If you haven't discovered Bill Sethares' 'Xentonality'...

MMM friends,

Since Bill has so kindly written up my 'Divide by Pi' effort with Andy
Hasenpflug, I thought I would return the favor by reviewing both of his
recorded CD's, first 'Xentonality', then 'Exomusicology' in another post on
some later date....many of you (the majority I'm sure) are familiar with
Bill's seminal works already, and they rightly stand as important landmarks
in the specific study of how tuning and timbre are intimately related.

Briefly, my first encounter with Bill's music was through the internet via
John Starrett's site about important microtonal composers and links to info
and musicians in the microtonal scene. I remember the delight upon finding a
sample of 'The Turquoise Dabo Girl', enjoying the strange futuristic sound of
a world that for me conjured Kubrick's plastic nightmare world of the 'Milk
Bar' in 'A Clockwork Orange'.

Speaking of 'Clockwork Orange', where Bill Sethares is not yet the razor-sharp
producer/composer the likes of a Wendy Carlos, (how many mortals are?, and
bear in mind I still have to hear most of the 2nd disc, 'Exomusicology') the
best tunes are quite strong indeed, and he makes up for what I feel are the
weaker parts with a very studied encyclopedic survey of various tunings, and
more specifically and most importantly, how tuning and timbre should fit
together, a field of expertise in which he is known in these parts as an
undisputed master researcher. In this sense, this is one of the more
important microtonal disks out there, and to top it off, the music at its
best is delightful.

The 'Xentonality' disk is 16 tracks full (yes, a cornucopia !) of what I would
call 'etudes', not in the 19th-century virtuoso-performer sense, but in the
'study' sense, of tuning. In general, all the tracks are well worth the
hearing, but since there are *16* of them, and I write this review at 1 in
the am, let me briefly describe the ones I felt were standouts for me, (which
were mostly the ones furthest from being modelled on pop style writing--I
reveal my style bias). It *is* impressive what a variety of masks Bill wears
stylistically, not to mention the technical importance of his work in tuning
and timbre.

We are thrown into the Marrekesh marketplace, I feel, with the opener 'Ten
Fingers', where 10-tet never sounded so harmonious! There is also great use
of stereo field in this track. However, sometimes the performance is a bit
marred by unsimultaneous attacks and loose time, creating a certain
intoxicated looseness of tempo feel. Or was this deliberate? (humanizing
function in a sequencer? -- without details of the production process it's
hard to tell) This looseness was sometimes noticeable on other tracks as
well.

'Circle of Thirds' (track 2) is like a 10-tet rotating kaleidescope with a
spacious, almost ominous middle section. It ends abrubtly and delightfully,
and features a kind of portamento synth lead that I've since noticed is a
sort of Sethares trademark. 'PentaFunk' (not from this album) and 'Turquois
Dabo Girl' (from this album) use it.

My favorite track on the album, 'Duet for Morphine and Cymbal' is so vastly
unique in the microtonal recording oeuvre, as well as for this collection,
with it's eerie organic pulsing and hallucinogenic quality, that it might be
the most important musical statement of all of Bill's output that I've heard.
This to me was pure magic, a deftly and simply conceived work which reminded
me of the best electronic music put on record to date, from the likes of
Morton Subotnick or Tod Dockstader. It definately has a great 'retro-sci-fi'
feel, and is very tightly performed as well. The fascinating liner notes
indicate that the timbres are derived from the x-ray diffraction patterns of
a morphine crystal !! Bill, please do an LSD piece for us !!! (or even THC?)

Ditto the next track 'Tingshaw' which was so delightfully and gently metallic,
I listened to it three times in a row. The scale is derived from the tuning
of the bell sample. This track is up there, perhaps next to, the high musical
level of 'Duet...' Again, wonderful stereo field and use of percussive drum
elements as well. Here, the timing was not at all marred in the way some of
the other, more pop-oriented tracks were. Bill seems 'In his element' or 'In
flow' on this and the previous track. There's also a neat little place where
the music unpredictably stops and restarts it's momentum. Very delicious...

A problematic track for me was 'Incidence and Coincidence'--it's starts out as
an innocuous sounding, almost dopey little tune, and then rips into a nice
prog-rock type theme, worthy of King Crimson or Yes, 44 seconds into it. My
problem is I *love* the 'heavy' second theme where it occurs, but don't care
all that much for the surrounding material. Perhaps a track of the 'heavy
theme' alone, entitled 'Coincidence', remixed for yours truly? ;) The piece
*does* have a fascinating genesis--the study of how 19-tet and 12-tet can
coexist.

Two pieces for Gary Morrison's 88-cent tuning come next, 'Haroun in 88' and
'88 vibes', of which the latter stands out for its fragile, explosive, and
pleasantly glassy vibraphone arpeggios, which flank a stately middle section
reminiscent of a royal processional with a pop music slant.

'Truth on a Bus' is simply a 19-tet guitar piece--the liner notes allude to Ry
Cooder style, I heard a bit of Leo Kottke's delicious style in there as well.
Wonderfully simple and moving, and one of the strongest tracks on the record.

'Imaginary horses', in a Lou Harrison 5-limit minor hexatonic scale, has a
wonderful disarming simplicity to it, and a good use of 'galloping piano'
texture.

Finally, also one of the top 5 or so tracks for me, the 'Turquoise Dabo Girl'
(11-tet) relishes, as I alluded above, the world of the futuristic night-club
perhaps. We seem to swim in a nightmarish room of purple and lavendar with
robotic women waitresses and lava lamps, art deco furniture and silver space
boots. Very vivid, darkly humorous, too!!!!

In short, a wonderful disc containing some delicious pieces of music
illustrating a seminal concept from a leading composer/theorist that deserves
every bit of its reputation as a landmark in the field. Bravo, Bill !!!!

(more to come on 'exomusicology')

--
Aaron Krister Johnson
http://www.dividebypi.com
http://www.akjmusic.com

I should also write that I overlooked a stellar track in my write-up of Bill's
album (so much for late nate writing) 'Glass Lake': a beautiful, dark,
understated yet menacing soundscape where guitars, basses, and flutes are
'spectrally mapped' to the sound of a tom-tom !! This is a 'glass lake'
wherein I might be careful not to swim, for fear of what beasts the forboding
tritone-laden melody might be hinting exist in it's depths !!!

A unique sound world here, folks. Good stuff....

Best,
--
Aaron Krister Johnson
http://www.dividebypi.com
http://www.akjmusic.com