Spoors

The Science Group
ReR Megacorp

Crashing Icons

Absolute Zero
ReR Megacorp

Reviewed by Michael R. (Mike) Mosher
mosher@svsu.edu, Saginaw Valley State University, University Center MI 48710 USA.

Prog Lives! This is clearly progressive rock, yet significantly more challenging in the melodic and rhythmic realms than the overdetermined Yes or Emerson, Lake & Palmer of our baroque highschool years.

The Science Group is yet another Chris Cutler project, and his propulsive drumming in unusual rhythms is a welcome part of it. It is topped with keyboard workouts by Steven Tickmayer, bringing arpeggiostic runs like off-kilter Hanon Exercises and other times a knotty yet soulful organ. Tickmayer is also the composer of the songs on Spoors. Jazz guitar by Mick Johnson is sometimes reminiscent of John McLaughlins playing with Miles Davis. Bob Drake is the bassist. This is music with empty spaces in it, and the CD cover even shows a cloud chamber with subatomic traces as northern Californians rest assured are measured at Stanford University's Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC). There is complexity to the Science Groups music that ebbs and returns, and there is a counter-tendency for the comedic and slapdash. And thats not bad.

Among the first six timelines, one evokes Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band, another is dynamically (Frank) Zappa-esque, and a third seems like the theme for a Charlie Brown TV special played by Little Richard amongst full-tilt robotics. There is the cacaphanous Slopes and Blind Alleys, a sort of refined evocation of the Stooges L.A. Blues. Dispersants suggests a contemplative cat or sleepy dragon stretching, a moment of rest before tackling the busy Dance of the Arguments. Two of the most interesting tracks are the shortest: the portentious Interrupted Thoughts, with its bells and its somber, funeral Beethoven chords, and The Regrets, which suggests nerds at play with its bubbling xylophone. Following these, Marching off is a bagatelle of wobbling wind-up toys that the Bonzo Dog Doodah Band would pantomime, before the track becomes rocking and ominous. There is the impish and clompy Slow Land, with Detroit church organ. Discrete Networks and Urban Music seem collaged from loose parts lying around, cinematic and expansive, bringing gamelan and chirrups, a circus calliope summoning a dangerous menagerie of animals (leaving their Spoors), dissolved into a lazy accordion alongside the Seine.

Absolute Zero is a Florida-based trio, whose Crashing Icons proves itself theatrical and ambitious from the first track onward, with its concentrated keyboard attack and all-over-the-map drumming. Aislins voice on the first track makes one wonder if her voice is classically trained, as it swoops in and out of the soup of keyboard, drums, and contrapuntal bass guitar. In some places her voice is woefully undermixed or under-micd. On the third cut Stutter Rock/You Said, Keith Hedger contributes some jazz trumpet. Sueneos Sobre un Espejo is a rather depraved tango whose eerie parts are punctured with interesting guitar noodling.

From this collection, Absolute Zero seems like a good-humored bunch of musicians to see perform live. Some songs are unmemorable and dont support their skilled playing; songwriting should be explored more deeply. The packaging is rich, its liner notes including poetic observations by Aislin and drummer Pips silly story of travel hardships with the band. Theres also a poster that unfolds to reveal the visages of myriad influences that include Max Roach and other nonconformists like Angela Davis, William Burroughs and Dennis Hopper. Both of these artworks were assembled by Aislin.

Though some college radio stations may tackle prog-rock, middle America's Classic Rock radio stations rarely play the genre, preferring the workingmans reassuring 4/4 thud. Both the Science Group and Absolute Zero reinvigorate a musical genre that is often reviled (and, for its pomposity, often deserving it) in their listenable, intelligent ways.