Garrincha And The Stolen Elk

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3...according to our Mike on Thu 14 Jul, 2011.

Christ, this is a tricky record to pin down. Apparently Davy Bui and Matt Kretzmann have been making music together for a decade or so now, but this is their first album together. It seems to be a mix of live instruments and manipulated noise and found sounds. It's pretty minimal, but not exactly a comfortable listen, with weird slowed-down vocal samples over fairly amelodic organ and guitar and lots of swooshy noises. It's a little bit ambient noise, a little bit concréte...if you're into stuff like Nurse With Wound it'll probably push your buttons. Every now and then they hit on a kinda primitive groove but largely the structure is fairly confusing and ambiguous. There's loads of slowed down vocal samples so I feel like I'm listening to it at the wrong speed, but I just cranked it up to 45 and that didn't sound right either. A dark and awkward listen for solo late night immersion.

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With a pair of cassette releases in recent months on the venerable tape labels, Stunned Records and 905 Tapes, Garrincha & The Stolen Elk may seem like neophytes on the scene but the truth is Davy Bui and Matt Kretzmann have been making music together in one form or another since 2002. Both have been active in their regional noise and DIY scenes for years with little official documentation other than Bui's releases in Antennas Erupt! for Weird Forest and S-S Records. Garrincha & The Stolen Elk's full-length debut reflects this combined two decades of fully integrated experience and influences.

"I Don't Believe You" kicks off the album with chiming bells and an upbeat church hymn slowed down and matched to a barrage of processed chanting voices. The song morphs into a hypnotic guitar loop layered with ringing synths, guitar washes and ghostly vocals, all building to a cacophonous climax replete with bleating saxes, a buzz metal riff and shredded guitar. "Tower of Babble" begins with sounds of rainfall and something sounding like slowed-down Gregorian chants as a chiming guitar melody softly repeats, eventually giving way to a buzzing organ drone, a tribal drum beat and belted German vocals before taking a final sinister turn with an insistent snare roll propelling the song towards its grand finale. The album concludes with the side-long, three-part "First Rites, Last Communion" suite. Heavily comprised of processed Asian church ceremony field recordings accompanied by occasional guitar and keyboard statements, the piece eventually erupts into a maelstrom of noise blasts, wild guitar and ringing bells before settling into a series of long, drawn out tones.

Mastered by Graham Lambkin (ex-Shadow Ring), this album sounds like little else in the Weird Forest catalog.

Mastered by Graham Lambkin. Design/layout by G+SE & Aaron Winters.

Vinyl edtion of 300 copies comes with insert.

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