Articles
2010 Artist Picks
Francesco Tristano
Albums
36
Access To Arasaka
Aeroplane Trio
Christian Albrechsten
Gilles Aubry
Andreas Bick
Wil Bolton
Caroline
Chaim
Scott Cortez
Dead Voices On Air
Margaret Dygas
F. Gerard Errante
Seren Ffordd
Field Rotation
Marcus Fischer
The Ghost of 29 Megacycles
Tania Gill
Gord Grdina Trio
Herion
Hummingbird
Ironomi
Yoshio Machida
Machinefabriek / Liondialer
Phil Manley
Matta
Mem1
me:mo
Miko
Momus
Moshimoss
Roger O'Donnell
orchestramaxfieldparrish
Cédric Peyronnet
Resoe
Danny Saul
Dirk Serries
Shedding
Clive Tanaka y su orquesta
Robert Scott Thompson
Two People In A Room
Undermathic
Wires Under Tension
Clive Wright
Compilations
Joachim Spieth Selected 6
Playing with Words
Reconstruction of Fives
20 Centuries Stony Sleep
EPs
Balmorhea
Clara Moto
d_rradio
Deepgroove
Kyle Bobby Dunn
Fear Falls Burning
Hammock
ptr1
Quiroga
Sawako
Phil Manley:
Life Coach
Thrill Jockey
Appearances can, of course, be misleading. On the cover of Life Coach, Phil Manley looks for all the world like a guitarist from Jimmy Buffet's back-up band. But, needless to say, the debut solo album by the Trans Am founding member includes no cover version of “Margaritaville” or anything remotely like it. Instead, Life Coach is in some measure designed to be an homage to German recording engineer Connie Plank and the recordings he made with Neu!, Kraftwerk, Harmonia, Cluster, and Popol Vuh. That it does pay tribute to the German krautrock sound of the mid-‘70s is evident immediately when the Autobahn-like “FT2 Theme” rolls down its own highway in a free-spirited blend of motorik drum machine beats and jubilant synthesizer melodies. The album extends its stylistic purview beyond one style only, however, in its nine instrumental songs, all of which were composed, performed, and recorded entirely by Manley between 2003 and 2010.
“Work It Out” finds Manley in No Pussyfooting territory with the focus firmly on electric guitars working themselves into multi-layered formation, sometimes merging and other times offsetting themselves from one another. “Night Visions” likewise brings Manley's Fripp-like guitar attack into a pulsating field of uptempo guitar patterns. Contrast emerges in the form of “Forest Opening Theme,” a brooding synth-ambient setting that evokes Popol Vuh and Cluster, and two acoustic folk settings, “Lawrence, KS” and “Make Good Choices,” that nicely spotlight Manley's finger-picking technique. The closing title track brings the album full circle by revisiting the drum machine and synthesizer pulsations of “FT2 Theme,” but this time slowing the pace to an easy-going cruise.
Gear used for the recording included a Fender Telecaster electric guitar, Gibson Country-Western steel string acoustic guitar, vintage synthesizers (a Roland Juno 60, Arp String Ensemble, Mini Moog, and Roland GR-20 guitar synth, among others), and a Roland TR-606 Drumatix drum machine. One of the recording's most appealing qualities is that, just like the ‘70s recordings to which it pays tribute, it's concise, with the album weighing in at a lean thirty-six minutes. The optimal format for Manley's recording would be twelve-inch vinyl, with five songs on the first and four on the second. The presentation of the release suggest as much too, as the songs are shown in two groupings on the back cover, and the CD itself is designed to resemble an old-fashioned vinyl label.January 2011