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***Talented British multi-instrumentalist David Coulter creates a series of 13 somber, deeply resonant, sonic mediations. Coulter plays an array of instruments, including guitar, violin, ukulele, theramin, mandolin, double bass/bass, didjeridu, mouth harp, musical saw, accordion, harmonium, and others. Mostly instrumental-though sometimes accompanied by sung, narrated, or chanted vocals-each piece has its own unique cinematic atmosphere, as if he's briefly tapped into an ongoing, transcendental stream of pre-existing sonic imagery. Low-key, low-tech, and intimate, Coulter's understated and organic music seems to search for something beyond itself-through the juxtaposition of colliding acoustic and electronic sounds, through the obsessively nuanced, ritualized grooves, and through the subtle interaction and improvisation of the wide assortment of players and collaborators. INterVENTION includes contributions from Marc Ribot, Steve Nieve (of Elvis Costello fame), Terry Edwards, Phil Minton and others. Coulter was a contributing member of the Pogues and Test Dept., and has also performed with the Kronos Quartet, Marc Ribot, Peter Hammill, and Roger Eno, among many others. He is a master of the didjeridu, having studied with the Aboriginal musician Bart Wiloughby. Though decidedly "serious" in tone, Coulter's music has the accessible immediacy of an Indian Raga or the bluesy, intuitive trance-lines of Mongolian folk songs. Its hand-made ambience achieves a rare combination of subtlety and intensely committed instrumental performance. INterVENTION has the purity of an invocation. For those interested in modern, experimental music that is both sonically inventive and emotionally rich, this album is a must. "The debut solo release from ex-Pogues and Test Dept. multi-instrumentalist David Coulter has a thrilling acoustic intimacy, coaxing evocative new textures out of instruments familiar and strange. Coulter's loosely receptive and inventive playing, uncluttered spaciousness, and the lack of rhetorical baggage makes this release a masterpiece of miniaturized beauty." -The Wire |
