Olivia Block: The Mountains Pass (Black Truffle)
We’ve followed Olivia Block’s music and compositions since her Sedimental releases in the late 1990s, but The Mountains Pass (2024) marks a giant leap. This LP introduces more pop-inflected songs/Block’s singing voice into her meticulous and evocative concrète and collage-based compositions.
Guest appearances by Jon Mueller (percussion) and Thomas Madeja (trumpet) adds other intertextual layers between song and composition, what Black Truffle describes as “flowing assemblages that move seamlessly from ruminative organ tones and fragmented piano airs to explosions of sizzling synths and thundering percussion […] The Mountains Pass draws inspiration from nature and the animal world. Time spent in a particular mountain range in Northern New Mexico informs this suite of pieces, whose lyrics and titles refer particularly to animal life in the area.
The music sometimes suggests the great outer-limits works of '70s Italian prog figures like Franco Battiato or Arturo Stalteri in the languorous drift of synthesizer, organ, and piano tones and the meticulous yet organic flow of its construction.
Block's crystalline voice and rich piano chords at times call up the restrained chamber songs of Janet Sherbourne, but fragmented and threaded through passages of woozy pitch-bent keyboards, hypnotic distant thuds, tinkling bells, and searing distorted synth tones.”
Easily one of our favorite records of 2024!!
We’ve followed Olivia Block’s music and compositions since her Sedimental releases in the late 1990s, but The Mountains Pass (2024) marks a giant leap. This LP introduces more pop-inflected songs/Block’s singing voice into her meticulous and evocative concrète and collage-based compositions.
Guest appearances by Jon Mueller (percussion) and Thomas Madeja (trumpet) adds other intertextual layers between song and composition, what Black Truffle describes as “flowing assemblages that move seamlessly from ruminative organ tones and fragmented piano airs to explosions of sizzling synths and thundering percussion […] The Mountains Pass draws inspiration from nature and the animal world. Time spent in a particular mountain range in Northern New Mexico informs this suite of pieces, whose lyrics and titles refer particularly to animal life in the area.
The music sometimes suggests the great outer-limits works of '70s Italian prog figures like Franco Battiato or Arturo Stalteri in the languorous drift of synthesizer, organ, and piano tones and the meticulous yet organic flow of its construction.
Block's crystalline voice and rich piano chords at times call up the restrained chamber songs of Janet Sherbourne, but fragmented and threaded through passages of woozy pitch-bent keyboards, hypnotic distant thuds, tinkling bells, and searing distorted synth tones.”
Easily one of our favorite records of 2024!!
We’ve followed Olivia Block’s music and compositions since her Sedimental releases in the late 1990s, but The Mountains Pass (2024) marks a giant leap. This LP introduces more pop-inflected songs/Block’s singing voice into her meticulous and evocative concrète and collage-based compositions.
Guest appearances by Jon Mueller (percussion) and Thomas Madeja (trumpet) adds other intertextual layers between song and composition, what Black Truffle describes as “flowing assemblages that move seamlessly from ruminative organ tones and fragmented piano airs to explosions of sizzling synths and thundering percussion […] The Mountains Pass draws inspiration from nature and the animal world. Time spent in a particular mountain range in Northern New Mexico informs this suite of pieces, whose lyrics and titles refer particularly to animal life in the area.
The music sometimes suggests the great outer-limits works of '70s Italian prog figures like Franco Battiato or Arturo Stalteri in the languorous drift of synthesizer, organ, and piano tones and the meticulous yet organic flow of its construction.
Block's crystalline voice and rich piano chords at times call up the restrained chamber songs of Janet Sherbourne, but fragmented and threaded through passages of woozy pitch-bent keyboards, hypnotic distant thuds, tinkling bells, and searing distorted synth tones.”
Easily one of our favorite records of 2024!!