(2023) Gunn Truscinski Nace – Glass Band        


Review:
For Glass Band, Three Lobed have brought together three musicians who have all worked as duos before on several projects – the most current being the Gunn Truscinski duo, who have four albums out on the label. Experimental guitarist Bill Nace is a collaborator at heart, having worked with Kim Gordon on Body/Head, as well as Thurston Moore and Chris Corsano, among others, and his input brings a fresh bent to guitarist Steve Gunn and drummer/synth technician John Truscinski’s already established sound, ensuring this setup feels new and that Glass Band is an equal parts trio album. This also means that there is weirdness aplenty, and hurray for that! Opener Entrance wastes no time shouting from the rooftops that there is a new outfit in town, with the song title announcing the band before dramatic electric guitar notes, deep, rumbling drums and sparse cymbals come in. Both guitarists aim for a slightly locked horns juxtaposition in their playing here, with the notes sitting together beautifully, albeit with a certain defiance. It’s confident stuff, made more so by the following song, On Lamp, a nylon string guitar-led piece of patient playing with spectres of (I think Nace’s) electric guitar swimming far off and a drum pattern coming in like a distant thunderstorm. Gunn’s playing here is quiet, his double-picked strings well suited to the quick decay of the nylon string, but the supporting players elevate the music into something especially eerie. Tape is similar in feel and unassuming poise, with Nace’s anxious-sounding altered guitar (something put through the strings to bring a metallic timbre) eventually infiltrating Gunn’s playing until all three come together for a tribal-sounding workout in the final third. Elsewhere, Corner Dogs sounds like a Xylouris White piece with added dust and metal, it being built on an odd little tape loop that Truscinski and Nace scratch and rattle notes through, and it’s quite possibly my favourite of the lot, a perfectly formed three or so minute piece of strangeness. Fencer, then, is Corner Dogs’ big (very big) brother, an eleven-minute-thirty chunk of muscular, flexing, repetitive electric guitar coming in like a dystopian klaxon. There is an almost drone-like quality to this song, reminiscent in a loose way of Truscinski’s solo Bridle Path album. Glass Band is an unpretentiously experimental and adventurous album, with lots to discover and each player bringing plenty to the table. It is also a set that rewards, perhaps even demands, repeated listens, which is certainly no hardship. — folk radio




Track List:
01. Entrance
02. On Lamp
03. Tape
04. Venus
05. Corner Dogs
06. Fencer
07. Sacked
08. Junctions
09. Noctiluca


Media Report:
Genre: psychedelic rock
Country: USA
Format: FLAC
Format/Info: Free Lossless Audio Codec
Bit rate mode: Variable
Channel(s): 2 channels
Sampling rate: 44.1 KHz
Bit depth: 16 bits
Compression mode: Lossless
Writing library: libFLAC 1.2.1 (UTC 2007-09-17)


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