The annual Big Ears Festival in Knoxville, Tennessee is one of the best little-known musical secrets. The festival features some of indie-rock's biggest names alongside a mind-boggling array of legendary experimental artists. It's the only American festival that I am aware of that features Joanna Newsom and the National on the same bill as William Basinski and Terry Riley. At last year's festival experimental heavyweight Christian Fennesz played an improvised set along with Necks drummer Tony Buck and avant-guitarist David Daniell, member of San Agustin and sometimes collaborator with Loren Mazzacane Connors and Rhys Chatham, among others. The result of that set has been preserved and released by Chicago's Thrill Jockey records titled simply "Knoxville". The thirty-minute set has been divided into four parts over the course of the record to reflect shifts in the group's dynamics. "Unuberwindbare Wande" begins things with subtle guitar and cymbal effects before cascading into waves of sound. What is most distinctive about the piece is that rather than Fennesz's washed out layers of electronics, electrified-rustic guitars take center stage, guiding the track towards a climax that is as noisy as it is beautiful. The track evokes the distinctly American drift of Scott Tuma's improv work in Boxhead Ensemble and Good Stuff House more than it does the anything to be found in the Touch records catalog.
"Heat From Light" measures the trio in the wake of "Wande's" early climax. Slight percussion and reverb-laden guitar slowly, but surely, builds into a shimmering drone featuring a backbone of electronics provided Fennesz. Eventually Fennesz's presence builds into a massive drone that will sound familiar to fans of his work. All the while Daniell and Buck hold on, coming in and out of the picture with drifting percussion and more countrified electric guitar squalls. By the end each member stands in equal balance with one another perfectly blending Fennesz' European approach with Daniell and Buck's ambient Americana.
"Antonia" follows and is all gentle-cascading waves of music that sounds like the sun reflecting on the ocean. "Diamond Mind" closes out the set on a darker more discordant tone. Stabs of electronics are juxtaposed against explosive free-jazz drums while Daniell's guitar works its way through the chaos trying to find some light amidst the cacophony. Eventually the track, and set, climaxes with each musician playing full force and blurring into one unified cloud of sound before gentle receding into the horizon. When all is said and done there is a calm and a kind of awe in the wake of what these three have accomplished. This is truly inspired improv and a perfect example of what goes right when three musicians set egos aside and play off one another to create something much larger than themselves individually. I would wager that seeing this performed live was absolutely transcendent. Thankfully this recording of that event exists for listeners to immerse themselves in time and time again.
"Unuberwindbare Wande"
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