crou039: Osso Exótico + Z’EV

CROUTON NO.39
Osso Exótico + Z’EV
“s/t”
CD

“Once the ball gets rolling, it rolls, it makes ripples become waves, and waves become a thunder storm. It’s in these moments when the true power of the music comes alive.” - Vital Weekly

Since 1989, the Portugal avant garde ensemble Osso Exótico have created a stunning body of work. Current members are André Maranha, David Maranha and Patricia Machás, but besides the recordings, very little historical information can be found about the group. Rather, the music speaks for itself. Percussionist Z’EV, who has spent the better part of 40 years finding ways to coax sound out of material, and then creating a mystic cacaphony out of it, also uses sound as communication. Together, this grouping produces quite a statement, as sound becomes something unexplained by words, yet shared as an experience. Here, long stretches of rhythmic and bubbling organ are matched by large bass drum patterns that culminate in an expansive psychedelic pool of sound. This isn’t glassine drone music. It spews the grit of Tony Conrad and the trance of Terry Riley, while radiating the experience of a sweat lodge in a behemoth explosion of tribal minimalism; only digressing for a segment of spatial hums and large frequencies rubbed from the surfaces of metal, before it dives back into oblivion. With no sound processing, the result is a highly natural, grossly enigmatic, and deeply energized recording. The power is yours for the taking.

Released in an edition of 500 and packaged in an offset printed chipboard envelope.

About Osso Exótico:
Osso Exótico formed in 1989. Over time, it’s members included André Maranha, António Forte, Bernardo Devlin, David Maranha, Patrícia Machás, and Francisco Tropa. Utilizing a diverse range of instruments such as glass harmonica, piano strings, hammond organ, mandolin, violin, and many others, the ensemble created and brought to life scored music that appears on eight recordings, titled, I - VIII. More info on the work of Osso Exótico, David Maranha, and Organ Eye can be found here.

About Z’EV:
Conceptual artist, dancer, musician, scholar and poet, Stefan Weisser began playing the drums at age 4. Moving to New York City from San Francisco in 1979, and adopting the name Z’EV, his work with performance/noise percussion broke new ground and drew the attention of rock symphonist Glenn Branca, dancer Simone Forti, guitarist Rudolph Grey and just about everybody related to the downtown scene. in the early 1970s, he developed a personal technique utilizing self-developed instruments formed from industrial materials such as stainless steel, titanium, and PVC plastics. Initially these instruments were assemblages of these materials with a movement-based performance style that was a form of marionette (although with the performer visible). He has since come to refer to this performance mode as ‘wild-style’, a term originally related to graffiti. Since 1984, he has been concentrating on performing in a more traditional mallet-percussion style, albeit with highly idiosyncratic and ‘extended’ mallet percussion techniques and his ’self-made’/adapted instruments. His recordings have been released by labels such as Touch, Tzadik, Die Stadt, and many others. More info here.