Bob Burnett: I just spent the last few hours slowly nursing a "holiday season" Stella Artois, watching the sky change while listening to Loren Connors' 2xCD compilation
As Roses Bow-Collected Airs 1992-2002. Happy Holidays indeed! Loren Connors is someone whom I began pursuing this past year. It was timely to do that given he released this
Collected Airs compilation as well as a 3xCD set called
Night Through: Singles and Collected Works 1976-2004. Before these
Family Vineyard label CD compilations came out you'd have had to pursue Connors via small label or self-released 7" singles or limited edition vinyl or CD runs by labels such as Menlo Park, Road Cone or his "breakthrough" releases on Table of Elements.
![](https://lh3-testonly.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_tGeANJj_ORihc67Z_CJLiWf9uFvCmdtbPmJsY-4n4UB5AlXMHFTWWkKVhgH_JY0sl0DkeekGxPTNw7FnEaZBMZ6zPiXsCCLGndziKGUrsmTpeqbpfMrlF3HSIBqsPtWHw7ZOy0fvly58jEyGoHGdK3X1WVB2O4=s0-d)
In fact, the liner notes say
Airs 1992-2001, an earlier CDR version of this collection, was released in 2002 on his self-imprint, Black Label, in an edition of......10. In fact,
Collected Airs is made up of compositions from 10 albums, 8 of which are out of print. There's more bio information available on
his website.
In listening to
Airs today, I'm drawn to the floating, fragile openness of this music--and it's charm. Most of his compositions are instrumentals; occasionally he's joined by his wife, vocalist Suzanne Langille. Connors writes that his
Airs series is inspired by Irish airs of the past--namely 17th-18th century composer Turlough O'Carolan who wrote for harp. The music is gentle; it draws you into the quiet changes taking place in each particular composition. Connors' electric guitar tone stays relatively the same--fuzzy, warm and pleasingly eccentric.
![](https://lh3-testonly.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_sSyEBcYg233MpvjtAaL-R3jjQtaqKmDGreL2Gyr-T3KSs4W9YlFzf_2KWlzkAAMBD7gzye1K2KBuBHQW3pfYpztmpYA6ryhwhErj6jGAdiJHm52BpqLO2-mrI8yq0x0klKPEDnXX_2X10z6Vzbv3IV=s0-d)
When I'd made my way through
Collected Airs I thought..."now what?"...thanks to the near perfect listening experience. I gave it a break for a few minutes and tried to move to more guitar music--Noel Akchote's trio effort (with Eugene Chadbourne and Marc Ribot)
Lust Corner for example. I'm afraid I wasn't ready for their multi-layered virtuosity. I'm now back to Loren Connors---this time disc 2 of the
Night Through compilation
. My house is filled with fat, floating overtone/feedback joy.
What a nice time.
No comments:
Post a Comment