Santo Subito
Xavier
Accretions
The experimental duo of Santo Subito revolves predominantly around the interplay of bass clarinet, violin and some wickedly-sustained electronic drones. Whereas most avant-garde music of this sort deals almost exclusively in mechanized noise, Xavier is suprisingly organic and fluid. Nowhere is this more apparent than on the 20-minute “Whole Trees in Motion,” where steady notes from synths run aground on nimble, low-end freakouts from the woodwinds and strings. There’s a definite sense of sonic progression in this music that’s not readily available in most other offerings in this genre. The subversion of expectations continues even when the group defers to the droning predilection, but still creates chorus effects with the notes or even harmonizes them. Interestingly, the disc offers some relatively straight-forward pieces as well, like “Radiosonde,” a which has the feel of a mutant chamber music composition and could easily pass for a Bernard Herrmann score in a Hitchcock film.
Accretions: http://www.accretions.com
