The third, double-disc volume in Zoharum’s massive reissue project of rare works by Rapoon, Seeds in the Tide, opens with a quartet of untitled pieces, source material for further belaboring in collaboration with Birds of Tin.
The third, double-disc volume in Zoharum’s massive reissue project of rare works by Rapoon, Seeds in the Tide, opens with a quartet of untitled pieces, source material for further belaboring in collaboration with Birds of Tin, released as Monomyth: Par Avion in 2004 (the year in which nearly all the material in this collection was produced) by the sorely missed American experimental label (and shop) Manifold Records. Partisans of the idling-rig percussion, low-slung sky and echoing wastes of Easterly 6 or 7 will be right in their element, as is the half-mad shaman whose wordless ravings haunt the tracks. The fifth and sixth tracks cover the sides of a 7″ single, Jane from Whitley Bay, the first a perky dance tune (“Adrift [Pop Mix]) laced through with a quandary about faith or lack thereof, a recurring theme in Rapoon’s work.
The three remaining pieces have been cherry-picked from multi-artist compilations; the first, “Dysfunctional Ghosts of Jazz,” is particularly memorable for its ectoplasmic bump-in-the-nightedness. The seemly “Iron Dawn” (aptly named for a track featuring on a compilation called A Rainy Day in Wroclaw) is a surprisingly soothing, gull-crying closer.
The second disc contains a previously unreleased live recording from The Rhiz in Vienna, an hour-long wending, alien-Oriental, High Church disco arabesque.
Seeds in the Tide is available on Zoharum.
