Tabs Out

Christopher Brett Bailey – Sax Offender

1.29.20 by Ryan Masteller

I first had mixed feelings about Christopher Brett Bailey’s “Sax Offender,” a title so off-putting that I almost didn’t even give it a chance, what with its proximity to this MF-ing Bleeding Gums Murphy record (he looks so sad!) and probably also Herb Alpert’s “Whipped Cream” (that lady looks less sad). Also the track titles are all double entendres – “Sax Pest”? I wish! And then there’s the jail-cell sleeve this thing comes in, giving the whole thing a very retro, outdated vibe: “Maybe I should be in jail … lock up your saxophones …”

But OMG – could that be the point?

Bailey, a London-based writer and artist otherwise (and with that fantastic haircut, what else could he be?!), is a sax caresser, the opposite of a sax manhandler, but in a totally non-creepy way, which makes the whole “Sax Offender” thing a bit lighter, a bit winkier and noddier than some people may realize at first. He’s certainly not heaving “saxily” into that mouthpiece and hoping the spit valve holds out for the duration of a performance. On the contrary, he’s running his instrument through “reverb, octave, and three loop pedals,” layering sound upon sound and drone upon drone until the soup’s so thick you can eat it with a fork. This is EXPERIMENTAL saxophone playing, and not even remotely close to Colin Stetson or anything like that.

So Bailey sets the mood, and maintains the mood, over five fairly lengthy pieces. Only the sub-two-minute “Sax Criminal” ventures into “traditional” playing, with a fairly straightforward (albeit effect-drenched) run tiptoeing into standard noir territory. But the rest is a fever dream, a Black Lodge mist of proto-Badalamenti swamp tone that swirls around itself until you’re not sure where you are or what year this is. Somebody get Dean Hurley on the phone. Bailey’s playing is as natural as breathing, and it will mesmerize you until you can’t tell friend from foe, or even if there were any friends or foes to begin with (there didn’t have to be). 

You still weirded out? Don’t be. Get hip to Christopher Brett Bailey. On Pastel Heck. “Only 50 copies available!”

Nils Quak – Rolltreppen im August

1.28.20 by Ryan Masteller

Nils Quak’s been around the block (and no, that wasn’t an intentional rhyme, but I’ve left it so you can see how skillful I am), having released stuff on, among others, Audiobulb, SicSic, Umor Rex, Cosmic Winnetou, Sacred Phases, Phinery, and “Not On Label” (which I’m presuming was an upstart around the release of Quak’s 2013 tape “Infinite Folds”). Here he lands on Kolobrzeg, Poland, label Plaża Zachodnia, a bastion of ambient and electronic experimentation. Because Quak is also an ambient and electronic institution, the pairing is as apt as it gets. 

“Rolltreppen im August” is German for “Escalators in August,” a strange juxtaposition of indoor technology and time of year. I figure you can ride an escalator anytime, regardless of month, and it would be the same as any other month. For example, if you’re at the airport and you need to get to another level, you may be wearing a coat if it’s winter or shorts if it’s summer, but the interior climate of the building would be the same. Are there any outdoor escalators? I guess at sports stadiums, etc., but you don’t go to those year round. Quak, what are you getting at here?

Maybe he’s playing mind games with us, and that’s OK, because I think he’s playing mind games with himself too, programming his synthesizers and allowing the sound to lead him wherever it goes. The sound trickles across the tiled floors of long, wide, empty rooms, like abandoned 1980s malls or abandoned urban convention centers (with tiled floors). Where’d everybody go? Nobody knows, but Quak’s tones burble like ghosts in corners and flit around the rafters and skylights, moving with ease from one level to the next and back. Quak’s exploring these empty spaces and imagining the concept of absence within them. Sometimes he rides the escalators to see what sounds he can coax from the different levels.

Just don’t let in the zombies! Too scary. (So are ghosts.)

Edition of 30.