Genre: Noise, Improv, Acoustic
Sounds like: Harry Pussy, Derek Bailey, Marc Ribot
Some more weird solo guitar 'cause I know everyone loves it as much as I do. I've been on kind of a kick lately. Bill Orcutt used to play in a 1990's noise band called (ahem...) Harry Pussy. I won't pretend that I listen to much noise but it's a good starting point for trying to figure out Bill Orcutt's new stuff as an acoustic musician. His guitar only has 4 detuned strings and I would say that he "rattles" on it as much as plays. In fact it's not entirely clear that he actually knows how to play guitar - as this Dusted review points out, he just sounds like Bill Orcutt. Sometimes melodic, sometimes furious, and all times challenging, How the Thing Sings ends up conveying a lot of different emotions despite it's austere approach. His previous LP A New Way to Pay Old Debts seemed liked it was an obvious next step for the former rocker, a stripped down version of pure ear splitting noise. This is more subtle, the space in between notes more pronounced.
Here's why I decided to write this up: I saw him this year at San Francisco's Hardly Strictly Bluegrass festival and it blew my mind. Here's the setup: 300,000 people converging on Golden Gate Park for a good 'ol throwback to the down home music of the south, complete with a dried-up Robert Plant singing Black Dog (an octave lower cause he's old as shit) and fat, drunk moms and dads bumping into each other on the way to the Banjo Stage. One of the organizers (maybe somebody with a sense of humor) booked Orcutt at the small stage near the front entrance as the last act, meaning that most of the crowd got to listen to him as they walked to their cars. For such a huge festival the crowd in front of him was sparse and I think he was as bewildered as anyone about his presence. And it was awesome. For a festival that prides itself on emotional music, he fit right in.
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