Under the name Drainolith, former AIDS Wolf guitarist Alexander Moskos makes woozy, eerie deconstructions–rock songs slowed and stretched until they become séances. His 2012 LP Fighting! was an unpredictable gem, and his next effort promised more surpise, as he travelled to Colorado to record with Neil Michael Hagerty and Wolf Eyes’ Nate Young. But even he probably didn’t expect those sessions to produce a second record by a spontaneous new band called Dan’l Boone, consisting of himself, Hagerty, Young, and Charles Ballas, a member of Hagerty’s Howling Hex band.
Bringing such large-sized musical personalities together could be a recipe for chaos, and judging by Moskos’ hilariously confusing press notes, the process wasn’t exactly orderly; he claims, “we never knew if we working on the Drainolith record or the Boone record”. But while Dan’l Boone happily courts disarray, these four outward-bound heads manage to keep everything legible. Even at its densest, this is well-lit music, with all the brushstrokes visible and travels mappable. At times it sounds like the musicians are passing through the room separately rather than sitting in it together, but that’s often a plus: the way sounds ping-pong around each track creates a loose tension, tempting you to stick around for what might happen next.
Dan’l Boone opens with a sample from Wolf Eyes’ last album, No Answer: Lower Floors, which could be seen as a statement—but no single voice ever really takes precedence here. Hagerty’s peculiar way around a repetitive phrase gets some sway, and the vocals hit an intense moan common to both Young and Moskos. The sparse, sinister rumble of “Mindface” could pass for Drainolith (or Young’s minimalist solo project Regression), and the mashed-up howls of “Hostage Rock” briefly catch Wolf Eyes-like fire. But most of the time, Dan’l Boone intertwines sounds without blurring them – the work of a collective rather than hierarchical group. Such creative democracy rewards repeat listens, as focusing on each element reveals new patterns.
Dan’l Boone also provides the simple thrill of the bracingly weird, an effect enhanced by the participants’ track records in demented abstraction. It’s especially tempting—and not too tough —to hear echoes of Hagerty’s ground-tearing work in Royal Trux circa Twin Infintitves, especially in the fuzzy casio-loops of “Thee Testimonye of An Maiden”. But every member injects some insanity to the proceedings, slipping it under the surface like tectonic plates shifting beneath seemingly-solid ground. Part of the craziness is, paradoxically, methodical: Moskos claims that, at one point, he sang a 12-bar blues which Ballas and Young chopped into 300 pieces and randomly rearragned. Nothing here sounds as wacky as that suggests, but undercurrents of randomness course throughout.
Still, after listening to Dan’l Boone, it's understandable to be left with an odd sense of calm. The band’s brand of chaos leans toward the hypnotic rather than the assaultive; all the rambling activity can free the mind from pattern-seeking, letting it ride the noisy currents like a paddle-less raft. It seems like something similar happened to this quartet when they were making the album; perhaps the new surroundings and lack of expectations gave their instincts priority. Of course, Moskos’ recounting could just be myth-making, and perhaps everything here was carefully planned and executed, but what matters is Dan’l Boone sounds spontaneous, and all the more alive because of it.
