Mannieb
8 August 2007, 23:05
Musicians who create in the realm of electronica or whatever one calls sampled, processed, or electronically generated music, almost always emphasize the genre's machine-like-qualities of Hans and Frans Germanic crunching juggernaut rhythms, and bloops and bleeps that resemble the conversations of robots. The composer, performer and soundscaper Polarity/1, however, creates music that has one foot firmly in electronica and the rest of the body in an organic musical universe that includes pop, folk-rock, various schools of jazz, Latin, funk and modernist music from the classical tradition. He mixes these genres into well-blended songs to create a sound that is like the Six Million Dollar Man: part man, part machine but at heart totally human.
[Mark Kirby] What the hell do you call this stuff?
[Polar Levine a.k.a. Polarity/1] I call the instrumentals Electronica/Fusion and the songs Electro-Folk. This genre issue has been ******* me for years. I've digested so many different genres of music from different times and places since I was little, and because of that all genres and styles have equal value to me. If anything characterizes Polarity/1, it's that I orchestrate with genre as much as with instruments.
I have a habit of alternating a collection of songs with a collection of instrumentals -- all falling into some unbridgeable genre divide. I get bored easily, so I only focus on stuff that's different from what I've done before. Since I was little, I always got hooked on artists who constantly change direction, even within the same album; like Zappa, Miles, Coltrane, the Beatles, Radiohead, Bjork, and Beck.
[Mark Kirby] What is your musical background? How long have you been playing music? When and how did you start?
[Polar Levine a.k.a. Polarity/1] I've been listening to music actively since I was around two years old. I started off with my dad's records, the radio, American Bandstand, Soul Train and the Ed Sullivan Show. My earliest faves were Cab Calloway (from my dad and Betty Boop cartoons), salsa (my dad's Tito Rodriguez records and the radio), Elvis, James Brown, Chuck Berry, Beatles, Led Zeppelin.
When I was in high school I discovered Brazilian music, Appalachian folk, Eric Dolphy, Japanese Gagaku (court music of the 16th century), Bob Dylan, Olatunji, Muddy Waters and Mahavishnu Orchestra. My thing with Dylan got me to buy a guitar so I could express my rage over the inconveniences of life on earth. Within weeks, I was writing clueless protest songs about important political issues I never bothered to read about. Later on when I was at the Studio For Interrelated Media at Massachusetts College of Art, I was listening to a lot of European post-serial stuff like John Cage, George Crumb, Morton Feldman, Stockhausen, Laurie Anderson, and the minimalists Steve Reich, Terry Reilly and Philip Glass.
So, for a few years I stopped writing songs but concentrated on abstract soundscapes for multimedia performance pieces. This was in the eighties before samplers became affordable. I'd make huge tape loops that stretched the length of my loft. They were made up of tiny slices of tape cut to specific lengths based on constantly evolving rhythms that I'd score. This involved lots of all-nighters and lots of drugs and cookies. Days later, when I'd finished the loops and finally got to hear them I'd discover mistakes which took another all-nighter to fix. Thank the god for samplers.
[Mark Kirby] Polarity/1 also cited a massive number of influences and favorites that covered hip hop (Lupe Fiasco, Nas), Electronica (Prefuse 73, Jon Hassell), Brazilian (batucada, Maestre Ambrosio), 70's funk, jazz (from Django Reinhardt to Coltrane, Eric Dolphy, and many others), blues, country (Doc Boggs, New Lost City Ramblers, George Jones), African music, Flamenco, old school gospel (Soul Stirrers, Staples Singers, Gospel Keynotes), salsa (especially bomba and the Fania stuff from the '70's), middle and south Asian music, Indian classical music and hard to categorize artists like Brazilian Girls, Broken Social Scene, Thomas Dolby, Bjork, Los Lobos and others.
[Polar Levine a.k.a. Polarity/1] I know it sounds like I'm dropping a lot of impressive cool-factor names but from the time I was tiny, I was constantly exposed to strange new music. That's because of my dad's early influence and an older weirdo cousin, plus growing up in New York with a huge variety of sounds on the radio. I'm drawn to the unfamiliar. This has advantages and disadvantages. I can play a little bit of a lot of different instruments but I never got very good at any one instrument. I can effectively work in any genre.
[Mark Kirby] This spirit of eclectic playfulness and experimentation is evident on his two solo CDs, "Speechless" and "Prettier Than You," and on "Heavy Meadow," by Audioplasm; his collaboration with Latin/electronica/bizarre artist Rubio.
"Speechless" is, naturally, Polarity/1's instrumental record and a repository for his wild and wide musical palate. While it is definitely an electronica CD that he composed, performed and recorded himself, he also added some live wire human elements as well.
