Dreamsploitation: The In-Between Years: 1959-1963
Mystic Roses
Issued on Mystic Roses, the label founded by You'll Never Get to Heaven duo Alice Hansen and Chuck Blazevic in early 2014, The In-Between Years: 1959-1963 is the formal follow-up to Blazevic's 2012 Dreamsploitation release Jupiter Flight (Clocks & Daggers). While the two have a couple of things in common (each cassette-styled release features a half-hour's worth of music), they're dramatically different on stylistic grounds: whereas Jupiter Flight ranges between a three-part, multi-layered guitar setting (“Those Red Strings Found Feathers From The Fountain”) and hell-raisers (“No More Sunshine” and the title track), The In-Between Years: 1959-1963 strips out beats altogether for an eight-song, tightly focused foray into crackle-drenched soundscaping.
Blazevic's intent in this case is to mine the elegiac period in American popular music that existed between the late-‘50s retreat of rock'n'roll and the rock explosion of the early ‘60s (The Beatles, The Who, The Rolling Stones, et al.). As one listens to The In-Between Years: 1959-1963, it's well-nigh impossible not to be reminded of artists such as The Caretaker and William Basinski, especially when Blazevic's material plunges so deeply into the kinds of hauntological realms mapped out on their respective releases. That said, there's no denying the powerful symphonic sweep of Blazevic's own mini-epics, especially when choir-like voices repeatedly well up from the music's oceanic depths. The absence of beats allows the material to float freely, and consequently the tracks rise and fall in accordance with their own natural, wave-like rhythms. Consistent with titles such as “Who Can Be Happy?” and “Alone, Watching Lovers Passing By,” the prevailing tone is one of melancholy and sadness, as if the voices wordlessly intoning within the blurry instrumental masses are pining for a fleeting temporal paradise they know can never be regained.January 2015