Karl Blau
AM (2008, Whistler Records)
A concept record based upon the poems of writer A.A. Milne (Winnie the Pooh), Karl Blau’s AM could be the soundtrack to a sepia-tone sweep of sublime countryside. Steeped in the sounds of the wild, these ten tracks, partly inspired by a collaboration with the Microphones’ Phil Elverum, map a mysterious landscape that oscillates between serenity and anxiety. From the rough atmospherics and murmuring hand-drums of “Morning Prayer” to the triumphant, understated “Lake King’s Daughter”, AM reveals a highly developed sense of composition that pits fragile melodies against harsh guitars and sputtering percussion with remarkable subtlety. Elverum occasionally contributes a haunted tenor voice and shares songwriting credit on the droning “Noah Richards Son”, but it’s Blau’s weary croon, shoegaze-y guitar and intriguing songwriting that makes his musical Hundred Acre Wood so strangely inviting.
Karl Blau
Before even considering his music, you gotta love Karl Blau. The guy practically tells the online music scene to fuck itself with Kelp Monthly, a service in which every 30 days, via snail mail, subscribers receive another eclectic nugget of Blau's creativity, ranging from collaborations with fellow D+ (and ex-Beat Happening) member Bret Lunsford and Phil Elvrum to 12" field recordings of crickets chirping. Give one of his releases a spin, and you'll appreciate more than just his grass-roots ethos.
Dance Positive was originally an installment of Blau’s handmade Kelp Lunacy subscription series and features his interpretations of 10 songs by D+ bandmate Bret Lunsford. Part of the pleasingly daft setup here is that Blau considers Lunsford’s songwriting underappreciated and seeks to popularize his oeuvre. (Never mind that as a member of Beat Happening, Lunsford is more famous than Blau, and that the two have already performed most of these songs with Calvin Johnston in D+.)
Funk sampling and mimicking on “Kill the Messenger” only add to the value of his low-budget nostalgia. The foundation of his sound, in this case, was set in stone some 30 years ago, and while Blau suggests “You hate my style,” his “style” is more or less full-grown and evolved, at worst affecting, and at best pretty sexy. It’s easy to suggest that Blau’s very basic setup, with glittery guitar or keys here and there, only benefits his imagination, his love of predominantly black musical traditions oozing with such enthusiasm that it’s hard not to enjoy them.
Karl Blau
Blau’s musicianship and compositional skill are quietly stated but, if you give the music time, impossible to ignore: he’s a talented guy, this Karl Blau.
Prolific, too: an Anacortes, Washington native, Blau has a history playing flute, drums and saxophone in indie bands The Microphones, Little Wings, and D+. He plays bass in The Tortured Souls, Laura Veirs’ backup band. His solo debut, Clothes Yr I’s, was originally released in 2001 on the Knw-Yr-Own label, and re-released to a wider audience in 2003 on K. Since then, Blau has been putting out a monthly CD subscription service, Kelp! Monthly, which sends hand-packaged (by Blau) CDs containing original material, covers, collaborations, and random sounds to subscribers. Guests on the series are much the same as those found gathered on Beneath Waves, and have included Phil Elverum, Dave Matthies, Nate Asheley and Laura Veirs.
Where Clothes Yr I’s was characterized by organic, as-if-thrown together at the last minute woodfire sing-alongs, Beneath Waves is, as the title would suggest, firmly preoccupied with the aquatic: from the rocking shanty 3/4 of “Crashing Waves” to the prostrated praise of “Ode to Ocean” to the wet, rolling formlessness of “The Dark, Magical Sea”.
Since 2003, Karl Blau has been operating Kelp! Monthly Releasing Corporation, in which subscribers receive regular installments of music he's produced from his home base of Anacortes, Washington. It's an unpredictable affair. One month might find a new pop album mixed in with the bills; the next could bring an experimental edition of field recordings. The sheer diversity of the Kelp! Monthly series speaks to Blau's enthusiasm for music of all kinds, a sense of excitement-- for melody, for experimentation, and for the possibility of what music can be-- that's front and center on Beneath Waves, his K Records debut.
While Blau's vocal presence convincingly knits the 10 songs together, taken individually they hardly seem drawn from the same well. "Crashing Waves" is a folky sing-along that channels Will Oldham's sweetly melancholic voice. "Into the Nada" is a hazy take on dub, as throbbing bass and delay-drenched guitars compete with horns and Blau's lilting vocals. And on "Slow Down Joe" and "Dragon Song", Blau strums skuzzy guitar, proving he's not above some solid rock action. It's an inclusive aesthetic, one in which Blau gorges himself on a buffet of disparate genres and styles.
It's not often when Karl Blau sits down by himself to write an album's worth of material. Between helping out friends on tour as well as in the recording studio and working on his monthly Kelp! Releases, it's easy to figure Blau's musical well drying quickly. Beneath Waves proves the scenario to not only be incorrect, but far off. The album is equal parts pop, rock, beauty, invention and head-bobs.
Karl Blau
For anyone familiar with Phil Elvrum’s Microphones or Calvin Johnson’s Olympia-based label K Records, the name Karl Blau should at least ring a bell. For years, with the exception of a 1997 CD and some cassettes, Blau has been something of a peripheral player on the Olympia indie-pop scene, quietly collaborating with Elvrum and a host of others. Elvrum named a song after him on It Was Hot, We Stayed in the Water, and earlier this year Blau received his most attention yet as he wrote his own solo part for the guest-star-studded title track to the Microphones’ Mount Eerie. Clothes Your I’s finds the longtime session man finally breaking free and striking out on his own in a more high-profile way, which is why it’s so surprising that this album, coming virtually out of nowhere, is so good.
photo by digital hearth
Interview with Trainspotter:
“In sixth grade, my rocker uncle gave my brothers and I a pink electric guitar. I had always been drawn to the idea of making rock music, but my mother said, “If you want to play guitar, you need to do it right, you’re taking classical guitar lessons.” I needed some guidance for sure, the idea of rock to me was Van Halen all the way, tapping hot licks and having big hair, it all seemed so awesome. I learned every Eddy Van Halen air-guitar solo and all of David Lee Roth’s incredible string of cliches. A neighbor of mine Rob was also into rock, but somehow he was much more educated and turned me onto the Smiths and XTC as well as Black Sabbath and Iron Maiden. We’d make music but there were no rules, I played squeezebox and he played bass…this is about eighth grade, the pink guitar has been completely dismantled and my friend was smuggling guitar cases full of beer into my room. I was still practicing classical music daily, and much to the annoyance of my guitar teacher, my interest in metal was overshadowing my dedication to the discipline of classical music.”