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Photo by Joseph P. Traina
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There's something mystical,
majestic, and off-kilter about the Pacific
Northwest, and few artists know that better
than Karl Blau. A creative fixture in the small
port town of Anacortes, Washington, Blau
has been quietly churning out a string of artful
and quirky DIY recordings for about a decade
on indie labels ranging from
Knw-Yr-Own and K Records
to his self-started Kelp Lunacy
Advanced Plagiarism Society
(KLAPS) subscription series.
He’s also an accomplished
bassist and frequent presence
on the greater Seattle music
scene, which is what drew the
attention of guitarist Dylan
Carlson. In 2005, Carlson
resurrected his genre-busting
drone metal band Earth, and
revamped its sound with
elements of ambient folk,
free jazz, and avant-classical forms. After a
few well-received albums (including 2008’s
The Bees Made Honey in the Lion’s Skull,
with guest guitarist Bill Frisell), then-bassist
Don McGreevy decided to move on, and
Blau got the call.
“I’d been freaking out on Earth since back
in the day,” Blau says. “They were so dark
and otherworldly, and they’re still a really
ethereal and interesting band. A couple of
friends recommended me, and we hit it off
musically right away. We started getting
together to rehearse, and pretty soon we
were in the studio for a three-week session.”
Angels of Darkness, Demons of Light II
is the second installment from that session,
and it walks a more meditative path than its
predecessor. “Both albums were new territory
for me. I knew I would have to practice pretty
serious restraint. You get to feel the physical
sensations of the bass that way. I played for
years in a dance
band—very noodly
and very highenergy.
Restraint
can be difficult to
learn, because
you get antsy for
making more stuff happen. But this music is
all about the void.”
Blau’s main bass is a hybrid Fender with
an early-’60s Precision body and a late-’60s
Telecaster Bass neck. “It’s built for sustain,”
he says. “It has a real fat neck that plays like
a piece of driftwood, but it’s got that thump.
If you can push the note down and hold
it, the sustain is incredible. In the studio,
I ran that through the mic input of an old
Optimus SCT-86 tape deck to give it some
bite. I set that really low, and then output
to an old Ampeg B-15. We miked that with
an AKG D12, a great low-end mic.”
Karl’s undertones get an added brick in
the pants thanks to Carlson’s odd tuning—a
quarter-tone below Eb. It stands out in the
opening invocation “Sigil of Brass” (featuring
cellist Lori Goldston), the menacingly low
“Waltz (a Multiplicity of Doors),” and the
mesmerizing drone of “The Corascene Dog,”
with drummer Adrienne Davies cueing hits
with Blau at a tempo that’s slowed to a narcotic
crawl. Earth isn’t exactly built for speed, but
the band’s dynamic arrangements are rich
and complex—and almost wholly improvised.
With so many of his own projects in the
works, Blau doesn’t know what’s next with
Earth, but at this writing he’s scheduled to
make the band’s UK tour in March. “I’m
really excited about that. Dylan isn’t afraid
to explore, and that’s cool. I think he likes
to keep everyone on their toes about what
direction the music is gonna take. It’s a
courageous thing to do, but if you’re in the
zone, it can be a really free and open mental
space, and I like that.”
HEAR HIM ON
Earth, Angels of Darkness,
Demons of Light II [Southern
Lord, 2012]
GEAR
Bass ’60s Fender Precision/
Telecaster hybrid
Rig Ampeg B-15, AKG D12 mic
Strings Dean Markley Blue
Steel flatwounds