Two EPs in 2018 preceded their debut album Earthsong of Silence in 2020, with Clash Magazine declaring that Wax Machine “occupy a space somewhere in the gaps where English psych-folk, sun drenched West Coast sounds, Brazilian Tropicália and spiritual jazz overlap.” That year they also had a track featured on the Mr. The three minute, psychedelic explosion of Springtime is a "meditation on the cycles of nature, the dance of duality, the swinging of the cosmic pendulum.” The first half celebrates the light and beauty of this world, while the second half is a reflection on the shadow of our existence here. The first single and album opener Guardians of Eden is carried in on a cloud of flutes and birdsong. This version is a homage both to my motherland and the great big blue that separates us.” I go to the sea whenever I can, her presence enlivens, refreshes and brings me deeper awareness. Canto De Iemanja is about the goddess of the sea Iemanja, a chant Lau has often found themselves singing to the sea in their hometown of Brighton. The album features a version of Canto De Iemanja from Vinicius De Moraes and Baden Powell's seminal 1966 Brazilian album Os Afro sambas. Instead I've opted for the next best thing which is connecting with the spirit and culture of Brazil via the medium of music.” We then immigrated to Europe and I was never able to visit Brazil after that as it's a very expensive flight. “Brazil is where I was born and grew up until I was 8 years old, and it's where my family is from. Wax Machine is the project of Brazilian-born, Italian/English-raised Lau Ro, who takes a deep dive into their Brazilian heritage on this LP, taking inspiration from 60s tropicalia music and movement and the likes of Os Mutantes, Caetano Veloso and Gal Costa. Led off by the single Guardians of Eden, the album is set for release on 1st July via Batov Records (Şatellites, Sababa 5). Primarily recorded and mixed in a closet room directly above a mortuary, their self-produced album Hermit’s Grove is a heady trip through progressive psychedelia, kitsch Italian library music and Brazilian tropicalia. Listen to A Tap on the Shoulder in the context of Ryley’s glorious Course in Fable listento it in the context of Grubbs’s playing with Loren Connors, Jim O’Rourke, Taku Unami, and others or listen to it as if you’ve never heard note one from these soulful odd birds, the two of them curiously, quixotically committed to working inside and beyond song form.Surfing on a sun-drenched wave of psychedelia comes Brighton’s very own Merry Pranksters, Wax Machine. Juggernauts, A Tap on the Shoulder toggles effortlessly between microscope, telescope, and Cinemascope, letting the smallest of gestures land in all of its sonic specificity before opening the scene up to disorienting panoramas. And where the duo’s live performances thus far have been set-length
What’s good for the geezer is good for the, etc. Ryley’s hellion musical fearlessness lights a fire under the more typically Apollonian, chess-masterly Grubbs. Don’t think for a second that these shorthand descriptions suffice.Įlectric guitars make electronic music.
Studio sessions were clearly in the cards, and the result is A Tap on the Shoulder, a collection of duo performances that veers from crystalline instrumental compositions (“A Tap on the Shoulder,” “Accepting Most Plans,” “Dorothy Kept”) to animated alien chatterfests (“Leslie Steinberger”), and from ecstatic extrapolations charging this way and that (“Pump Fake on the Death Rattle,” “The Madman from Massachusetts in an Empty Bar”) to, I don’t know, words don’t do the trick (“Uglification”).
RYLEY WALKER KIKAGAKU MOYO BANDCAMP SIMULATOR
(One of these live sets was released earlier this year as Fight or Flight Simulator on Café OTO’s Takuroku label.)
Mutual admiration society and David Grubbs and Ryley Walker had been taking notes on one another’s playing for some time before they hit the stage together on a couple of blistering occasions immediately pre-pandemic. How about now? (Not for you to decide.) Or exactly what it means-except in the aftermath. You never know when that tap’s going to come.
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