DAVIS, JOHN: Ask The Dust LP
John Davis "Ask the Dust" LP
Hailing from Northern California, John Davis is a sound artist, composer
and filmmaker who has released music on labels such as Root Strata and
Digitalis. With “Ask the Dust,” he offers up a moving suite of
compositions made using a plethora of instrumentation including guitar,
piano, tape loops, Max/MSP, field recordings and the newest addition to
his arsenal, a complex assortment of Blacet synthesizer modules. Davis
uses the synth not as the crux of his recordings but as a tool among
many in his kit, weaving oscillations and mangled or rhythmic tones
through pastoral webs of processed guitar and field recordings. To this
end, the richness of his palette cannot be denied, nor can his prowess
as a masterful arranger of abstract sound. “Superpartner” opens the
record, a jittery array of pure sound that refuses to sit still,
developing slowly and accruing detail and a sparring partner in the form
of delicately treated acoustic guitar. Perhaps the record’s defining
movement, “Synecdoche,” begins with a contemplative, and even romantic,
piano arrangement, sparse and beautiful - a moving miniature that is
abruptly broken apart and replaced by a bed of layered sine waves and
guitar haze which somehow matches the radiance of what preceded it.
Striking in its attention to detail and compositional deftness, “Ask the
Dust” is easily Davis’ most refined set of recordings to date, a deep
album that rewards focused and repeated listening.
Tracklist:
1. Superpartner
2. Joy Meridian
3. Palestrina
4. Synecdoche
5. Julian Wind
