Despite finally releasing a new studio album in 2022 after an almost two year gap filled with live albums, a remix album, and various improv sideprojects, this year turned out to be a relatively quiet one for Osees. Outside of extensive touring and somewhat under-the-radar releases of a couple live performances by the improv sideprojects, there simply wasn't a lot to discuss this year. We keep expecting a surprise EP or something, as previous years have been capped off with, to no avail. Maybe this means 2023 will be bursting at the seams? Maybe we'll finally get the badly needed Singles Collection Volume 4? Regardless, the year has also turned out to be a bit of a wash as far as my life is concerned. This time last year, as I started to listen to Gong Splat and had recently begun a new job, things were looking up and the next year felt full of promise. Instead I'm ending 2022 in a real rut, unemployed and rudderless, with the same amount of debt as I started with...though I am more frequently sober than I have been in years, which is something! Anyway, my apologies that it's taken way longer to finish this run of reviews than I had anticipated.
Gong Splat was released on December 17th, 2021, the last in the slate of improv sideprojects “recorded in the peak of dope smoke lock down” according to John Dwyer. While this one doesn't stray too far from the rest in terms of overall sound, it's quite unique in the line-up, which is stripped down and for once doesn't include Tomas Dolas:
John Dwyer- guitars, etc.
Ryan Sawyer- drums
Greg Coates- bass
Wilder Zoby- synths/Mellotron (on tracks 2, 4, & 9 only)
Andres Renteria- misc. percussion (on tracks 1, 3, & 5 only)
From this you may have noticed that a full third of the songs only feature the trio of Dwyer, Sawyer, and Coates, while Zoby and Renteria never appear on a track together. Speaking of Zoby, he's the wildcard here as we haven't heard him on an improv record yet. Gazing at his discography reveals he's worked with El-P and Run The Jewels as well as production work and various appearances with bands I won't even pretend I've heard of (Chin Chin, Lanoiraude) and some I have heard of but haven't listened to (Cass McCombs, Blockhead). At least on Gong Splat his style of playing tends toward the abstract/atmospheric and is used as a background rather than a foreground element. To put it another way, I'd describe him primarily as a synthesizer player and not a traditional keyboardist.
Given its smaller pool of musicians, I would definitely put Gong Splat more on the Witch Egg side of the equation than the Bent Arcana/Moon-Drenched side. Which is to say it's more jazzy, spacious, and atmospheric, though lacking saxophones and a traditional keyboardist/pianist. Ryan Sawyer on drums means it certainly has more of a krautrock and groove-oriented vibe as well. With less cooks in the kitchen, Gong Splat showcases more of a small-group interplay that allows ideas to happen and develop with more immediate focus in a more rapid fashion. It's quite telling that the three tracks that only feature Dwyer, Sawyer, and Coates are the shortest on the album, and among the shortest in the entire improv sideproject run. Judging from the plays on Spotify, I get the sense most people start off strong on Gong Splat and their enthusiasm kind of wanes as it goes. I can understand that. This album doesn't do anything terribly surprising and different than the records that had come before, so despite the fact it's probably some people's favorite in the run and has some excellent material, some fatigue has no doubt set in among fans.
With the bookend of Gong Splat it was now easy to differentiate these releases as if one is going into an options menu in a videogame and tweaking the settings here and there. “What if Witch Egg but no sax, more guitar, different drummer...”, you get the idea. Anyway, we were talking about the album starting off strong, yes? The opening title track is certainly one of the strongest harvests from the entire improv run, with its deep bass stabs, blurting synthesizers, noodling guitar teleporting in and out of the mix, and a typically addictive Sawyer kraut-groove that could go on for days if they'd let it. 'Cultivated Graves' yet again demonstrates how effective using an acoustic bass with this kind of music can be, doubly so if it's mixed in a way that it isn't overcome by the rest of the instruments. The song builds to a frenetic and loud peak before letting out the breath and ending with a reverberating crescendo. 'Toagut' is a showcase for percussion and drums, though Dwyer's expansive, effects-coated guitar solos burn straight through to the Earth's core before we suddenly shoot off into deep space and the remaining minute is given over to peaceful keyboard sounds that flutter in-and-out across the stereo sides. As for 'Anther Dust', which my spellcheck and I both keep desperately wanting to be titled 'Another Dust'...well, it's a bit of a non-starter. There's a huge mess of sounds going on but I'm not sure the abstraction of it all ever adds up to anything interesting other than a bunch of people making a lot of formless racket.
Side B opens with 'Yuggoth Travel Agency', a title which promises more of a spirited and motorik-beat infused good time than what we actually get. But I'm fine with that; not every long song on a Dwyer project needs to be interstellar overdrive, as it were. The sleighbells are certainly a nice touch, as is the skipping/skittering beat machinations of Sawyer. For those curious, “Yuggoth” derives from Lovecraft mythology and is a planet you probably wouldn't want to visit unless you like freaky fungus/crab creatures and impossibly old ancient godlike beings who couldn't care less about your existence. But I digress. 'Hypogeum' has lots of layers of keyboard/synth sounds from Dwyer, including wind-like whooshes and twinkle-twankles, and suddenly is cut off just as the groove is getting going. 'Oneironaut' brings the energy level up a couple notches, with a loping bass-and-drums led stride that...um, also is suddenly cut off just as the groove is really getting going. Huh. The even shorter 'Minor Protocides' tries to see what would happen if you mixed Endless Garbage with Moon-Drenched, and the result is every bit as calamitous as that sounds. Frankly all it does for me is hurt my ears and make me wish I was listening to either of those albums. I'm happy to report, then, that the Dune-referencing 'Giedi Prime' completes the album with more a more graceful and eerie version of what Side A's ending 'Anther Dust' was trying to do. Just as I would say Gong Splat's album cover is mirrored by its opening title track, 'Giedi Prime' sounds like what happens when you travel all the way down that dark road into the 2001 rings of psychedelic color and come out the other side, no road or drums/percussion to ground you. Coates's masterful use of bowed bass on this track finally makes me concede that, if Sawyer is the obvious MVP of the improv records, then Coates is the most underrated player.
My general takeaway from Gong Splat is that it makes for an uneven capstone to the improv sideproject run. It simultaneously always leaves me wanting more and yet wishing a couple tracks had been cut. It should be more consistently interesting and fresh than it is, especially coming after the four albums that preceded it and did more to differentiate themselves. I suppose in some ways you can posit Gong Splat as a sampler for what the improv sideprojects have to offer, but this kind of implies that it's not the inherently satisfying and coherent feeling record that should be, too. It's especially weird for me because for most of the last year, it was unquestionably my favorite of the improv records. But in revisiting it more closely for this review, I've been continuously left underwhelmed by it. I dunno, I'm having a hard time coming to grips with my take on this one. Just as 2022 in my personal life ended up being a confused and confusing mixed-bag of feelings and events (both minor and major), this record similarly doesn't settle out into something I can easily explain and summarize. Thankfully I don't do scores for albums anymore, because this one would be a tough nut to crack. All of that said, in my opinion it's the weakest of the improv sideprojects in the sense that it sits as the least unique and the most imbalanced record in the lot, with some obvious highlights (in particular the title track) and some forgettable filler. It's essential if you like the other improv records, or even music in this vein in general—just be ready to chew and swallow the gong with the splat. Err, I mean, the wheat with the chaff.
