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CD Feature/ David Watson: "Fingering an Idea"

  Tobias

There was a time, when albums were not only pressed to Vinyl, but actually conceived with the format in mind. Artists would record an “acoustic” and an “electric side”, bring together a side of “songs” and a side of spun-out improvisation or contrast a “bright” side with a “dark” side. Because those days are long gone, “Fingering an idea” will probably find it hard to be appreciated by many.

In line with the list of opposites from the first paragraph, this double album has a bagpipe-disc and a guitar-disc. Between the two, there seems to be no other rational connection but the fact that both are instruments Watson, who is dividing his time between New Zealand New York, has been experimenting with for large parts of his career – a major aspect when considering this record not only serves to present listeners with some of his more recent work, but is also intended to act as a gateway into the oeuvre of a man, who has not exactly been generously endowed with media attention.

The relationship between the two CDs is certainly not straightforward. “Dexter”, which contains the bagpipes-pieces, is more varied in approach and thus more eclectic in its general outlook, but the powerful serenity of its drones makes individual tracks seem cohesive. The nervous guitar exorcisms of “Sinister”, meanwhile, are completely torn apart, fragmented and almost schizophrenic – but the continuity of this clustered high-bloodpressure noisescapes renders the disc as a whole perfectly homogeneous.

At the heart of the contrast lies a pronounced difference in approach. The sometimes over a quarter of an hour long bagpipe pieces analyse the sonic potential of the instrument, manipulating it through breath, the combination with other sound sources and through electronics. “Dexter” reinforces what is almost common knowledge: That the bagpipe has a remarkable similarity with the tambura of Indian classical music in many ways, that its play with harmonics is fascinating enough on its own to concentrate fully on its sound-aspects (and doing away with its melodic capacities) and that it directly combines textural dimensions with rhythmic components.

The respectful software-manipulations, however, also give a demonstrative example of how adjusted the bagpipe is to our contemporary musical environment: It has a raw and primordial facet to it, but offers a richness and depth even in its simplest emanations, which is of an immediate physical nature – and therefore invulnerable to trends. Watson runs through a string of timbral transformations, which shortly culminate in sine-wave like dissonances. But most of the time, he stays true to the original colours of his instrument of choice, which triumphantly return in full in the closing seven minutes.

“Sinister” will not have a similar impact, simply because so much has already been said about the guitar. While these condensed tracks might have sounded bewildering or outlandish in 1987, when the first cassette recordings of Watson were taped at the Amica Bunker in New York, they are part of a tradition now, which is being continued in the works of many contemporary artists – a school, which sees the guitar as a tool for sound production rather than a classical instrument and which uses its entire body.

Watsons input consists in a complete resistance against clear-cut tonal, melodic, sound- and arrangement-related centres. His pieces itch as though bugs and worms were crawling underneath their skin, with sudden strikes of concrete chords piercing through the music like a hand scratching the surface in a bid of stopping the pain. There is no resolution here, as the music returns to the same phrases again and again without development or hope. It requires a completely blank and open mind on the side of the listener not to get lost here and the reward lies not in enlightenment, but in the chance of watching the tracks unfold according to their own logic.

Nothing here, not even the liner notes, point to an easily definable philosophy behind “Fingering an Idea”. I don’t even think that the inclusion of the bagpipe should be seen as a conscious approach to rehabilitate the instrument in the eyes of the general public. I rather suspect that Watson simply seized the chance of recording two entirely different works handed to him by label owner Phil Niblock and realised two CDs full of intriguing, provoking and powerful music. With regards to their potential for fascination, that is more than enough.

By Tobias Fischer

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