EXCERPT – In Altered Realities, Erdem Helvacioglu has found a balance between guitar and real-time processing that results in a cohesive disc with moments of true beauty. The titles of the tracks are visually suggestive and offer vaguely poetic extensions of the disc’s title. Names such as “Sliding on a Glacier” and “Shadow of my Dovetail” betray nothing of the musical mood, the programmatic intent or the creative inspiration. They are almost interchangeable on a disc that has no lyrics or program notes, but maybe this betrays Helvacioglu’s aesthetic intent to create a compact disc that plays like an extended composition as each track flows effortlessly into the next. Because the disc works so well as a unified whole that unfolds its macroform over the course of 53 minutes, it makes little sense to isolate the tracks from each other and talk about them as individual compositions. So instead my review will focus on the connective elements that Helvacioglu uses throughout the disc: his method and materials.

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EXCERPT – Bob Gluck’s new compact disc Electric Brew features an eclectic mix of influences. The backbone of the disc is formed by four original compositions that were inspired by and use motifs from famous jazz compositions by Miles Davis and his collaborators, namely Joe Zawinul and Dave Holland. In addition, Gluck offers up two additional interludes that he describes as “collages” formed by editing together several live performances of his original compositions. Gluck mixes these jazz references with his eShofar, a twenty-first century take on an instrument typically used in Jewish religious ceremonies, and Stravinsky’s infamous Rite of Spring. Unfortunately, these varied influences often yield muddled results.

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