For immediate release please
MUMPBEAK
TAKES PROG-ROCK TO A NEW PLACE
Self-titled Debut on RareNoise
Features All-Star Cast
Produced by Bill Laswell
AVAILABLE IN STORES AND ONLINE
NOVEMBER 28, 2013
AND THROUGH RARE NOISE RECORDS
ON CD, VINYL AND HI-RES DIGITAL DOWNLOAD
ABOUT THE LABEL - RareNoise Records was founded in
late 2008 by two Italians, guitarist /arranger/ producer Eraldo
Bernocchi and all-round music nut Giacomo Bruzzo. Located in London, the
label was created to present a platform to musicians and listeners
alike who think beyond musical boundaries of genre. For further
information and to listen please go to www.rarenoiserecords.com .
New York, November 4, 2013 - It is safe to say that you have never before heard anything quite like Mumpbeak.
Throbbing with intensity and a sense of mystery and searching on each
track and imbued with undeniable virtuosity, this powerhouse outing is a
significant extension of the prog-rock legacy established by the likes
of King Crimson, Yes, EL&P, Gentle Giant and others. Fueled by the
formidable yet flexible backbeats of Pat Mastelotto (King Crimson, Naked
Truth) and grounded by the humungous fuzz bass tones of Shanir
Blumenkranz (John Zorn, Abraxas), it stands as a stunning showcase for
the creative keyboard manipulations of Roy Powell (Naked Truth,
InterStatic), whose heavily-effected clavinet playing throughout
emulates guitar gods on the order of Allan Holdsworth and Jeff Beck.
Augmenting that core lineup is a cadre of low-end stars in bassists
Lorenzo Feliciati (Naked Truth), Tony Levin (King Crimson, Peter
Gabriel) and Bill Laswell, who also produced and mixed the session for
RareNoise. Together they create an imposing sound that is intricately
structured, in the great prog-rock tradition, though far looser and more
powerfully interactive than that genre generally allows. Says Laswell,
"Itʼs more elastic and thereʼs more humor in it than you would find in a really regimented, military prog band."
Part
of the looser feel to the proceedings can be attributed to the playing
of drummer Mastelotto, whose approach to the kit on tunes like
"Biscuit," "Monocle" and particularly "Piehole" is freer and more
flowing (in the tradition of Elvin Jonesʼs over-the-barline playing with
John Coltrane or Mitch Mitchellʼs Elvin- influenced playing with Jimi
Hendrix on the Experienceʼs ʻjazzierʼ numbers like "If Six Was Nine,"
"Third Stone from the Sun" and "1983: A Merman I Shall Turn To Be") than
with most prog-rock drummers. Says producer Laswell of Mastelottoʼs
interactive style throughout the Mumpbeak sessions, "That helps a lot. It keeps it from being math. It turns it into something a little more fluid."
Says Mastelotto of his jazzy inclinations heard on Mumpbeak,
"There was a lot of freedom. I recorded at home so no oneʼs watching
and I can just go for it and then edit the crap out. I donʼt think Roy
ever questioned anything I played on these tunes and if I offered him a
choice of direction on drum takes, he always chose the most out take.
Roy is a jazzy son of a bitch anyway, so it feels OK to do some of those
things like the double strokes you hear throughout the record. Growing
up, Tony Williams and Art Blakey were two of my favorite drummers. In
fact, I first heard Tony Williams Lifetime and King Crimson on the same
day, back to back, listening through headphones at the Oroville Public
Library in Oroville, California."
This
superb ʻart by committeeʼ project started off as the brainchild of
Powell, who crafted the tunes and structures from his base in Oslo,
Norway, then sent the music to Mastelotto to add drumming parts from his
home base of Austin, Texas. Finally, Laswell was recruited to
contribute the low-end to this slamming project. And for that, he chose
Blumenkranz, who is fast emerging as a rising bass star on the scene
through his exemplary work with John Zorn on various projects, including
his remarkable gimbri (Gnawan stringed instrument) playing with the
screaming two-guitar band Abraxas. Blumenkranz added his parts in a
Brooklyn studio while
Laswell did some ʻtouch upʼ bass parts at his studio in Orange, New
Jersey. Legendary bassists Feliciati and Levin later came onboard to
add their distinctive bass parts to two songs -- Feliciati playing his
signature fretless bass lines on top of "Nork" and Levin grounding the
highly experimental soundscape "Chain" with his trademark humungous deep
tones.
Mastelotto explains the genesis of this Mumpbeak
project: "Iʼll tell you how this batch of biscuit tunes started for me.
