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Cory Smythe

Accelerate Every Voice

Review by Gary Hill

It seems appropriate that this release is being reviewed in the same issue as a collection by John Cage. This is similar to his work in the way that it is very much outside the box and experimental. There is a lot of discord here. I think John Cage would have really liked this. Like that Cage release, I am putting this under progressive rock because of the experimental nature of the release. It's not prog in a traditional sense.

This review is available in book (paperback and hardcover) in Music Street Journal: 2020  Volume 3. More information and purchase links can be found at: garyhillauthor.com/Music-Street-Journal-2020.

Track by Track Review
Northern Cities Vowel Shift
Freeform chaos comes in here. There are weird operatic voices along with clashing musical concepts. It has some purely crazed piano. There are weird nearly spoken voices, screamed ones and more here.
Accelerate Every Voice
Feeling almost connected to the previous piece, this has a more purely classical approach, but also use of strange loops and lots of dissonance and chaos. The voices on this do some particularly bizarre things. This has some jazzy scat singing and some backwards tracked stuff.
Marl Every Voice
Again, this seems like an extension of what has come before it. It has backwards tracked elements, weird voices and crazed piano among other things. Weird atmospherics with piano and what sounds like a tea kettle takes it late and holds it for a while.
Kinetic Whirlwind Sculpture 1
Strange vocal bits make up the early portions of this. It works to bizarre freeform spacey ambience from there.
Vehemently
This has the same strange vocal concepts from the previous number along with more trippy ambient weirdness of a more instrumental variety. There is some pretty crazed piano on this thing.
Kinetic Whirlwind Sculpture II
There is an element of this strange sound tapestry that makes me think of car horns. In fact, that is the main sound here. There are other elements more as layers on top, including some voices.
Knot Every Voice
There are weird voices, piano and more on this freeform bit of strangeness.
Waterproof Song
This frantic piece feels much like the previous number.
Piano and Ocean Waves for Deep Relaxation
The titular ocean waves bring this into being. The cut is over 19 minutes long. Strange ambient elements seem to take over from the waves. I never really make out the piano on the piece, unless it's slowed down to create the ambience. Still, this is a restful and relaxing number.

 

 
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