[Image: from “Modifications to the ICE ‘Polyhedral Model Kit’”
by Phillip Barak, PhD, Assoc Prof, Dept of Soil Science
 at Univ of Wisconsin-Madison]

   

   QA’A (pronounced, simply, “Ka”) is a Barcelona-based band on Màgia Roja, an indie psychedelic/noise record label. Their latest record, “Chi’en” (2009) was mixed and mastered at Faust Studios in Germany, with support from Hans Joachim Irmler himself. And after listening to it, it’s clear to me why Irmler might have become involved: “Chi’en” is a powerful effort that has much of the focus, daring, and breadth of vision of the great krautrock acts of the 60s and 70s.
   This is a bold, uncompromising record. QA’A feels completely assured as it explores territory that’s by turns mantra-like and hypnotic, shrieking-atonal, funky-jazzy, spare and rustic, tribal and antic, or just plain unclassifiably alien. “Chi’en” operates on a daunting scale (six songs averaging over thirteen minutes apiece) and what’s impressive is that the songs are largely justified in their length — each track is a mini-LP unto itself, full of plot-twists, about-faces, climaxes and codas that, for the most part, cohere.
   Take “Peeling Off”, 25 exhilarating, frightening minutes of everything from Cromagnon (the band, but also the early human) ritualistic mutterings, Amon Duul bonfire-chants, chiptune glitch-beats, Pollock-like tangles of guitar noise, and sax wails straight out of The Stooges’ “L.A. Blues”. This is obviously the kind of thing you’re either reading about right now and thinking: “Hell yes!” or “Umm, no” — soundscapes like this are a bit polarizing. Often, the only way a band can make 25 minutes of this kind of sound-adventure compelling is to either do what it does here and provide endless variety and richness of texture, or let the exploration unfold against a grid of pattern — something QA’A consistently does in “Chi’en” through recurring guitar motifs & catchy bass riffs. What this does is properly ground each song’s far-reaching explorations. Think of some of the more anarchic passages in “Daydream Nation”, where Shelley’s drumming can anchor Lee & Thurston’s twin Fender soundscapes. You have that kind of magic going on here on “Chi’en”, and it’s not only impressive as hell but a lot of fun to listen to — this is a band delighting in the possibilities of sound.
   Other highlights include the way the guitars tidal-waved in about halfway through the opener, “Eastdown Westdown”, after a mysterious underwater opening full of tense, hushed vocals. The squalls of feedback at the track’s close provided satisfying release. I also loved the Can-like percussion breakdown mid-way through “Speaker Box”, and the whole of “She Provides”, with its menacing bassline, demented pitch-bent guitar riff, and firestorm of catharsis. It’s the second to last track, and by this point the record has grown steadily more exploratory with each song, culminating in the free-form lunacy of “Peeling Off”. “She Provides” in this context is like a seizure after some kind of bout of chemical madness. And after this kind of frenzy comes the only thing that can or should come — rest in the form of the pastoral, restrained, acoustic closer “Chi’en”.
    The record has flaws — passages in some of the songs, particularly “Speaker Box”, overstay their welcome, even if you’re like me and don’t mind music taking its time to unfold. Also, some of the production and instrumentation feels like it’s only paying homage to the past, where involving more of the present would have been welcome (example: I would have loved more of the glitch-core breakdowns in “Peeling Off” dispersed throughout the record).
    It’s rare that a record this vast & bursting with ideas and sounds (definitely try with a pair of good headphones), is able to hang together not only song by song but in its conception as a whole. This only happens when a band knows what it wants and isn’t afraid to take itself as seriously as its vision demands. That kind of presence in the world of contemporary psych/prog is rare — compromise and lack of technique find many bands noodling away in lo-fi under-reach. Not these guys. With “Chi’en” they’ve made a fearless second record that proves the spirit of late 60s experimental music is alive and well, thank you, and is living in Barcelona in a room in the House of QA’A.
   

C. Way/ SnailCrow.com © 2010
   
   
More of QA’A on the web:
   
www.myspace.com/houseofqaa

Màgia Roja

Below are samples from the work of Rebecca Vicars, a painter who divides her time between New York City and Guatemala.

Here is a recent work, “Portal”:

I love the turquoise and mauve, and the dark purple corona, like a fringe of hair, circling the central disc of swirled & bled tones. Like some of Redon’s work, like a piece from Debussy’s Preludes, hues here blend and blur in mysterious, unnameable harmonies.

