Acid Mothers Temple is the perfect band for geeky record collector types: a semi-mythic history, a genuine Guitar God for a leader, and most important of all, a seemingly endless supply of side projects and related bands to fret over. Over the past year or so, a flood of releases from these "Japanese psychedelic speed freaks" has been unleashed to quench the thirst of rabid completists-- live albums, reissues, vinyl-only releases, etc.-- it can all be a bit daunting for the uninitiated. It's the kind of thing that kept me away from the Fall for so long, and to my ultimate regret once I finally took the plunge into their vast and intimidating discography.
On this disc, Makoto Kawabata, the leader of Acid Mothers Temple, collaborates with Richard Youngs, a Scottish songwriter, sonic experimenter, sometimes librarian, and vegetarian cooking columnist probably best known for his musical partnerships with Simon Wickham-Smith, which often result in Dead C-ish noise sculptures. But he's also known to take a much more hermetic stance, composing such minimalist statements as "Sapphie" and "Advent," the latter of which was recorded with only guitar and kazoo accompaniment.
On paper, this Kawabata/Youngs pairing has all the making of a all-out aural assault. The easiest path they could have taken would have been for Youngs to record some ear-splitting, distorted garble and have it shipped to Kawabata who would superimpose an afternoon's worth of blistering guitar solos over it. And even though this record was a long-distance affair, Kawabata and Youngs did the right thing: they decided to listen to one another and shoot for subtlety over brute force.
Youngs typically lays the foundation on these compositions, adopting one of his more meditative moods. Building upon autoharp, organ, or distantly droning tape sounds which constantly shift and realign, Kawabata fingerpicks his way back to Youngs' home turf, often recalling such British folkies as Bert Jansch or John Martyn. He slowly dwells upon an inner theme, never high-jacking the songs with his guitar for his own display. Youngs adds vocals on two of the five tracks, sometimes sounding oddly like Robert Pollard, other times like a more embittered Roger Waters.
None of the tracks are titled; they're differentiated only by numbers and bars of different colors and lengths. The first track is the most traditionally song-oriented piece: a far off autoharp underpins Kawabata's bright, rollicking flat-picked steel-stringed acoustic work as Youngs sings about how, "There's so much beauty now," in a heartbreakingly honest voice that can't be denied. The least accessible track is the second, which takes a dense swirl of autoharp and guitar notes and slowly submerges them in an organ drone that rises over the course of 12 minutes.
But, all told, this is far from the difficult music you might expect from these two; my attention never wavered over its 42-minute running time. Admittedly, it would be a stretch to call this release essential, but it would be sad if music this good was confined to the collections of Acid Mothers Temple completists. It's much more suited to open-minded folk aficionados or even fans of electronic ambient and trance.
