THURSDAY, APRIL 23, 2009
Prefuse 73, one of the many projects of Atlanta, Georgia born Guillermo Scott Herren, has been known to put out music that is both innovative and interesting in that he merges several different genres into one. His latest unclassifiable effort, Everything She Touched Turned Ampexian, is comprised of 29 songs, though don't expect an album of epic proportions. Clocking in at 48.4 minutes, Everything She Touched is really a series of snippets, seamlessly blending into one another, making it impossible to tell where one song ends and another begins.
On a musical level Everything She Touched Turned Ampexian is as hard to define as the word Ampexian itself. And while it's difficult to pick favorites on an album that cycles along like one continuous mix, highlights come more or less on those few songs that surpass the 3 minute mark. Dec. Machine Funk All Era's starts out with some pretty female vocal harmonies to go along with scratchy electro effects, until the song shifts dramatically into a fully fledged, funked out hip-hop backtrack...all that before finally coming to an end with a few more bits of glitchy electronica and ample harmonies. Regalo could also be considered a stand-out, flowing nicely along with it's easy going guitar riffs and vocal cooings. Peeling away the layers of this one even reveals the vague sound of a didgeridoo drifting along somewhere in the background.
There are also a few other moments on this one that are truly unique, if only for the fact that they are downright weird. Take the vocals that haunt that background of "Four Reels Collide", for example. I can really only describe these as sounding something like a ghost being tickled (or perhaps Devendra Banhart warming up). And though the track provides one of the oddest moments on the album, 10 songs later, on Pitch Pipe, the apparition returns, and this time, it's found a mate.
In all honesty, it's songs like these, plus the previously mentioned two tracks that make Everything She Touched worth listening to. While they help to pull the album together, Everything She Touched Turned Ampexian is a little too scattered to warrant multiple listens. - Greg Lozoff
