360 records from 2000: 83. Trans Am - Red line

83. Trans Am: Red line

Country: US
Artist: Trio
Career: recording since 1996
Language: English
Genre: Post-rock

Rock improvisation hits another peak. As befits the genre, I don’t know or care where these guys came from or where they went. When they made this, they put down the law. In 2000, my most recent landmark for rock improvisation is Tortoise’s ‘Millions now living…’ These guys know Tortoise, but if ‘Millions…’ is the ‘90s version of ‘Future days’, these guys have more devious schemes on their mind. Dark with propulsive electro riffs, distorted and otherwise FX-mangled vocals, ominous keyboard melodies, minimalist sections of silent dread breaking up the noise. I bet there are three (count’em) mad scientists in this band, or maybe two mad scientists and one evil genius. They’re not polite about fucking around with you or with the sound waves of their original recordings – it’s obviously a studio record, and whatever base materials they had after initial sessions likely bore little similarity to the way it ended up sounding.

Obviously sub-divided in four 18-minute LP-sides, it’s masterfully edited and sequenced. The fully formed tracks surrounded by cross sections, snippets and glimpses of even further mayhem – it totally works. Two examples. First, ‘I want it all’, first song side one – a driving electro groove, robot-monotone singing, totally amazing drumming keeping it all together, keyboard themes colouring the track ever more sinister. It’s like that moment on the threshold: are you in or are you out?

Second, at the centre of this beast of a record, sits the epic ‘The dark gift’, an island of melodic assurance – you could say everything up to then is leading up to it, and afterwards it’s just getting you back down. It’s majestic structure unfolds in its three sections: an acoustic fingerpicked introduction with folk-influenced grace overtaken by a gentle bass and drums restating of the theme, the Stygian knots mid-section – multi-rhythmic overlapping motifs leading us down ever deeper into the pits, and finally a graceful drums, guitar and synthesizer third part, casually restoring hope and normalcy (until the next track kicks in).

At its best: I want it all, Play in the summer, I’m coming down, The dark gift