Here’s another recent work entitled “Papaya”:

Papaya has such presence here, massive, fleshy, wounded. The background & table, with their closed, earthy tones & grains, crowd everything in, pressing the viewer against the fruit. And note the squat avocado as anchor, behind, with its pocked and brooding green, secretly balancing everything.

Her Etsy shop: http://bvicars.etsy.com

And her site: http://www.rebeccavicars.com.

In lymph,

-S.Crow/ Chris

      A beautiful novel.
      I urge anyone to read The Wizard of Earthsea, not just those who are C.S. Lewis & Tolkien fans [two others often mentioned in reviews of Le Guin’s work], and not just those who are interested in fantasy and science fiction. The language is spare, noble, at times biblically rarefied. The psychological insights are shrewd and not over-labored. What this slim novel says about the human condition and our collective struggle to overcome fear and be whole could fill a library.
     I’m not very good with plot summaries, so I’ll keep mine minimal: the setting is a mythic place called Earthsea, made up mostly of ocean and archipelagos. A boy, Ged, grows up on the isle of Gont with great innate talent for magic. He rapidly grows into his powers, eclipsing his peers, but struggles with pride, anger, and temper. He lets loose a dark nemesis early on in his development which he must spend the rest of the novel coming to terms with and challenging. This struggle of Ged’s to reckon with and integrate a dark side, a shadow, forms the dramatic and emotional crux of the novel.
     I loved too how Le Guin explores the idea of True Names; everything in Earthsea has a surface name [the protagonists’s birth-name is “Duny”] and also a True Name [his True Name is “Ged”]. Like Plato’s Ideals, this world of Earthsea is made up of transitory markers and their inherent, immortal signifiers. Magic on Earthsea is dependent on a sorcerer’s knowledge of True Names — without the knowledge of a thing’s True Name [be it animal, stone, ghost, person, region of the sea, etc] , one cannot control it or affect it with spells. Much of the action in the novel revolves around Ged, his friends, and his enemies navigating the external world and the unchanging signifiers that world is tethered to. It’s a fruitful and flexible philosophical underpinning that (among other things) distinguishes Le Guin’s world as unique in the fantasy canon.
     There’s so much more about this book I loved. For instance, the inhabitants of Earthsea seem to be uniformly dark-skinned — at one point early on, Ged thwarts a pirate raid, and the murderous, pillaging pirates are described somewhat like Vikings, pale-skinned and fair. Ged and most of his friends, meanwhile, are clearly described in many passages as being dark-skinned or black. Not many books of the fantasy/sci-fi canon — and keep in mind the times; she wrote this in the 60s — feature non-white protagonists, let alone entire nations of non-whites. And incidentally, Le Guin doesn’t treat this detail at length or pointedly/politically (it’d be fine if she did, but that would mean a totally different novel); this physical detail of her characters is mentioned very matter-of-factly.
      Finally, and I’ve talked about this already in brief — I love Le Guin’s voice. It’s tender but forthright, economical but not dry, careful in its use of details: just enough to keep the novel from being too lofty & allegorical. She spends good, warm, emotional page-time on the friendships Ged forms, the rivalries, the interactions with people and animals which help shape and challenge him — something vital to this novel of otherwise solitary struggle and awakening.
     So, anyway: man, book review. Been a bit since I bashed out one of those. I feel like a middle schooler again. Enough — it’s a damned great novel so go to the library, git it, read it.

Ursula K. Le Guin’s Site

Order Ursula’s Books
   
C. Way/ SnailCrow.com © 2009

! ! ! ! ! NEEDLE OUT Album Release ! ! ! ! !

HAI TEAM!

      My new album’s out and I’m happy to share it. I know cds are passe and all but it’s the only way I’ve gotten around to distributing the thing, so bear with me. I’m proud of these 11 songs (about 35 minutes) and I hope you eat ‘em up like fritos.
      As a bonus, you’ll get free cd-sleeve-sized ink & brush art with each order for a limited time (i.e. until I get too busy to do it).
      Free mp3 and order page here. Just $6 including shipping [US only], that is cheeeepieeeee!

      Enjoy the Springin.

-C.Way

Various photographs, paintings, collages & drawings of mine for sale via PayPal here.

“Untitled 10″:

Thanks for looking and let me know what you think if you have a chance.

-CW