"This Machine Works Like a "
Markus Dorsun Jr.
The Centennial (A BlocOut Communications Brand)
Filed: 6/8/19 20:56 CST

An album or any piece of art for that matter is really just a machine designed to give you deals associations ideas or maybe to help you do a certain thing or make you want to do a certain thing. Some of these machines immediately tell you what therefore certain albums from the first eight or 16 bars it’s impossible not to move.And then there’s machines did you walk up to an a mediately are interested in and they start giving you feels in associations and ideas and making you do things and want to do things but you’re not exactly sure what any of those things are. They’re different and new to you. And so is this our and so is this album.

It’s titled six to go with the bands name and cake seven and one assumes is also referencing the fact the album is Aamir six tracks. But if you’re hoping for an EP or sample of some kind you’ll be pleasantly tricked. Stylistic whiplash from the first of the second song will have you thinking that this band wants to show its many sides. But by the end of the third song the epic three act passion play Saint fat cow 3x it might Dan on you that you’ve been traveling on a path with one character or Manny all mom from the first track to this one. Or maybe you didn’t notice at all and sort of woke up from a trance and not a totally relaxing type a trance because the world a lot of unexpected things that happened, woke up from the entrance somewhere Space else.

All right Markus fine but what the fuck does it sound like I mean in conventional terms? Space can you give us a genre or are these a bunch it and were not in a genre douche bags? Well I think the best way to put it is that the band sounds like a bunch of people move listen to a pretty broad range of music but right now play pretty freely. I mean it’s got a lot of rock to it and psychedelic yeah and some sort of post rock and a Bongard flourishes and it’s a little prodding and it’s scale at times and definitely has a has a lot of old and new school soul and hip-hop influences. But fuck inferences it sounds like the people in the band. Vocalist Becca Barniskis is a widely published poet and performer known for her live fx wizardry Who also leads the avant Gard collective Downrange Telemetrics. Her approach to writing and performance somehow seem to drive the somatic thread that binds the whole thing together. I’ve seen her live and she is a brilliant performer but her particular genius on this record is to have somehow threaded out of six very distinct and different sounding songs not just one story but a multitude of possible stories.

Vocalist Sidney Cowan has been with Pancake7 from the beginning and brings an entirely different set of characters voices and compositional approaches that at times seem indistinguishable from Becca’s or I should say it becomes unimportant who is who the characters take over. At other times her voice is very much the focus of the music and it’s spectacular range and character is maximized to great effect. But as of right this I’m starting to realize that that thing I just said about it becoming an important is something about this band that I really like. You actually don’t notice the musicianship unless that’s what you’re listening for. There’s entire sections of songs where Drummer Matt Keseley and bassist Shea Drenkow absolutely terret up in a highly original and idiosyncratic Waze and it’s precisely because of that originality that those sections are just part of the music. They do their jobs in the machine. Dad said if you want to hear a magnificent rhythm section stretch and work time in all sorts of ways this album does that to. Shea and Matt play like Musicians who know each other really well and that’s because they do. There classically trained players who went to Augsburg college together. They’ve already spent years playing all kinds of music from hip-hop to rock to R&B to contemporary classical and improvisational music. And it seems obvious that all of that comes out in music and the way it’s played. You know how I feel about rhythm sections they’re decisive. They make or break The band the song the album. This one makes it on every damn bar. There’s nothing super flashy parentheses though Keasley is an above an occasional impossible I had Phil. But it’s not about flash it’s deeper than that. It’s about playing with time and dynamics in ways that don’t call attention to themselves but I have a profound effect on the dramatic and rhythmic arc of song.

Nick Jaffe and Becca put the band together soon after Nic moved to Saint Paul, mm from Chicago in 2014. Nick was something of a fixture on the Chicago Neil soul and hip-hop scenes and perform live and recorded With a wide range of local talent as well as such national artists as Dwele I Ice Cube Common and Bilal. His solo work has been eclectic a little like pancakes sevens music. It’s more experimental collaborations with Becca as part of a Downrange Telemetrics parentheses which also includes the other members of P7 some of the time as well) are often groove driven or if not then highly interested in rhythm and its absence. Like Becca as a vocalist Knicks playing is a little bit hard to describe because it’s Chamaeleon like. It also doesn’t tend to it track attention to itself in the middle of the song but not because it’s timid. Rather it’s because Nic seems to have a knack for playing the right part at the right time He does indulge in water clearly some sonic signatures and it times they can be predictable. I’ve been listening to Knicks playing on recordings and live for probably 15 years and that’s enough for the volume is well been D Betts. They can be retired.

Look man and I see that a non-gendered sort away what it is is this album sounds pretty freshen up the date the wood dowels and some old school shit and mostly it sounds like a single experience that you’re gonna want to just sit down and listen to and you’ll realize that six is exactly right it comes out to just little bit less than 40 minutes and it’s a 40 minutes that will make you understand what this machine is for.

TLDR is get the album. You’ll be able to download it free because P7 has excepted that freeing the music however much it’s ripping off artists presages a future where all music is free and Artist are ripped off. That said you should buy the deluxe package or whatever the hell they’re calling it because you’ll get some very cool and no spoilers here but bonus tracks and possibly a bonus video or isn’t stuff I don’t know is that spoiling Laney don’t know if there is one or isn’t one as well as a limited-edition spatula engraved with the for some reason terrifying slogan it’s tomorrow a beautiful original design Limited addition T-shirt that is an interpretation of the album mart by Nick Jaffe and a limited edition small format I think it’s like five by seven framed art print you can see on one side of the print is the album mart on the other side is the version with the album release show information on it so get it. Get it. Get it.Come get it.