True to formula, structure and scheme, reason and rhyme are all cast as pebbles to a murky pond on electro-avant trio Random Touch's eighth album. The threesome's name could be not be more à propos with regard to the roving meanderings since most other "jam bands" still lay down groove orbits, and with Random Touch that is simply not a priority. Drummer Christopher Brown indulges in a semblance of a groove here and there, as on "Getting Ready," wherein the Frippian guitar and spacey synth pads make it the most "normal" sounding cut on the entire disc. In other places, the listener is treated to Brown's nonsensical e-processed vocals — what was that about being turned into the Gingerbread Man? — undulating synthetic sweeps, bleeps and blurps, oppressive cymbal crashes and tom-tom trip-outs, and detached, heavily-effected guitar deviations. Keyboardist James Day milks his Alesis QS8 and Kurzweil K2500 synthesizers for a great many nonorganic tones. "Illumination Of The Flesh" is a somewhat spooky piece, its soundscape sluiced with synth-bass squargles and sine-wave spliggles. "Skipping" pulses along on a bedrock of various synth pads and a programmed flanged hi-hat sample. "Shelter" features similar synthetic invocations that swirl like letters floating in a cosmic soup, a party crashed by Brown's freeform beats and guitarist Scott Hamill's incessant note torture. "Naked Feet In The Dark" gets under your skin the same way bugs in your sleeping bag did that one time at band camp. Like an ambient comet smashing into the jazzteroid belt, Conductor is recommended to musical soulsearchers and curious kitties bored with "traditional rock" music.
Tracklist:
1. Silk Sheets, The Weight Of Bodies Sliding (1:25)
2. The Giant Took A Liking To Jack (4:34)
3. A Slow March Becomes A Flight (3:20)
4. Skipping (4:54)
5. Something Worth Waiting For (2:28)
6. Plainclothesman Tuesday (2:02)
7. Shelter (5:49)
8. A True Conductor Wears A Man (2:12)
9. Getting Ready (2:43)
10. Mixed Up With Who? (4:25)
11. Illumination Of The Flesh (3:45)
12. Naked Feet In The Dark (4:59)
13. All The While (5:15)
14. Exponentially (6:29)
Total time – 54:27
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