Chainworks is a futuristic trio playing otherworldly music for beings with expanded capacity for
absorbing new directions. On Red Rooms, Dan DeChellis develops varied sonic possibilities
on electric piano, Brian Moran submerges the soundscape with electronic supplements, and Matt
Hannafin paints asymmetric rhythms from a palette of assorted shades and colors. Together, they
unite to spontaneously chart unknown regions in the darkest crevices of the universe.
Recorded live, the trio’s music initiates a chilling ambiance where starkness and sparsity of tonal
centers gradually build in intensity as would the compaction of shooting stars. The interaction of
acoustic, electric, and electronic elements mesh intelligently in this natural extension of three minds
channeled in one outbound direction. Each musician anticipates and relates to the changing
environment to allow the thought processes to become a single source of atonality.
DeChellis introduces a plethora of intergalactic moods on electric piano. He alters the sound range
and phasing to emit a flood of cosmic vibrations having jagged edges and abrupt angularity. The
music seeps deeply into cavernous spaceways and accelerates rapidly to thrust the program into
freefall weightlessness. On “RR3,” DeChellis’s unstructured orbit reenters a known corner of the
cosmos but still maintains ties to the language spoken in far off star systems.
Moran adapts
his electronics to the drifting, shifting environment. He supplies simulated heartbeats, lung gasps,
and other stimuli as a retort to the staccato variables pouring from DeChellis’s piano. Moran’s efforts
have a contrasting effect on the performance by promoting calm to combat the unearthly sensations
circulating about.
The percussive contributions of Hannafin act as a tether from other
galaxies to more recognizable terrain. He injects splattering jolts of white light while co-existing with
the alien populace. Brushes scratch surfaces, hands rub skins, and sticks strike cymbals to provide
clusters of arrhythmic responses to these ultra-foreign tongues.
In further documentation of
the space journeys by Chainworks, Sachimay Records released an abbreviated follow-up of the
trio’s exotic approach to spontaneous improvisation titled Twenty Minutes in Brooklyn. This
shorter but equally compelling work, taken from the Improvised and Otherwise festival performance,
is another live example of their spontaneity. DeChellis plays acoustic and electric piano, and the
same sinister thrill of discovery permeates this more recent and aggressive trek into space by three
adventurous hearts.
Taken together, these recordings provide a view into where creative
improvisation is heading in this new century.
Visit
www.sachimayrecords.com.
~ Frank Rubolino
