This here commentary is wholly unsolicited, an' far past the oven timer of immediacy (not, however, past the oven timer of relevancy), but I got some things to say...
Journey to the Far Side of the Room by Kindom Of Not
In the only-could-be-original realm caught somewhere between
the medieval folk rock pageantry of Donovan and the sonic voodoo rituals of
Screamin’ Jay Hawkins there is a new kingdom to contend with. The Kingdom of Not.
Three years ago I sheepishly inquired of Andrew Goldfarb,
The Slow Poisoner, if’n he’d be interested in playing GRIT’s first Old Timey
Music and Variety Show. Completely
surprising me, he responded by asking if, in addition to his
snake-oile-salesman-one-man-band routine, we would be interested in the new
project he was involved in (then called The Wounded Stag). He forwarded some videos of their work
and we were completely sold.
While certainly musical in orientation, the project Goldfarb
and frontman Dan Carbone brought south with them is best perceived through the
filter of performance art. Backed
by a turbaned and masked Slow Poisoner grinding out his pulsating
jungle-folk-psychedelia, Carbone (channeling Buddd Underwood) sings, chants, admonishes,
pontificates, and acts out a wide array of fringe characters, fluidly donning
costumes, toys, and various other props drawn from the guts of a massive steamer
trunk at his feet.
At once both fascinating and alarming, the duo’s performance
danced a taut tightrope between luring their audience in close and then
abruptly provoking a terrified desire to flee for fear of the cataclysmic
happening being conjured. It was
definitely spectacle, definitely a spiritual journey of some sort, and it was
definitely enlightening, but it did not leave the audience soothed or reassured
about its uncertain place in the vast and scrutinizing (or indifferent) cosmos…
and that unwillingness to answer its own questions made the performance truly
magnificent.
I have to admit that I was a bit dubious when I heard that
Carbone and Goldfarb were going to commit their project to aural recording. I didn’t know how the living, breathing
beast I had witnessed, its name now changed to Kingdom of Not, would translate
into an audio only format. Even
so, when the disc came in the mail I fell upon it with eager anticipation. That anticipation was not disappointed.
While Kingdom of Not’s recording, titled Journey to the Far Side of the Room, is
certainly a different creature than the live performance, Carbone and Goldfarb
have definitely accomplished a masterful act in bringing the concept of their
live Prometheus to the listening-only audience. It is not a substitute for experiencing their live
performance, but as a detailed conceptual narrative it is undeniably its own
very important monster. Its often
modal musical drivings, trance inducing at times, possessed of a frenetic
energy at others, combined with the sometimes-storyteller-sometimes-eyewitness
bard work of Buddd Underwood create a richly decorated otherly world that
effectually commands the mind’s eye for the duration of the production. Not an easy feat when working with such
an elaborate aural-oral-visual foundation, but a feat admirably accomplished.
There indeed exists a Kingdom of Not. Its domain, however, extends
considerably beyond the realms capable of being rendered by the recording
studio. That said, if the kingdom
could be transferred to a listening-only format, Carbone and Goldfarb have committed
to us the best possible manifestation imaginable. Listen to and embark upon the Journey to the Far Side of the Room, but do so knowing that you
will not be able to cease your pilgrimage at the edge of the compact disc. The kingdom will continue to beckon
from beyond the confines of the recording. Acknowledge and follow.
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