Eclectic Bassist Bill Laswell Releases Two Distinct Digital Albums at Once
Experimental/avant-garde bassist, producer, and composer Bill Laswell has released back-to-back albums as part of his M.O.D. Technologies’ Incunabula Digital Series.
One album, On Brion Gysin, features the spoken word work of the late poet, photographer and filmmaker Ira Cohen, incorporated into Laswell’s music, in tribute to the work of the late artist and writer Gysin, who pioneered the cut-up writing technique that so heavily influenced writer William S. Burroughs.
The other is a one-track album called Untaken Path. It pairs Laswell’s electric bass with acoustic drumming from Japan’s premier drummer, Hideo Yamaki on a 15-minute track that shares the same name as the album.
On Brion Gysin Track List:
1. On Brion Gysin 1
2. On Brion Gysin 2
3. Elegy
Both albums are available for digital download: On Brion Gysin and Untaken Path.
I bought Untaken Path today after reading the profile above and listened to it 3x already. It’s 15 minutes of total bliss. Absolutely what I needed and was looking for. I’ll try to describe it… It was like my first time listening to Return to Forever’s Romantic Warrior for the first time, or like listening to Birds of Fire by the Mahavishnu Orchestra for the first time. The interaction between the bass and drum is climatic. It eventually explodes orgasmically. It’s like each player knows the other one is there but doesn’t care but it’s still symbiotic, like an old married couple in the same room. They’re on a plane. He’s reading his Kindle, she’s on the internet, but they’re still in tune with each other. There’s plane trouble, the pilot loses control. Chaos ensues. The plane crashes into the ground and explodes into a big ball of fire on impact.
I am completely blown away by Untaken Path, seriously. Buy it.