Ken Camden - Lethargy & Repercussion

Ken Camden
Lethargy & Repercussion
(Kranky)
Rating: 3.7 of 5


Chicago experimentalist Ken Camden has been assigned roles with the Implodes Sound Quartet and Pittsburgh’s Mike Tamburo; the latter, acting as guitar contributor to the supertemporal Universal Orchestra of Pituitary Knowledge album Ghosts of Marumbey. Now acting as bellwether to his own flagship for modern classical and experimental ambient music, he recorded and re-recorded several one-take pieces and carefully selected the top qualifiers for the new Kranky release Lethargy & Repercussion.

This is not music for study. This is an engaging exploration, yet you will want to remain recumbent to digest it. The six tracks unfurl as follows.

In naïve jubilation, the fluttering arpeggios spray about on the opening tessellation “Birthday”. Every trill permeating deep within the eardrums, Lethargy is a headphone enjoyment through and through. The second exercise, “Raagani Robot”, begins down a passageway to the otherworldly featuring swells in modulation from left to right in static delay. As the track culminates, the hypnotic dance shifts the playfulness of the intro to something more convoluted before petering out. Think DOPO without vocals. The trend goes: everything is to play out before seven or eight minutes expire.

The metallic cicada-song of “In Your Ears” bounces channels with just enough basal communication to resonate an uncannily warm feeling of microcosmic isolation before invoking the Eastern spirits of “Raga”. The adaptive bourdon of the tanpura (used in several of these compositions) bolsters the midrange of the equalization in these mixes. More pedal-work through guitar mutterings persist as “New Space” opens up and ultimately sublimates.

Final vision “Jupiter” (the only inclusion to benefit from overdubbing) drones and wavers in illuminating epiphany. The sound of blinding light, God, paranoia, space travel, the afterlife; whatever the intent—Camden’s expressions are limitless. The melodic modes are still seventy-five hundred miles east, but the intended destination is extraterrestrial.

In Your Ears - Ken Camden

The review posted on ZapTown
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