GE Stinson was born of gospel roots in Kingfisher, Oklahoma. Such a
birth indicates a variety of options. Richard "Oh What A Beautiful
Morning" Rodgers for one, or Jerry Lee Lewis and just about how the
world could become dust (in the eyes of God or not, as the case may be),
learning the blues on a guitar bought working the railways (and
performing with B.B.King and Muddy Waters), this expanded into jazz and
the avante-garde and formal composition training.
All this lead to seminal band Shadowfax through the 80s and a final Grammy Award. That takes us through 1988. A Thousand Other Names is his new direction and
something of an underground supergroup. Joining him are veteran Japanese
vocalist and composer Kaoru, who always sounds a bit like Liz Frazer,
guitarist Nels Cline (who has worked with everyone from Charlie Haden to
Mike Watt via Thurston Moore and his own band) and percussionist/
melodica player Brad Dutz (Leo Kottke, Rickie Lee Jones, Terence Trent
D'Arby).
It's a thick brew alright, and one which contains too much for
it's own good. Clocking in at a little under an hour, with only eight
tracks, this is heavy-going and a little like being turned to dust. The
Japanese connection speaks volumes if we're thinking atomic, of course,
and California is itself renowned for crumbling into rubble every few
years. According to the press release, the opening, "Meadows," is
exactly that: "The fragile and tragic circumstances for life on the
fault lines." That's almost true for the whole record, actually. It's
less an album, more a collection of eight individual pieces, as much
paintings as songs. It's album-as-art-gallery. This is partly the result
of the fact that each track sounds like a elegiac finale, the closing
point of a different album eight times over.
It tends toward the maudlin
in one way, but more than that it's a genuinely unnerving experience,
discomforting although impressive, detailed, exciting and intriguing.
The second number, optimistically titled "Marie Marie," is arpeggiated
twang guitars and a lullaby singing "Snow once fell on a photograph of
you/ Someone spoke and night came around the room." It appears to be a
hymn to sexual contact that moves at the same pace as Jarmusch's "Dead
Man" (i.e. very slowly) and although the chorus is very melodic,
Stinson's voice is too much of a hazy baritone to do anything
approaching giving it wings. That, coupled with the lengths involved
here in minimal contact, means that the listener has to be alert if this
isn't to become unsettling aural wallpaper. That's not bad, but it isn't
good either. The patience required only sometimes equals the results
attained.
"Dirty Boy" is slightly faster, still overly centered on the
lower range of the aural spectrum, the flashes of Japanese and
unexpected feedback meshing into a wall of light patterns. Again, less
song, more sensual/ sensory experience. "Walk In The Fire" uses ethnic
rhythms to the same degree as Bruce Cockburn, although aurally we're
sleeping under desert canvas with This Mortal Coil or Peter Murphy or
Siouxsie and the Banshees or Strangelove. The "Dead Man" thing is still
apt, too, with the life rhythms exemplified by ancient tribal culture
being rejuvenated.
"My Paradise" is less successful, mainly because the
spoken delivery fails to convey the multiplicity of the lyrics, instead
sending us only the doom-laden elements. It examines the gospel
surrounded youth of the vocalist but the beauty and transcendence are
left purely to to the spiraling lead guitar melody. As the time passes
the eight minute mark the gap between this and, say, Jane Siberry's
"Sweet Incaradine" becomes uncomfortably clear.
But things restore with
the Nick Cave-y doom-funk of "Disappear." This isn't easy and some
bits are just too heavy for their own good. It's too long, too, and
threatens to go under, but the lyrics ("make me a bed beneath the pecan
tree") and production create fascinating soundscapes and regularly
enough this is very nearly excellent. However, at their pace very nearly
can still seem like a long, long way.
December 1996 - Fright X Magazine - Denise Bashmore
Music of G.E. Stinson is executed perfectly on this CD. This is great music for those nights that you find yourself at 3AM contemplating your navel. G.E. Stinson's music has a certain edge that seperates it from standard offerings. The lyrics are spiritual, poetic and sultry. Buy it, it's great!
