Barreca / Leimer: Drowning Guides
Palace Of Lights
Over the course of four decades, kindred spirits Marc Barreca and Kerry Leimer have built significant individual discographies, with many of the releases issued on Leimer's always reliable Palace Of Lights imprint; they've also, however, collaborated on releases equal in quality to those each has produced separately. A compelling argument in support of that claim is their fourth collaboration, Drowning Guides, a 128-minute magnum opus spread across two CDs. Handsomely packaged, the physical release comes in a six-panel foldout case with a twenty-page booklet of landscape photographs adding to the strong impression made by the music.
As one would expect, a particular strategy was adopted by the duo for the project. For Drowning Guides, their collaborative exchange was restricted to re-voicing MIDI tracks that were then returned to the originator for final processing, editing, and mixing. However, the productions as presented blend both of their contributions so seamlessly, it's impossible to determine who's responsible for what, but it doesn't matter. These are collaborations in the fullest sense, with intense attention given to detail, texture, and development and processing and audio manipulation handled with sensitivity. Egos are set aside as both allow the emerging sound design to influence their choices and respond to the music as its form crystallizes.
Representative of the recording's first half is “The Raft of the Medusa,” which drifts and pulsates energetically for almost seventeen minutes, the material's incessant shape-shifting suggestive of the changing scenery that would have been visible from a raft coursing down a river hundreds of years ago. Of the two CDs, it's the second's material that is slightly more exquisite. As “Seiche,” its opening track, shows, the overall tone of the second half is comparatively more subdued and placid than the first and thus more conducive to contemplation. The degree of difference is modest, however, and consequently the first's seven settings flow seamlessly into the second's seven. The three-part, twenty-eight-minute “Fata Morgana Image” series that appears toward the end of the release similarly speaks to the high level of sophistication the artists achieve in their sound and compositional design, with the central part of the suite especially arresting.
Consistent with the album title, a kind of blurry quality informs the material, though identifiable instrument sounds occasionally extricate themselves from the mass—strings, percussion, piano, acoustic bass, etc.—and bob to the surface. Texture is key, too, with the productions subtly speckled with granular dust, crackle, and other tactile details. On the booklet's penultimate page, a lengthy alphabetical list of softwares and hardwares is displayed; yet as interesting as it is to scan it, one's advised to set it aside and instead direct one's full attention to the music to be fully engulfed by it. What you're hearing is the work of two highly advanced practitioners of their art operating in tandem and amplifying each other's strengths. Stated otherwise, Drowning Guides is a terrific addition to both of their catalogues and argues strongly on behalf of their collaboration continuing.May 2022