Zaïmph, "The Stranger" (Drawing Room)
ICYMI, Rhizomatic Gaze was one of the most fascinating experimental releases of 2018. On it, Zaïmph (aka Marcia Bassett, a guitarist with the Hototogisu, Double Leopards, GHQ, Un, and others), erects a forest of eldritch drones and uneasy atmospheres. The effect is like ingesting a drug that's too obscure to be described on erowid.org and then going scuba diving in a body of water whose name you can't pronounce. I suggest you listen to it after midnight with someone you trust.
The reason I'm bringing up this record now is that Bassett is performing tonight with the brilliant Samara Lubelski at Chapel Performance Space, and I forgot to write a proper blurb for it. Oops. I highly recommend that you go, as the bill's rounded out with some of the West Coast's most rigorous drone-based sound designers and songform-subversives: Kaori Suzuki/John Krausbauer and Greg Kelley/Robert Millis.
It was hard to choose a track to review from Rhizomatic Gaze, as they're all worthy of analysis, but I'm going with "The Stranger," for brand synergy... and because it sounds amazing. Bassett launches a cosmic swell of aerated, distended guitar and distant, angelic vocals, summoning memories of Europe's most profound tone poets: Popol Vuh, Richard Pinhas, Fluence, and Sensations' Fix. This is wholly holy music, a diaphanous portal to higher planes of existence. Witnessing Bassett improvise with equally sublime violinist Lubelski—with whom she's been playing for a decade—should be extraordinary.
