DP / DAVE PHILLIPS

Made a rather hectic sojourn to heat-infested NYC last weekend - hence the lack of substantial posting last week - and finally got to hit the fabulous Hospital Productions underground lair. Surely you know all there is to know by now about Dom Prurient's amazing noise/metal store, but if you haven't been there, I can attest it's all it's wacked up to be. Unfortunately I stopped by on a day wherein not only was Dom not working so I couldn't chat him up, but I only had $20 on me. So I decided to pick something totally random that I didn't know anything about, and the best candidate was a CD with an oversized, full-color cover that read simply "field recordings," with a logo next to it that I later surmised represented the letters "d" and "p". I could tell from the inside info that the CD literally had field recordings on it, and that it was on the excellent young label Little Enjoyer, but that was all I could glean.

There's still not a ton to glean now that I've scrubbed the web - even Little Enjoyer's own site doesn't mention the release - but I did finally figure out from the CD's fine print that these recordings were made by Dave Phillips (i.e. DP), Fear of God mastermind and core brain-cell in the massive grey organism known as Schimpfluch-Gruppe. I don't know much about Dave and his previous pursuits, but I do know he's a commited noisemaker, so I think my mysterious purchase was well-divined.

As far as what's actually on the CD, it's pretty recognizably field recordings - lots of whirring wind, humming insects, gurgling frogs, rolling water, etc - but Phillips has a clear knack for capturing stuff that has the repetition and texture of the best, uh, intelligently-designed noise. Listening on the train back from NYC I initially settled into these pieces as a kind of 3-D audio closet to store my head in for the trip, but as I wrapped back around to the beginning I started to hear weird structures and even semi-themes in Phillips' collection of random, undirected sound. Of course even the numbest brain can find shapes and colors in almost any field recordings, but the best kind produce so many patterns you almost can't keep track. Such an effect only comes from discriminating editing and an ear/head/spirit for catching the right stuff at the right time. These traits, DP has.

Anyway, I'm not gonna claim that this disc is some kinda revolution in field recordings or even a singular noise disc, but it certainly deserves a place on yr shelf if yer into this kind of randomized screech...since everything on here's pretty short, I'll give ya two tastes of DP's collection style, one that he describes as a "noon heat serenade" filled with happy piercings, and one made of bullfrogs "who somehow dig themselves under the earth's outer layer," and proceed to croak in super-fascinating loops. Enjoy...

mp3's:
DP - Noon Heat Serenade and Bullfrogs, from Field Recordings