal expedition as far as diversity
of sound goes; but it is nevertheless a fascinating instrument
study. The first of four indecipherable titles, "Ssev: opens this
album up with a confrontational ten minutes of snare-scrubbing. By
vigorously rubbing the drum's innards, Murayama produces a vast, hollow soundscape which transcends the mere
noise of him sawing away at
his instrument. "Auci," meanwhile, is a sparser rattle, this time
constructed of the quixotic pops and clops of drumsticks on drum;
it's got the randomized bubbling of a popcorn machine, though lacks
the full-bodied flavour -- file under
cacophony. "Lbtt" is more of a shifty, scratchy
racket than its
spiritual cousin, "Ssev," but the real fun comes in the seventeen
minute final track, "Ejie." Here the listener is treated to the
endlessly proliferating reverberation of what sounds like a
resonating cymbal, with a distant snare sifting away in the
background. It's a droning, seemingly endless hum that has a bizarre
windy element to it -- like a mutant
didgeridoo. I'm not sure how exactly its sounds were produced, but
it's an easy pick for the disc's high point in my book. All around,
though, Solos is a curious and intoxicating affair.
