BIRCHVILLE
CAT MOTEL – gunpowder temple of heaven
(CD,
picadisk)
Another month, another review about a release somehow
related to Lasse Marhaug, and if only as release number four on his new
found label Picadisk. Check out Hild Sofje Tafjord, Hijokaidan and
the Incapacitants
as well as one of his recent solo releases “it’s not the end of the world”
to get an impression on the restlesness and workload of this man. But this
review is not about Lasse Marhaug, but about another guy who has never spent
a minute in his live leaning back and enjoying some time doing nothing at
all, it seems. For some time I thought I had a pretty good impression on the
work of Campell Kneale aka Birchville Cat Motel and that I was aware of the
range of releases he has under his belt, but then comes “gunpowder temple
of heaven” and there is a three page discography of Birchville Cat Motel
in there, that lists 21 Compact discs, five full albums, a long list of 7 to
10 inch records, an even longer list of CD-R releases and where the heck
will I ever be able to get some of those 15 tape releases mentioned here.
Somehow I feel I need the “Chaos Steel Skeleton” 6CDR box release noted
in here.
More to the fact, this discography shows that New
Zealander Campell Kneale has been around basically forever and has done
collaborations with many artists around the world, from Fear
Falls Burning to Anla Courtis, from the Yellow Swans to Lee
Ranaldo and from Bruce Russell to Guilty Connector. To some he is also known for
his work in the band Black Boned Angel, who had a hype for two or three
months around here, which faded when none of their music was available. In
all this time and all this variants of musical expression Kneale has formed
a unique sonar language that derives from the guitar and which he displays
to perfect execution and emotional impact on “gunpowder temple of
heaven.”
The disc contains one, epic track that seems to make
time stand still. It starts with somebody turning on the switch and then
nothing seems to move anymore. Taking a step closer into the dense, flirring
wall of sound there is actually a multitude of dynamics and movement, when
layers upon layers of sounds are shifted and shoved, manipulated and
mingled. I just realised that Bruce Russell uses exactly the same metaphor
– about time standing still – in his liner notes to the CD, so it seems
that this effect is almost universal. Anyway, I will have to find a new
metaphor quickly. Hm, I decide for immersion. The situation where emotional
and physiological control is taken away completely and the human mind is
sunken into a mesmerizing state of non-input that makes the subconscious go
completely wild, but leaves the rest of the organism as relaxed as three
weeks of holidays in the middle of nowhere.
The sounds shine with clarity and crispness like the
sun on freshly fallen snow on an arctic spring morning. I think it has also
been said before, but I don’t shy away from moving it: where other drone
artists stack layer upon layer and thereby produce more and more mush of
noise and compression, Kneale builds a fantastic site of sound that stands
tall and invincible like a medieval cathedral. Hey, Russell also talks about
cathedrals in his text! Is there nothing left for me? Does he have to take
up all the good metaphors or what? It would probably have been better if I
had just copied his text in here, would have saved me a lot of work, too. I
guess it is my fault because I rarely read liner notes, except on those old
jazz records, where mostly they don’t make any sense at all, but do a lot
of talking anyway.
One more try and this time I will keep it simple: this
is big. “Gunpowder temple of heaven” is a musical piece of enormous size
and stature. Almost gargantuan. And it moves like the Leviathan does in the
endless depths of the ocean, with grace and might, though slowly and
careful. Sometime later on a reverb of something or other marks a distant
bass drum going slowly all six of seven seconds. Compared to a lot of
minimal music and droning what seems left out a lot and what seemed to make
all those many releases bloodless and without energy is just that: size
filled with energy. This release seems like it is filled to the brim with
sound that pulsates and reverberates, that stirs and lives and contains
enough energy to make a village last through the winter.
