Vast Mass, by Chad M. Clark (DT 004)

Vast Mass

by Chad M. Clark (DT 004)

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cosmikjrufan continual surprising in all the best ways Favorite track: Bubble Crumbs.

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Full Digital Discography

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Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Sublimation Incantation, Palm Fronds, Human Being Borealis, Vast Mass, Muon Dons, Cashmere Spheres, and Time Tidal Disruption. , and , .

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1.	Weft 01:57	buy track
2.	A piece of fabric 02:45
3.	Loomstate 02:37
4.	Epistrophy 05:24
5.	The turn of the screw 01:28
6.	Momento mori 02:41	buy track
7.	Bubble Crumbs 03:11
8.	Observations of the Oort 03:32
9.	Principle is apparently broken 03:50
10.	Monterey 02:02
11.	Shaven prop 05:20

about

Guitars: Chad M. Clark
Recorded at Experimental Sound Studio, Chicago,IL
(Ralph Loza) and Studio Sea, Evanston, IL

Artwork by Harper Ptica

[DT/CD004]

Each time I’ve put Vast Mass on, I’ve been perplexed. There’s a frenetic creepiness lurking in the countless corners, but a feeling of whimsy and enchantment winds through the intricate sonic architecture. It’s a fantastic combination that leaves me on edge. There’s a lot of different instrumentation throughout Vast Mass, but Clark’s wizardry on guitar is the foundation. Skittering excursions, creaking motifs, bowed strings, and angular soundworlds in constant motion. Dichotomies run wild throughout Vast Mass, whether it’s the aforementioned whimsical creep or the way Clark creates simultaneously expansive and intimate music. Rapid-fire guitar runs to spark the sinewy atmospheres that let ghost melodies filter in from nowhere, all transmitted like a secret whispered in broad daylight.

Foxy Digitalis

--

credits

released February 3, 2023

Vast Mass, perhaps even more so than its equally catchily named and colorfully covered predecessor Cashmere Spheres, is consistent with a wider trend in post-Bailey “total guitar” improvisation of engaging not only with the full extent of the instrument’s physical soundmaking potential, but also with external sounds and textures that align with the central action—Ash Cooke/Chow Mwng dubbed his own particular approach “Gwrth-gitâr,” drawing in chunks of inspiration and serendipity from outdoor environments and nonmusical objects. Chicago’s Chad M. Clark shapes even more complexity through the use of multitracking, overlaying, and collaging, stuffing each track full of countless layers that nonetheless seem to have sprung from the same place. Even when brief flurries of sax skronk or frantic arco surface in the stew, even when the spiderleg bridge taps and rattling plectrum scrapes feel so alien they couldn’t possibly have been produced with a guitar, every audible sound embodies and emphasizes the central, irresistible tension that keeps ear after ear returning to records like Aida more than forty years later (and who knows, probably this one forty years on): the strain and wrack of strings stretched taut, the aching gasp of a half-formed harmonic, the creaking breath of the wood itself.

Jack Davidson - Noise Not Music

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Chad M. Clark Chicago, Illinois

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