Mural — Tempo
The first two discs both have single, long tracks, whilst the third contains a 51 minute piece, and a 21 minute coda. This brings us to an odd feature of the release. The inlay notes make a strict point that, ‘In listening to the recording it is clear to us that Tempo is one moment - the breaks between CDs are only there because of the limitations of the media’. This conception of the performance as one whole is entirely valid, but it’s complicated, and compromised, by the odd decision to remove the first hour from the album. The track-listing reads: Second Hour, Third Hour, Fourth Hour, and Coda, which only highlights the omission further. There may be any number of reasons for this decision, but none are given; reading the holistic quote above, it seems a strange thing to do - especially since the beginning of an improvisation is undoubtedly one of the most exciting, interesting moments of a performance. I’m not po-facedly promoting the ‘every sperm is sacred’ school of improv, where a recording must as best as possible be a photographic documentary of every second of playing - I’m comfortable with editing, and cuts. However, the omission of the first hour’s playing seems weak, when the inlay notes make such a emphasis on duration and wholeness. This is compounded by the very existence of Coda: ‘breaks between CDs are only there because of the limitations of the media’, true, but separate CD tracks are conscious decisions…
What does it sound like? Well, bits are of it are very good indeed. The playing is overwhelmingly textural, and very colourful at that. Whilst the long duration might suggest a slow, sparse, landscape, the trio work up a head of steam at several points. There are various passages during Tempo, where Mural build up layers of scrabble, smeared by Denley’s almost electronic wind sounds, and punctuated by hefty percussive thuds from Zach. Sometimes these become rhythmic jerks, often led by Myhr - there’s a section near the beginning of Third Hour which is propelled by a two chord zither lurch. Myhr’s playing is quite often distinguishable as guitar or zither, while Denley flits between breathy, melodic lines, and more noisy, textural playing. Zach’s gran casa (a large bass drum with two heads) is perhaps the most intriguing element of the group; he coaxes all kinds of low drones, and percussive sounds from its skins. Founded on this, there’s a nice passage halfway through Third Hour, which is almost a restful, if dark, piece of ambient music. Indeed, the use of singing and clanging tibetan bowls, and the ripples of the zither, create a quasi-spiritual feel in places throughout the album.
Tempo definitely has some great sections within it, but it is clearly a monolithic beast to listen to. Ironically, of course, the addition of the missing first hour would have made it even more so. So, there is the obvious question of how this will be precisely listened to, given its extreme length.
However you approach the three CDs, there is a wealth of material on Tempo, from the barest near-silences, to more celestial drones, to the thundering outburst near the start of Fourth Hour. Unfortunately, much is made (in the inlay and artwork) of the performance space itself, the Rothko Chapel, and that is something the CDs can’t replicate. However, beyond the plain odd omission of material, this is an album of surprising depth and concentration.