Yearlong

Album review

Nearly a year-long in the making, friends and musically kindred spirits Greg Davis and Keith Fullerton Whitman embarked on a year-long excursion taking them to various coffee houses, galleries and living rooms across the country performing for the most captivated of audiences in the most intimate of settings. The result is a 13-track-long interplay between Davis and Whitman improvising on organic instrumentation and their ever faithful weapons of choice: laptops. Like most Whitman releases, his contribution to the equation is heavy on processing and Max/Msp programming. In contrast, Davis relies on piano, guitar and various other acoustic percussion to give a sense of balance to the interplay (a sharp example of this happens on the second piece recorded in Washington) and to seamlessly integrate them into one unified whole. Neither artist overplays or unnecessarily hogs the spotlight, which is just another indication of the mutual respect they have for one another. The compositions vary in nature from fierce and biting to gorgeously calm and placid, and bring together the best of both worlds from these two versatile performers. The sequencing and texture of each track is more abrupt and jarring than any on either of the performers' solo releases, with the albums' closer (recorded in Holland) bringing together the best of both the electronic and acoustic by digitally manipulating files of several marching bands and bringing it to a passionate apex before fading out breathlessly. It's a strong release from start to finish and fans of both artists will no doubt enjoy the interplay and fun the two are having here.
© Rob Theakston /TiVo