[Polar Levine a.k.a. Polarity/1] All the tracks were around 85% done when I brought in some living organisms to add a touch of reality and liveness. ["Bring on the Sudz" blends a post-Disco dance beat with a '50's mambo sound and texture. It features ex-Lounge Lizard saxophonist Michael Blake.] I wanted a sax player who played like the nasty honkers from the sixties like Archie Shepp and Pharoah Sanders." [Blake also wails out on the title cut, adding some '60's free jazz black fire to a dense groove that is part Afro beat, part Bo Diddly beat played on cowbells.]
[Mark Kirby] "The Eagle Has Descended" is the funky theme song of an imaginary blaxploitation sci-fi movie, with a psychedelic break off jazz drums and disembodied voice.
[Polar Levine a.k.a. Polarity/1] I layered into the groove the voice of a friend taken off my answering machine. 'Brother dearest, the eagle has descended and has left a little clump in your honor.' He owed me some money and he called to let me know that he stumbled upon some income and was ready to pay me.
[Mark Kirby] The song "Nilestones" is, by contrast, sp****r and more deceptive in its structure. Over a musical core of chopped and disembodied vocals, drummer Gregg Bendian, recording mate of jazz guitarist Pat Metheney, guitarist Pete McCann, synthesizer player David Gilden and Blake gradually build upward with dense, jazz rock style music, creating a swirling effect, at once anchored and freewheeling.
"The Sumo Glide," an easy-going funk tune, and the hip hop inspired "Blues for Chucky" feature former Prince bassist Scott Parker Allen. The most incendiary cut on the CD is "Munton's Revenge" which is built around a fractured jazz funk beat in 7/4 time. It features an apocalyptic dual between drummer Gregg Bendian and guitarist Pete McCann that goes from air tight unison lines to blazing leads and back.
"Speechless" mixes many of Polar's above-mentioned musical influences, particularly the jazz and experimental modes. But what of his interest in and influence by rock, folk music and Bob Dylan? The CD "Prettier Than You" is an album of songs with clearly sung vocals -- as opposed to the processed and manipulated vocals-as-sounds approach on "Speechless" -- and leans more toward rock.
The songs on "Prettier Than You" fly in the face of current conventions, which ignore politics, critical thought, or even everyday life; and instead focus on *** fantasies, crass individualism, and our national religion of money, power and respect. The subject matter on this CD ranges from attacks on consumerism ("Free Money" and "Charge It") to the music industry ("There's Music" and "Ka-Ching") to the political corruption and ineptitude in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina ("Duck"). The title cut "Prettier Than You" lampoons the modern obsession with spokespersons and celebrities selling products and news.
The first song "Love Is Hard" starts out with an early '90's Miles Davis groove with trumpet riding over a sp**** funk beat. The vocals come in a clear naturalistic manner. The words are poetic and allegorical like those of Bob Dylan (but not as obscure). Like he does with his instrumental music, Polarity/1 uses a playful formalism in creating Prettier Than You.
Read the complete interview with Polarity/1
http://polarity1.livejournal.com/1593.html
And visit http://www.polarity1.com
[Mark Kirby] What the hell do you call this stuff?
[Polar Levine a.k.a. Polarity/1] I call the instrumentals Electronica/Fusion and the songs Electro-Folk. This genre issue has been ******* me for years. I've digested so many different genres of music from different times and places since I was little, and because of that all genres and styles have equal value to me. If anything characterizes Polarity/1, it's that I orchestrate with genre as much as with instruments.
I have a habit of alternating a collection of songs with a collection of instrumentals -- all falling into some unbridgeable genre divide. I get bored easily, so I only focus on stuff that's different from what I've done before. Since I was little, I always got hooked on artists who constantly change direction, even within the same album; like Zappa, Miles, Coltrane, the Beatles, Radiohead, Bjork, and Beck.
[Mark Kirby] What is your musical background? How long have you been playing music? When and how did you start?
[Polar Levine a.k.a. Polarity/1] I've been listening to music actively since I was around two years old. I started off with my dad's records, the radio, American Bandstand, Soul Train and the Ed Sullivan Show. My earliest faves were Cab Calloway (from my dad and Betty Boop cartoons), salsa (my dad's Tito Rodriguez records and the radio), Elvis, James Brown, Chuck Berry, Beatles, Led Zeppelin.
When I was in high school I discovered Brazilian music, Appalachian folk, Eric Dolphy, Japanese Gagaku (court music of the 16th century), Bob Dylan, Olatunji, Muddy Waters and Mahavishnu Orchestra. My thing with Dylan got me to buy a guitar so I could express my rage over the inconveniences of life on earth. Within weeks, I was writing clueless protest songs about important political issues I never bothered to read about. Later on when I was at the Studio For Interrelated Media at Massachusetts College of Art, I was listening to a lot of European post-serial stuff like John Cage, George Crumb, Morton Feldman, Stockhausen, Laurie Anderson, and the minimalists Steve Reich, Terry Reilly and Philip Glass.
So, for a few years I stopped writing songs but concentrated on abstract soundscapes for multimedia performance pieces. This was in the eighties before samplers became affordable. I'd make huge tape loops that stretched the length of my loft. They were made up of tiny slices of tape cut to specific lengths based on constantly evolving rhythms that I'd score. This involved lots of all-nighters and lots of drugs and cookies. Days later, when I'd finished the loops and finally got to hear them I'd discover mistakes which took another all-nighter to fix. Thank the god for samplers.
