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Phewie! This one is a trip. Cellist Lia Kohl and viola player Whitney Johnson’s debut album sees their collected experience as sound artists and improvisers fully transform a collaboration that began in 2018 by exploring the space between the cello and viola notes. If you take a look at the text that comes with this release, including the techniques and methods involved in stitching together this weird sonic tapestry, you’ll have an idea of how intricate and complex a project it is. I’ll try to give you an idea of the levels of creativity, originality and experimentalism present throughout this set…
A forty-minute journey is split into four tracks of a similar length, all with dual numbered titles, lending the abstract nature of the music more ambiguity; there is no Sunset over Dales style clue-giving to be found here. Opener 65|66 begins with electronic pulses akin to an approaching helicopter, with sharp, metallic bowed viola notes scratching eerily along with some disparate plucked notes. The playing is deliberately sharp in places, but there is softness to be found lurking amongst the swirls and dense digital sound that balances it, and the urgency of the bowing towards the end is equally unnerving and exciting.
Further on, 73|74 smothers itchy string noise with a blanket of warm electronic sound that, after three minutes or so, forms into something of a melody, with chimes and plucked notes creating a hypnotic and meditative sound very different in character to the more sinister feel of 65|66. That’s not to say there’s no unease here; after the halfway point, the orchestra paints on something of a frown and short bowed fragments shift the mood into a less assured place, with manipulated rays of sound darting past like laser beams.
54|56 goes a bit darker, with a low rumbling drone approaching like a nemesis and electronic sounds snipped before they fully form. Yes, it could perhaps be used in a soundtrack to The Thing or Alien, but once the urgency of the soundscape ebbs and you focus on the cello notes, Dr. Jekyll becomes more apparent. At least until the viola begins worrying the cello around the halfway point; then it all shifts back into more sinister territory. Wow!
This is very possibly one of the more challenging albums you will hear this year, and the music certainly has teeth in places, bringing in unease and asking questions, but stick with it and give it time to wash over you. This complex, dense tapestry is orchestral in places, but over time plays out more like a meditation, especially once its structure becomes more familiar. Experimental, trippy, fiercely creative and quite mesmerising, For Translucence is a tricky album to pin down, but you’ll be glad you gave it the time and space to reveal itself.
For Translucence (March 28th, 2025) Drag City (DC951 LP)
Pre-Order on Bandcamp: https://whitneyjohnson.bandcamp.com/album/for-translucence
