Lee Ranaldo and Raül Refree are two fantastic guitarists, Ranaldo as a founding member of noise rock legends Sonic Youth and Refree as a flamenco innovator, yet their first co-release, Names of North End Women, displays almost zero guitars. However, these are also artists who work with sound just as much as their particular instruments and these audio collages fit their art world focus.
Ranaldo and Refree have worked together in the past (Refree produced Ranaldo’s excellent Electric Trim) and formed a true partnership on this release by collaborating on every sound. The artists recorded with marimba and vibraphone, samplers, a vintage 2-inch Studer tape recorder and a modified cassette machine Ranaldo had previously used in performances 25 years earlier.
Spoken word with slight singing around clicks and beats form opener “Alice, Etc” as Ranaldo’s vocal delivery will be familiar but the lack of drums/guitar/bass pushes him back to his more experimental days. There is no band, just the duo creating sounds with no limits; “New Brain Trajectory” uses chimes and pulses around more spoken word poems while the title track incorporates a bombastic beat as the track grows, swelling with bass-heavy blast and chanting lyrics resulting in the best effort in this new style. Another successful sonic collage is “Humps (Espiru Mix)” which brings samples and banging to an almost industrial level as more spoken word lyrics are presented.
Ranaldo re-worked old poems wrote new ones and used lyrics from Jonathan Lethem in the pieces as he sketches phrases around the unique sounds. Ranaldo’s vocal style may not be for everyone, but it is what keeps these songs together as Refree mentioned that the record began by simply using “samplers and cassette players as experimental music, musique concrete, poly-rhythms.”
The end result works better in some spots than others, “Lights Out” feels like the artists tossed everything they possibly could into the mix and the overload/instant shift in styles is a bit much while “The Art of Losing” featuring Haley Fohr (Circuit des Yeux )is torn between traditional song structure and free for all, never truly coalescing around either.
“Words out of the Haze” is a solid effort starting off with an ominous digital pulsing before adding organic vibes, handclaps, supporting vocals from the Sey Sisters and even some rare guitar riffs/plucking to the mix while closer “At The Forks” flirts with being a huge dramatic crescendo, but purposefully undercuts itself with dropping notes, tape rewinds, and a buzzing sad ending.
Ranaldo and Refree range free on Names of North End Women, experimenting at every turn and expanding what instrumentation for their songs can be.