[Mark Kirby] Polarity/1 also cited a massive number of influences and favorites that covered hip hop (Lupe Fiasco, Nas), Electronica (Prefuse 73, Jon Hassell), Brazilian (batucada, Maestre Ambrosio), 70's funk, jazz (from Django Reinhardt to Coltrane, Eric Dolphy, and many others), blues, country (Doc Boggs, New Lost City Ramblers, George Jones), African music, Flamenco, old school gospel (Soul Stirrers, Staples Singers, Gospel Keynotes), salsa (especially bomba and the Fania stuff from the '70's), middle and south Asian music, Indian classical music and hard to categorize artists like Brazilian Girls, Broken Social Scene, Thomas Dolby, Bjork, Los Lobos and others.
[Polar Levine a.k.a. Polarity/1] I know it sounds like I'm dropping a lot of impressive cool-factor names but from the time I was tiny, I was constantly exposed to strange new music. That's because of my dad's early influence and an older weirdo cousin, plus growing up in New York with a huge variety of sounds on the radio. I'm drawn to the unfamiliar. This has advantages and disadvantages. I can play a little bit of a lot of different instruments but I never got very good at any one instrument. I can effectively work in any genre.
[Mark Kirby] This spirit of eclectic playfulness and experimentation is evident on his two solo CDs, "Speechless" and "Prettier Than You," and on "Heavy Meadow," by Audioplasm; his collaboration with Latin/electronica/bizarre artist Rubio.
"Speechless" is, naturally, Polarity/1's instrumental record and a repository for his wild and wide musical palate. While it is definitely an electronica CD that he composed, performed and recorded himself, he also added some live wire human elements as well.
[Polar Levine a.k.a. Polarity/1] All the tracks were around 85% done when I brought in some living organisms to add a touch of reality and liveness. ["Bring on the Sudz" blends a post-Disco dance beat with a '50's mambo sound and texture. It features ex-Lounge Lizard saxophonist Michael Blake.] I wanted a sax player who played like the nasty honkers from the sixties like Archie Shepp and Pharoah Sanders." [Blake also wails out on the title cut, adding some '60's free jazz black fire to a dense groove that is part Afro beat, part Bo Diddly beat played on cowbells.]
[Mark Kirby] "The Eagle Has Descended" is the funky theme song of an imaginary blaxploitation sci-fi movie, with a psychedelic break off jazz drums and disembodied voice.
[Polar Levine a.k.a. Polarity/1] I layered into the groove the voice of a friend taken off my answering machine. 'Brother dearest, the eagle has descended and has left a little clump in your honor.' He owed me some money and he called to let me know that he stumbled upon some income and was ready to pay me.
[Mark Kirby] The song "Nilestones" is, by contrast, sp****r and more deceptive in its structure. Over a musical core of chopped and disembodied vocals, drummer Gregg Bendian, recording mate of jazz guitarist Pat Metheney, guitarist Pete McCann, synthesizer player David Gilden and Blake gradually build upward with dense, jazz rock style music, creating a swirling effect, at once anchored and freewheeling.
"The Sumo Glide," an easy-going funk tune, and the hip hop inspired "Blues for Chucky" feature former Prince bassist Scott Parker Allen. The most incendiary cut on the CD is "Munton's Revenge" which is built around a fractured jazz funk beat in 7/4 time. It features an apocalyptic dual between drummer Gregg Bendian and guitarist Pete McCann that goes from air tight unison lines to blazing leads and back.
"Speechless" mixes many of Polar's above-mentioned musical influences, particularly the jazz and experimental modes. But what of his interest in and influence by rock, folk music and Bob Dylan? The CD "Prettier Than You" is an album of songs with clearly sung vocals -- as opposed to the processed and manipulated vocals-as-sounds approach on "Speechless" -- and leans more toward rock.
The songs on "Prettier Than You" fly in the face of current conventions, which ignore politics, critical thought, or even everyday life; and instead focus on *** fantasies, crass individualism, and our national religion of money, power and respect. The subject matter on this CD ranges from attacks on consumerism ("Free Money" and "Charge It") to the music industry ("There's Music" and "Ka-Ching") to the political corruption and ineptitude in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina ("Duck"). The title cut "Prettier Than You" lampoons the modern obsession with spokespersons and celebrities selling products and news.
The first song "Love Is Hard" starts out with an early '90's Miles Davis groove with trumpet riding over a sp**** funk beat. The vocals come in a clear naturalistic manner. The words are poetic and allegorical like those of Bob Dylan (but not as obscure). Like he does with his instrumental music, Polarity/1 uses a playful formalism in creating Prettier Than You.
Read the complete interview with Polarity/1
http://polarity1.livejournal.com/1593.html
And visit http://www.polarity1.com