The Harp Factory on Lake Street
| The Harp Factory on Lake Street | |
|---|---|
| [[File:|center|frameless]] | |
| [[File:|center|frameless]] | |
| EP by Gastr del Sol | |
| Released | 1995 |
| Recorded | |
| Studio |
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| Label | Table of the Elements |
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Track listing
Personnel
Reviews
CMJ New Music Monthly
January 1996[1]
Franklin Bruno
[...] Gastr's current release, The Harp Factory On Lake Street (Avant), is its least rock-derived and most ambitious yet, a single, 17-minute track supplemented by nine other musicians. [...] Harp Factory (a reference to the Lyon-Healey building on Chicago's South Side, one of a handful of American harp manufacturers) dispenses with the rock-band format altogether. A quiet acoustic figure introduces the piece, only to be drowned out by a sustained orchestral blast from the entire ensemble, which includes, among others, bass clarinetist Gene Coleman, Shellac bassist Bob Weston (on trumpet), and McEntire again, this time playing synth. Through overdubbing, just nine individual musicians perform up to 60 parts during these sections. Although most of this music is composed ("If I want to improvise, I can go play at the bookstore around the corner," says O'Rourke), "composition" here has a wider meaning than the European classical tradition would allow. "Some composed sections have pretty loose parameters," explains Grubbs. "We'll sit on these chords or choose between a couple of chords, or improvise using these several pitches for x amount of time... I tend to write out instructions for myself. People have said, 'I'd love to see your graphic scores,' and they're these little junior legal pads." O'Rourke concurs: "Traditional notation is nothing. I could spend hours notating every detail of a part, or I could just tell someone like [bass clarinetist and frequent sideman] Gene Coleman, and he'll get exactly the same thing faster, and he'll probably play it better. The people that I write for, I know how they play, and they know how I write." [...]