Tunnels — On a Body of Nothing But Radiance
The Tunnels is a one man project by Nicholas Samuel Bindeman, known for his participation in Jackie-O-Motherfucker. This cd-r is a re-release of a tape, and to the best of my knowledge, it's a couple of years old. The disc is self-released in a tiny edition, and is presumably self-labeled by Bindeman in black marker. This is the third artist associated with JOMF that I've have the pleasure of listening to, who were also at one time on the YarnLazer cd-r label. Honey Owens, aka Valet, and Adam Forkner's White Rainbow both produced very fine and very divergent psychedelic music for the label (and for Kranky Records as well.). Bindeman's music is slightly more "rock" than the aforementioned artists, yet his music is no less intriguing.
What is strange to me is that I have never been blown away by JOMF. In all fairness, I've never seen them live. Over the years, they've had forty or so members, finally settling on somewhat of a core lineup, which still includes Owens and Bindeman. The fact that I've never taken a glean to their recorded work may very well be akin to saying the same of the Grateful Dead. Improvised music is best experienced in a live setting, unhampered from the constraints of the studio environment. Having said that, every solo project that I've heard from a member of the collective has been impressive.
On a Body of Nothing But Radiance includes psychedelic fuzz jams with touches of Indian and Middle Eastern influenced drones, used as backing tracks. There are "songs" on this disc, but they're coated with an ethereal, yet ragged and homespun array of background and foreground accents. The disc starts off with Heavy Circles, a mantra like tune which takes a route along the lines of a stripped down 13th Floor Elevators, with vox more akin to Skip Spence than Roky Erickson. It's driven by distorto-electric guitar, and, like most of the rest of the album, it's backed up with clanky, yet tasteful percussion. The next tune, Isadora, lays some sitar-like jamming against a Middle Eastern tinged drone. So Good as When...is a weird tune with vocals doing some heavily reverb-ed slurring until finally building to an anguished intensity toward the end.
I Swear There Was Somebody There includes manic feedback laden guitar soloing over acoustic guitar strumming and soloing, making for a superb two minutes. Storm Whips the sand is another weird vocal rant, with dueling in-the-red guitars. The last track, You Help Me Breath is a fairly high pitched, sun scorched track, again with semi-blurred vocals and tons of clanking and carrying on. It's strange, but somehow the track exudes brightness.
The disc as a whole, though at times intense and very noisy, never descends into darkness. For all of its low fidelity harshness, there is a warm feel to On A Body Of Nothing But Radiance which makes for a fairly uplifting experience. Hopefully Kranky Records will rescue this from obscurity, as they did for Bindeman's colleagues Valet and White Rainbow. As it stands, it's well worth the effort that it may take to get your hands on a copy.