Release August 30, 1999
EAN/UPC: 705304892626
Traumton CD: 4432
Lineup
David Moss: drums, voice, percussion, electronics Michael Rodach: guitar, slide guitar, acoustic guitar, bass
Info / Info english
Rodach / Moss – Fragmentary Blues
“Is that my Bizness?“ keucht, japst, jault eine Männerstimme. Trotzig quietscht eine Gitarre hinein, schrille kurze Klänge. Immer zorniger verknäueln sich die Worte ineinander, Blues schiebt sich zwischen die Zeilen, sekundenkurz. Schon ist der Spuk der musikalischen Sinnsuche vorbei.Gewaltiges Gelächter?
Musik ist zweifellos das Business von Vokalist/Schlagzeuger David Moss und Gitarrist Michael Rodach. In ihrer ersten gemeinsamen Produktion treiben sie den Blues zum Wahnsinn. All die Klischees, gängigen Soundmuster und Klangfarben – auf “Fragmentary Blues“ werden sie ordentlich geshreddert und in neue Formen gepreßt. Bisweilen klingen die Resultate nach einer völlig überzogenen Parodie – das zweite Stück “Boys“ ist so ein Fall, in dem sich Moss’ Stimme wie ein Chamäleon einer ranzigen Männer-Vison annähert und sich sogar im (nachgeahmten) Geheul einer Polizeisirene verliert. Hektisch, zerstörerisch, irrsing – die Bezüge an James Brown sorgen in “Story Time“ für Lachanfälle und Verwirrung. Doch nicht alle dieser 20 kurze Stücke verfolgen ein lautes wildes Muster. “Blues for Tango“ etwa taucht in die Schwerelosigkeit blauer Tiefen, Worte werden nur bruchstückhaft laut, sepiafarben wie alte Photos mit gezacktem Rand.
Moss und Rodach haben sich zum Thema Blues viel zu sagen: Gitarre, Percussions und Stimme reagieren wachsam aufeinander, focusieren und umtanzen die unterschiedlichsten Stimmungen zwischen Chaos und der eigentümlichen Ruhe mitten im Sturm. Auf unnachamliche Art haben die beiden Künstler eine zeitgemäße Variante dieser alten Musiktradition gefunden, eine, die der individuellen Zerissenheit im postmodernen Dasein auf die Sprünge hilft. Wie heißt es so treffend in “Wittgenstein Blues“: “The gramophone record, the musical thought the score, the waves of sound: a pictorial relation between language and the world / In fact there´s a general rule: the musician can read the symphony out of the score“.
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Rodach / Moss – Fragmentary Blues (english)
„Is that my Bizness?“ puffs, pants, howls a man’s voice. Defiantly, a guitar screeches in, short schrill notes. The words tangle up with each other furiously, manically, blues pushes in between the lines, for a second. And suddenly the storm has passed and with it the search for musical „sense“. A burst of laughter?
Music is undoubtedly vocalist/drummer David Moss’s and guitarist Michael Rodach’s business. In their first joint production they play the blues into complete madness. All of the clichés, popular sound patterns, tone colors – on „Fragmentary Blues they’re all shredded and pressed into new forms. Now and then the result sounds like an overly exaggerated parody – like on the second track „Boys“, where Moss’s voice sneaks up like a chameleon on the vision of a rancid man and then loses itself in the (imitated) howling of a police siren. Hectic, destructive, insane, references to James Brown in „Story Time“ provide for laugh attacks and confusion. But not all of these 20 short tracks follow a loud and wild pattern. „Blues for Tango“ for instance, dives into the weightlessness of blue depths, only fragments of words are sounded, sepia colors like old photos with serrated edges.
Moss and Rodach have a lot to say to each other on the blues: guitar, percussion and vocals react alertly to each other, focusing on and dancing around the most widely varied atmospheres between chaos and the proverbial quiet before the storm. Inimitably, the two artists have found a contemporary variant of this old musical tradition, one which lends a helping hand to individual inner conflict in post-modern existence. So rightly put in „Wittgenstein Blues“, The grammophone record the musical thought, the score, the waves of sound : a pictorial relation between language and the world / In fact there’s a general rule: the musician can read the symphony out of the score“.
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„Who could imagine ? A blues album — a „fragmentary blues“ album? Well, I never really imagined it either. But then Michael Rodach and I met in Berlin at a recording session for trumpeter/composer Paul Brody’s „American Folk Songs“ project. From the beginning we loved each other’s sound and style, approach and eccentricities, energy and rhythms. Fate ! Then Michael invited me to play a duo with him (as live music with the old Warner Brothers „Road Runner“ cartoons) for a jazz festival. So in December 1997 we played together for the first time: funk riffs, improvisation textures, fast changes, odd sustains, blues quotes, rhythm fragments, odd melodies and (James Brown inspired) screams — all mixed with that minimalist/repetitive and definitely dada-inspired cartoon bird and coyote. After the concert we both knew it was only the beginning. And Stefi Marcus, of Traumton Studio, who heard us that night, realized the potential of our duo and invited us to record at the studio sometime and „see what happens…“. And somehow we both felt that the power of our duo came from an odd mixture of improvisation, noise, fund and blues elements.
Then, after more than a year of schedule conflicts we finally set up at Traumton. We wanted a ‚live‘-feeling: no headphones, no room dividers, no vocal booths; just the guitar, drums, and voice hearing each other in a room, playing and responding. After 3 days recording, and some vocal and guitar overdubs (we couldn’t resist, because so many songs gave us new ideas), this was the result: improvised songs based on our own eccentric perceptions of the blues. Guitar, drums, and voice — on the one hand, pretty basic; on the other hand, perverse, distorted, fragmentary, transformed.
Through it’s lyrics and rhythms, „Fragmentary Blues“ pays homage to the blues music that we’ve heard for years. The words, voices, passion, sounds, noises, beats, fractured blues forms, quotes and warped riffs are playful elements of old and new music, Michael and I found many sounds and ideas that we’d never made before. We certainly never imagined the 20 songs on this CD before we sat down in the room together to discover these fragments and moods. But hasn’t „blues“ always been about personal voices, life-stories, intense moments and surprises, anyhow ? We both wonder how listeners will react.“
David Moss, Michael Rodach, Berlin, June 1999