Through A Room

“Bill Nace’s ‘Through a Room’ represents a seismic progressionfrom ‘Both’, his startling 2020 debut solo LP for Drag City.Nace’s career has been defined by a relentless probing of waysto frame the complex menu of human emotions, and that theguitar has been his primary tool for exploring this terrain is oflittle consequence. On this new release, he also employs tapes,hurdy gurdy, doughnut pipe, quelle est belle, as well as hislatest instrument of choice, taishōgoto. This is also, ultimately,insignificant. What matters is the discerning spirit whichanimates his work. The tracks are carefully built from loops andphrases that talk to each other, subsume one another,overlapping and crashing and diving and expanding andemerging into unimagined vistas. On the whole, the recordoffers a fascinating and engrossing chronicle - a sequence ofinterrelated stories told by a temporally dislodged narrator. Youthink you’re here, then you’re there, and then you go throughtrapdoors and along tunnels, into cellars and secret rooms, andyou find that actually you’re back where you started. But it’s nothard to follow. Nothing this enticing can be hard to follow. “The record was recorded and edited in Philadelphia during theuncertain summer of 2021 with engineer and co-producerCooper Crain. Where ‘Both’ was a chiselling down ofspontaneous live performance, ‘Through a Room’, whileobviously the work of the same artist, treats its sounds asbuilding blocks, combining them to mesmerizing effect. What’sstriking is the poise, the degree of authorial intensity. The falsedichotomy of composition and improvisation is thoroughly andrightfully abolished. Bill’s interests range from post-punk to postindustrial to hip-hop to free jazz to avant-garde composition,and every area between such unhelpful labels. From theinscrutable, evocative track titles to the enticingly baffling coverart by his longtime compatriot Daniel Higgs, Nace is guided byan ineffable, internal muse, a persistently personal stormcloudof ideas that, ultimately, comprise that thing we call art. Here’sthe real deal.” - Matt Krefting, Holyoke, 2022

Intro
Les Echos (Piece for Tuba)
Boil First
E:E
When Orange
Crooked Teeth
The Giant
Ann
Outro