Rating:   3 Ratings     12345  

Rothko and Blk w/Bear Wish For a World Without Hurt Trace

      Mark Beazley and JS Adams, Rothko and Blk w/ Bear respectively, have tapped into the very sound of thought, sorrow, and confusion. As frightening as it may be, there are times where the music is so distinct and powerful that it takes the listener right back to wherever they may have been on that day. It is this type of sound-association that is usually derivative of the actual sounds heard personally in a drastic situation such as the one in question here, but Beazley and Adams are able to tap the live wire that connects us all and drum up the flicker of newscasts and stunned faces looking for some sort of explanation.

Inside of the CD tray, we find the following words:

If you look at our time in history from that day forward, you will see that we are in the midst of another mini-era where things that are happening as you read this will be accounted for directly when the information is taught and re-taught to our children and theirs down the line. If there is a distinct sound to that era, if there is one resounding noise that carries through the images and accounts of not just one day, but all to follow, it is on this record. Rothko and Blk w/ Bear flip the channel between recognizable sound with instrumentation and the unknown static that was/is undeniably present in such a manner that one's stream of conscious will take off on its own journey as these songs play on. Each track is connected to the one that precedes it and the flow of energy does not stop at any point until the record has spun to completion. For all of the work that has been done to commemorate the heroes and the lost, this is, in a way, commemorative of the panic, confusion, hurt, and search for answers that we all experienced as a people.

      For a scant few seconds when the record begins, we hear a piano with just a little ambient noise bubbling behind it. It doesn't take long until disorder sets in overtop and the ears and mind are thrown into their attempt at trying to figure out what has just happened here. This seems like those few seconds of normality that most of us experience when September 11, 2001 was a day just like any other. It did not take long before we realized that something was happening, but we still had that little period where everything was alright.

      At times the disc offers a chance for calming and resolution like the string driven "Like Nails in the Rain." A definite shift is found throughout the disc and as a whole the resemblance of a song-to-song theme may imply that this disc is actually an account of September 11th from morning through night. We find ourselves in a very different place when the disc ends than we did when it began. The twisting and confusion subsides to a mourning and longing that only instrumental music may be able to provide. Frances Morgan’s violin moves through this track surrounded by the offerings of Beazley and Adams.

      The last track, "Lowering With Wolves" ends things with an overall thought. This is the only song on the disc separated by two seconds of silence from the track before it. As we are still caught up in the final suite of songs, the tension that we heard in earlier tracks returns before eventually being overcome by the sounds we've grown more comfortable with through the second half of the record. Hearing it for the first time, you question what note they will end the piece on, consonance or dissonance. This does wonders for the feeling that has been set for the 15 minutes or so that have come before it. In a situation like this, we do not instantly become "okay" again, thoughts linger, the confusion remains, and there are times when it is at its most powerful point. This record does not pretend to offer answers or heal every wound, what it does do (very effectively) is get us in touch with ourselves and allow us to connect with something outright that is deeper inside of us than we may know how to communicate.

      Why does this music sound like nothing else I have ever heard before? Because nothing like this has ever happened before. Mark Beazley and JS Adams have taken a wholly foreign situation and put pieces of themselves behind it. These pieces have something in common with everyone from the most skilled musician to the least knowledged... genuine emotion. Everyone has it deep down inside and when that is translated into something that can be touched, seen, and heard, there is not a truehearted individual that cannot benefit from its bounty.

-Joel Armato 03/20/04