Biota - Cape Flyaway
SKU
ReRB7
After many, many years of work, this is apparently the final Biota release and it's also probably their finest as well as their most accessible. The heavily treated sonic material remains, but as in their last few, it's applied to a very 'folky' under-carriage.
Think of the most twisted-yet-musical take possible on Sandy Denny/June Tabor/Judy Collins imaginable and you have a glimmer of what they are doing here. Really nice. REALLY NICE. And a gorgeous art portfolio is included. Highly recommended.
"After 5 years of extensive and careful work, the new and much anticipated CD by this extraordinary collective, who have no parallels, no rivals and no peers, is at last complete. It’s a dense and indescribable orchestration of electric and acoustic guitars, clavioline, trumpet, Hammond organ, micromoog, biolmellodrone, electric and acoustic violins, bass, mandolin, accordion, piano, rubab, kit percussion and sometimes voice, layered and radically processed in the unique Biota manner. There is a leitmotif of folk elements in this piece that emerge from the roiling, swirling quicksand of sound we now expect from Biota, with texts by WB Yeats and snatches, arrangements and influences floating by way of Christy Moore, June Tabor, Judy Collins, Sandy Denny, Bert Jansch, the Bothy Band and older traditional sources. Biota craft sonic worlds that relate to, but are not built like, the music with which we are familiar; for them time is a continuum rather than a sequence of events; a simultaneous present in which past and future possibilities exist conterminously. With a 24 page full colour art portfolio from the Biota collective.
This album’s aural world is as vast as space, and seemingly as limitless; they are the one group most apt to embrace the latest technology, and to put it to good use to create "anti-music". But the outcome is so beautifully flowing and amazingly profound that their radical methods create positive change in a sonically transparent way, rather than to bludgeon the listener into submission by means of shock tactics. The result then, is elucidating and exciting. BIOTA are the un-challenged masters of hypnotic sound collage; each instrument is highly treated with effects BEFORE being recorded, which shows that the intention of the music is the means unto itself, and there is no cheating or "fix it in the mix" principles at play. This is real, veritable, and important stuff."