Experimental brass and wind composer Colin Stetson has created sounds with his instruments in a way I’ve not heard before. Returning last month with his first album since 2017, Colin is taking alto saxophones and contrabass clarinets into dense atmospheres and soundscapes like few others. His latest single ‘So say the soaring bullbats’ uses the contrabass clarinet’s deep resonance like a didgeridoo. It vibrates the soul and arcs outwards like an evocative sci-fi dystopia. It is dense, cinematic and sweeping in a way that focuses the mind. The added murmuring vocals and percussive use of Colin’s breath work gives the track even more uneasy dread.
The penultimate track on ‘The love it took to leave you’ is a great piece on what is a dark, hypnotic and battle-scarred album of horror. Colin Stetson veers from percussive funeral dirges on steroids to wild ten-minute explosions of brass, wind and modular synths. They all bring a feeling of oppression and scale to the listener and Colin says this style of sound design has come from his art installations and live performances. When arriving at a venue, Colin uses set design, building materials and the stage dimensions to work out the in-room reverb to shape the tone of the sound. As most of Stetson’s instruments involve air, Colin believes designing the room to let the air – and therefore sound – flow around it, can shape the experience. For this album he aimed for “supersaturation” and whilst I don’t pretend to understand all the mechanics of it, when I hear this single, I feel it as much as I hear it.
Enjoy the moody music video for Colin Stetson’s ‘So say the soaring bullbats’ below. The single and album ‘The love it took to leave you’ are out now. For more information on all things Colin Stetson, including his scores and installation work, visit his website.
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