Rather than offering a single 75-minute disc (or a double album of two LPs, since vinyl has regained favour), Hassell preferred to split Pentimento‘s pieces into two volumes. Most of the tracks on this second volume were therefore recorded at the same time as those on the first, but when Hassell listened to them again after letting them rest for a while, he was not entirely satisfied. So he began to rework them. As a result, on this second volume, we can “see through the sound”, as the title rightly indicates, these levels in the background. The elements in the foreground seem to stand out even more clearly, and the textures are at once better defined, more varied and even more abundant. In the first piece, “Fearless”, for example, there’s the sound of flowing water, a raspy intermittent drone that sounds like a contrabass clarinet note, a rhythmic pattern provided by a guitar and keyboards, chords that evoke Portishead, some machine sounds and above it, Hassell’s hovering trumpet. Then in the back, at times, layers of another pattern appear and, in the distance, Hugh Marsh’s violin… Some pieces are vaporous, like “Timeless” and “Moons of Titans”, others are more rhythmic and bumpy, like “Unknown Wish” or “Reykjavik”, with their more experimental sound fragments and glitch. On the gliding “Delicado”, we even think we recognize, in the filigree, the echo of some of the trumpet player’s old pieces. On the aptly named “Lunar”, the judicious yet abundant use of echo really transports us to another planet. The last one, “Timeless”, is an utterly hypnotizing ballad with intersecting melodic lines, enhanced by all sorts of little rhythmic noises, some of which evoke teletype machines, with the various patterns seeming to fluctuate from one level to another. As long as you listen carefully, the whole thing will leave you dumbfounded.
Latest 360 Content
Interview Rock
Alex Henry Foster Talks About Overcoming Death and his new album, Kimiyo
By Stephan Boissonneault
Interview Classical/classique
Information: Montreal Oct. 1970 by Tim Brady: a first opera about the October ’70 Crisis
By Frédéric Cardin
Album review Electronic/Hip Hop/hyperpop 2024
Single of the Day: Kaya Hoax ft. Magi Merlin “Hot Girls with ADD”
By Stephan Boissonneault
Album review Americana/Pop
Taylor Swift – The Tortured Poet Department: The Anthology
By Alain Brunet
Album review classique/musique traditionnelle/Classical/trad québécois 2024
Karina Gauvin – Marie Hubert : Fille du Roy
By Frédéric Cardin
Interview Folk/Americana/Rock/hyperpop
P’tit Belliveau Talks About His New Album, Frogs, and Income Tax
By Stephan Boissonneault
Interview Rock/Electronic/Experimental / Contemporary/expérimental / contemporain/Pop
At Annie-Claude Deschênes’ table: between utensils & sound experimentation
By Louise Jaunet
Concert review
Université de Montréal | Jean-François Rivest’s Grandiose Farewell
By Elena Mandolini
Interview classique/Jazz/Classical
OSL | Naomi Woo | Musique du Nouveau Monde
By Alexandre Villemaire
Album review classique/Jazz 2024
Nadia Labrie – Flute Passion – Claude Bolling : Suite for Flute and Jazz Piano Trio
By Frédéric Cardin
Album review Classical/classique 2024
David Jalbert – Prokofiev : Piano Sonatas vol. II
By Frédéric Cardin
Interview Rock/Electronic/Pop/Jazz