Elegy (1992)
This album was one of the ones from Zorn that I'd read and heard a lot about before I started to explore his discography. It features a few guest musicians, most notably Mike Patton on vocals. This was another reason I'd seen a lot about it, as I was already a huge Patton fan and checking out stuff he'd been involved with. Trey Spruance is in there too.
This album has a diverse range of sounds and influences, from chamber music to ambient, sound-collage to avant-garde (you know, whatever that means in a general sense). It has an overall chamber/orchestral sound to it, created by a wide array of instruments such as flutes, viola, guitar, percussion, to name a few, and the use of turntables and samples.
It is a tribute to French activist Jean Genet. The album is a short one, under 30 minutes, consisting of four file-card compositions, all named after a color (Blue, Yellow, Pink, Black). The first two tracks are very downtempo throughout, featuring incredibly sparse instrumentation and even sparser vocals. "Pink" starts out a bit more raucous but soon retreats to the more lax chamber sounds of the first two, albeit not for long. It breaks into a sample heavy piece after about four minutes in, with crashing waves, and ethnic vocals. Patton maintains his "creepy breathing" vocals as well, soon to be accompanied again by the rest of the band. Six minutes in dynamics start to get a little crazy, with thumping percussive moments alongside squealing sound effects, shifting from this back to the chamber music multiple times. It goes on like this for the rest of the track. The closer, "Black", is my favorite here. A very unsettling atmospheric track featuring some throat singing by Patton (I assume) and other dramatic vocal movements. The atmosphere for this one grows very dark with rattling chains, scraping, choral samples, distorted guitar, and an overall feeling of anxiety. A great way to close the album, in contrast with the "easier" chamber music from the first three tracks.
This is generally a quiet album, that seems to rely on the sparseness. Not one of the more accessible ones from Zorn's catalogue, but also one that's not at all too hard to digest.