There's an old joke that sort of follows the next line:
"A dulcimer player, a banjo player and a 12 string acoustic guitar player all crashland on a deserted island..."
Or something like that.
While not involving a plane crash or a deserted island, the formation of Illegible Records' newest project collaboration - Stringth - has taken comedic turns and strange directions with it's ultimate punchline being one of the years most intriuging and freshest offerings so far. "If anybody ever wanted to get a gift for that special someone that has everything... this would be it" says member, Dennis Preston as he thinks back to the very odd origins of the group.
Begun in early 2008 as tracks for Preston's "Iceberg" solo album - his first for Illegible - started to take more formation, percussionist at hand, Perry McDonald, was asked by Dennis to bring his banjo over for some possible inclusion to that day's session. As they sat and jammed for a bit (Perry on banjo and Dennis on his dulcimer), producer Eric Blades, who was on the phone at the time, liked what he heard and asked them to continue to play while he ran upstairs and grabbed his 12 string acoustic guitar. Sitting in the Blades living room, the three of them enjoyed the sounds and quickly humored the idea of putting together something more formal. "It was a nice, solid sound that I found myself wishing we had a few mics around to capture" says Blades "I hadn't anticipated such a groove and obvious chemistry." Indeed, the three agreed to pursue the jams as a side project in conjunction with Preston's CD but to be handled and sold seperately and on the side as time to record presented itself.
Unfortunately, they got their wish.
As the three sat and recorded some tracks and then later listened back to them over the weeks, they slowly and quietly agreed with eachother that the songs at hand, while well-rounded and enjoyable, were not what they had in mind or had hoped for. Content to continue in the same vein, the trio paused to stop and consider Blades' unorthodox new idea for the recording. Essentially, throwing everything they already had out the window, the producer's suggestion was to embrace the old with the new - their instruments with the 21st century. "I basically wanted to turn our three traditional, acoustic instruments upside down, throw the weirdest and thickest audio effects we could find on them and see what happened " says Blades "it had to be more compelling than what we had."The three gathered and in one day - with more microphones, processors and digital recorders to shake a stick at - recorded their debut album, leaving nothing but their percussion tracks to be tackled later. Instantly, they were excited "With the short amount of recording time and minimal tracks used, I think we came up with something rather unique" says Preston "Parts of the CD sound like putting Frank Zappa, Salvador Dali and Buck Rogers into a blender... and other parts I think sound pretty amazing." McDonald agrees "I'm a huge fan. To me it's a load of fun." Recorded at Studio Lagoon and then mastered at Stand Up and Panic studios, the the ethereal, instrumental album has transformed itself from an idea and jam to a full-blown project with all involved proud and looking forward to more "I think that we're just scratching the surface with what we've come up with for this CD" says Preston "I want to do more!" Summing it up, McDonald more than concurs "It's all new territory for me, and I'm WAY out of my comfort zone, but I'm enjoying it immensely. We Rule!!!!"
Look for Stringth Spring, 2008.
