Bark!
Contraption
Psi 2007

01. Polaris
02. It's a Life
03. Gyre
04. Snout
05. The Diver
06. Below Zero
07. Spanners
08. Mr Pointy
09. Decompression

«Against the laziness of the cerebral circuits, and virtually dedicated to the brigade awaiting for the moment in which music will be brought back to the ones who should officially own it, comes this exercise in uncontrollable instigation to disobedience by Rex Casswell (electric guitar), Phillip Marks (percussion) and Paul Obermayer (samples). Nine tracks that fight the e-commerce of presets, laptops and pro-tooled bedclothes through the one and only available weapon: instant fancifulness. "Interplay" may be a word too often used without really considering its real meaning; this time, though, it makes all the sense in the world, as these three musicians not only listen - with the utmost attention - to what they reciprocally do, but also let us intuit what's going to fill the blank spaces, leaving a little margin for the sounds to self-determine in order to extract immediate reactions and indeterminate enthusiasm from our systems, cranial twitches and spastic foot-beats augmenting their intensity in parallel with the puddles of scintillating liquids and ruptured percussive patterns characterizing tracks like 'Snout' or 'Mr Pointy'. Contrarily to many well known improvising motor-mouths whose redundancy leads them to repeated three-and-outs, Bark! is that kind of ensemble that deteriorates the patience of saints through insistent pricks to common sense that nevertheless cause an irrepressible smile of approval. A true fusion of radical gestures and wide-eyed electronic sapience that calls for an immediate check by the inquisitive minds.»

>> rapid / fsend (61mb)
>> love it, buy it (Squidco)

One of the unique attributes of this session pertains to band’s fusion of the acoustic-electric factor; at times it is difficult to distinguish between the organic element and Obermayer's sampling maneuvers. But overall, it's mostly about the extension and expansion of spontaneous composition, woven into the fabrics of this brave new world we inhabit: anything is free game. Gripping work, and so much fun.