First, you need to know that Roy is a seriously crazed and deliriously
musical individual. So one day Roy sends me this email with his new idea
-- itʼs him playing clavinet through whammy and distortion pedals so it
sounds like a pedal steel or some crazy country style guitar player
with a B-Bender. I mean, it could fool anyone! Mondo coolisimo and so
dynamic and powerful! And Iʼm like, ʻWow! This is killer!!ʼ And I email
back to him, saying, ʻYou should put this out or do a record like
this.ʼ And. ..bam! He immediately sends me the first tune, ʻOak Room.ʻ
So he already had it brewing."
Powell explains his adventurous excursions on Mumpbeak.
"Over the years I have become less interested in stock electric piano
or Hammond organ or acoustic piano sounds. I gradually evolved more and
more interest in preparing a piano by putting things on the strings or
using effects on a Fender Rhodes electric piano and realized that it
helped me to find genuine fresh expressions. So one day when I was
playing my clav at home I thought I would max the guitar aspect of the
instrument and see where it would take me. I recorded some stuff and
sent it my Naked Truth compadre Pat
Mastelotto and he wrote back encouragingly. We soon had a whole bunch
of incredible musicians on board and I wrote up some parts and we got it
done."
Laswell
says he came on board after Mastelotto and Powell started cooking up
things together in their respective studios. "They created some
structure and some patterns and foundations and then I was given sort of
the opportunity to add bass ideas to it and then mix it. But it pretty
much was generated from their side, for sure. On our end, I recorded
Shanir, who is pretty dominant on a lot of tracks. There was notation,
quite a few structured patterns that Shanir had to deal with. But they
were fairly easy to follow and he played those very quickly and with
expertise."
After
decades of working as producer-conceptualist of countless recordings by
the likes of Herbie Hancock, Bootsy Collins, Sly & Robbie, Mick
Jagger, Motorhead, Iggy Pop, Ginger Baker, PiL, Buckethead and his own
series of Material, Massacre, Last Exit, Praxis, Painkiller and Method
of Defiance recordings, Laswell has come to embrace the studio as an
instrument in and of itself. Therefore, he has no problem at all playing
to previously recorded tracks.
"The
only difference between recorded music and live music is the visual
aspect," he says. "Playing live really doesnʼt have anything to do with
audio and sound and playing so much, itʼs strictly a visual thing. You
look over and you have this kind of perception that because youʼre with
someone in the studio, youʼre playing better together. Itʼs not always
the case. Playing with
recorded music is absolutely the same if you do this continuously and
consciously and with experience. Old school people say, ʻNo, you have to
play together,ʼ but that really goes way back and itʼs not necessarily
true anymore. We recorded Shanirʼs bass parts for this album in
Brooklyn. So naturally, he was playing with recorded music. Itʼs
something that everyone does these days. If you know how to play with
the sound youʼre hearing in the headphones, playing with recorded
information is absolutely no different than playing live with musicians.
You just have to adapt to it and it comes with experience. Theyʼre the
same thing, to me."
Laswell adds that his own bass contributions to Mumpbeak
were purely supportive. "Iʼm not really playing so much, just a few
riffs here and there, some ideas, some textures. Iʼm just providing a
little bit of support to the other basses."
While Powell mentions that he played a
synth organ loop on "Chain" and also solos on synth on "Forelock," the
rest of his keyboard contributions on Mumpbeak are played
strictly on Hohner clavinet. And he tweaks the sounds in some radical
ways using distortion and whammy bar pedals to affect electric guitar
sounds. As he explains, "The clavinet is like a guitar played from a
keyboard. It has strings (60) and pickups and a pre-amp, and if you run
it through an array of effect pedals into guitar amplifiers you can
achieve any sound you want. The only limitation was on the note bending
side of things and I solved that by using a standard guitar whammy pedal
effect. I just want to play all the sounds in my head especially all
the twangy metallic microtonal ones and the dark distorted metal stuff."
On
"Monocle," Powell comes up with shimmering chords then layers on
stunning legato lines that emulate British guitar god Allan Holdsworth,
of whom Powell says, "Allan has always been a hero of mine and
incidentally comes from the same part of the world as me." Then on
"Nork" he affects the signature whammy bar inflections of Jeff Beck
while also creating some rather unique koto type sounds on his clavinet.
And for his explosive, distortion-laced clav work on the closer
"Piehole" or the imposing maelstrom of "Oak Room," Powell says, "Think
of Adrian Belew and all the sounds he can create."
A
flood of ideas pour forth on this formidable release, which sets an
edgy new tone for prog-rock. Creativity and virtuosity abound on this
all-star project, underscored by an audacious streak a mile wide by all
the participants. Indeed, you have never heard anything quite like Mumpbeak.
TRACK TITLES
1. Biscuit
2. Forelock
3. Monocle
4. Nork
5. Oak
6. Chain
7. Piehole
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