Chessie - Manifest CD
- Artist: Chessie
- Label: Plug Research
- Jahr: 2008
- Format: CD
- Verfügbarkeit:
Auf Lager und sofort verfügbar! -
Beschreibung
With their new album, Manifest,
Chessie continues their musical exploration of the railway
environment, this time focusing on the freight trains and railway corridors that
simultaneously divide and connect America's
landscapes.
Manifest is an exhilarating journey
through a realm of extremes, where stillness is shattered by jarring motion and
cacophony subsides into silence. Using guitars, bass, drums, signal processing,
samples, analog synths, organs, horns, and other instruments, Chessie
captures the interplay between the manufactured and natural worlds that
railroads inhabit. In doing so they've created their best work yet. Manifest
bursts forth with "Take the Lark," a gritty analog ballad that gives way to the
metronomic pulse of ?Intercity?, which captures Chessie?s Indie-rock roots and
amazing ability to transform overdriven noise into pop music. ?Long Bridge?--a
meditative, two-part piece-- follows with an inverting melody that will lodge
itself in your memory. ?Alone Together,? is a lazy walk along a rail bed, with
the repetitive hums, buzzes, and pulses one hears trackside. "Highline" pulls
you back into pure locomotion with boisterous guitars and subverted beats.
?Poughkeepsie Aflame? is a smoldering requiem for all that?s lost in the modern
world, while ?CP Azure? evokes the quiet melancholy of an abandoned railway
outpost. Things get sunnier with ?Magnolia Cutoff?, an airy charmer that reminds
us--with its dueling leads and contrapuntal horn section--of the excitement of
passing trains only to turn dark once again with ?Farewell Diagonal's" desperate
and thundering drums, wailing synths and layers of hocketed loops. ?Alphabet
Route? showcases Chessie's signature guitars with interlocking melodies and
exciting harmonies. Finally ?Hoosac? closes the album with an expansive lullaby
that envelopes you in a shimmering sonic wash.
Chessie has been releasing genre-defining albums for more than a decade. Beginning in the early 90's they helped create what became known as "Post-rock," combining guitars and indie-rock sensibilities with the timbres, sonic palette, and production techniques of experimental electro-acoustic music. Over the years their music has continued to evolve, with arrangements featuring ever more complex sonic and harmonic elements. Manifest is Chessie's fourth full-length, and the long-awaited follow-up to 2001?s critically acclaimed Overnight. It will be available from Plug Research in February of 2008. Stephen Gardner started Chessie in 1993 as a side-project while he was still a member of Lorelei, the groundbreaking Washington, D.C. Indie-rock trio. In 2000, Ben Bailes joined Chessie, and he and Gardner have since worked as a duo, sharing composition and production duties at their System Studios in Arlington, Virginia.
Their music has received praise from The New York Times (Best of 2001), The Washington Post (Best of 2001), The Washington City Paper, The Village Voice (Best of 2001), The Wire, Spex, Le Monde, Amazon.com (Best of 1998), BBC, NPR, WAMU Radio, and more.
