a r t i s t : Alexander Tucker
t i t l e : Portal
d a t e : 2008
l a b e l : ATP Recordings
g e n r e : Folk
r l s. d a t e : May/2008
t r a c k s : 08
b i t r a t e : VBRkbps
s i z e : 55,1 MB
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On 9th June 2008 ATP Recordings will release the third album
from Alexander Tucker, Portal. The album will be issued on CD
and LP, featuring artwork from Tucker (see above).
"Texts of this nature usually require the author to make
fashionable or wilfully oblique references to artists past and
present. Portal, the third Alexander Tucker long player for
ATP Recordings is a work of such bewitching splendour that any
such comparisons would read like hyperbole, thus doing it a
great disservice. Even Tucker's Previous albums (Old Fog and
Furrowed Brow) seem like stepping stones in the wake of
Portal. But if we must draw comparisons then lets say Chicago
musician/composer Jim O' Rourke both are unparalleled in their
pairing of the 20th Century avant-garde techniques of
composers like Stockhausen and Steve Reich with the archaic
sounding free-folk of John Fahey, Robbie Basho and Loren
Connors.
The late Karlheinz Stockhausen envisaged music where "instead
of very precisely formed single notes there are little
complexes little crystalline blooms that pass through a
register form". During Portal, Tucker's finger-picked guitar
lines become indistinguishable from the more traditional
string arrangements and voice. These melodic clusters
interweave like the paths incurved by a figure skater. This is
still to say nothing of Tucker's voice, which sounds as if it
is emanating from a ghost channel on an ancient mixing desk
rather than appear sung on top of the epochal arrangements.
It's a voice comparable perhaps to Meddle era David Gilmour or
John Martyn on Solid Air. These are big claims of course but
then Portal is a work of such extraordinary majesty that even
trying to surmise it in words seems like a heresy. If you
disagree after listening, then I'm sorry to inform you that
you are spiritually dead."
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01-Poltergeists Grazing [06:38]
02-Veins To The Sky [04:56]
03-Omnibaron [05:20]
04-Husks [04:28]
05-Bell Jars [05:50]
06-Energy For Dead Plants [04:40]
07-Another World [02:56]
08-Here [08:36]
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43:24 min