Trying to guess the content of a record from its cover is a temptation that’s as entertaining as it is often useless. But in the case of “Bellowing Sun” by Mind Over Mirrors, it is an interesting exercise.
“Bellowing Sun” is not just a record but it’s a multimedia work commissioned to the group by the Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art and inspired by a work by the writer Henry Beston. The installation includes a live performance that requires the audience to surround the musicians. The visual focus (reproduced on the album cover) is a large rotating light sculpture suspended above the group, a monumental zootrope in the shape of a large internally lit drum, conceived and hand made in collaboration with visual artists.
So what can we then deduce from the cover that we can then find in the disk?
The huge work of art mentioned above appears in the foreground. The most obvious element is its grandiose circular shape that directly recalls the musical structure of the album and in particular its rhythmic structure. The tracks are in fact built around patterns consisting of the arpeggios of modular synths played by the leader Jaime Fennelly or the percussions of Jeff Mueller that seem designed to repeat themselves uninterruptedly in a figure that seems to have neither beginning nor end.
The work’s purpose seems therefore to alienate the listener from what surrounds him, creating through this cyclic movement the illusion of a music that can last infinitely.
The other components that stand out immediately are the geometric and chromatic ones. The surface of the circle is not uniform but it consists of a weaving of fluid and multicolored shapes deeply intertwined and furrowed by white broken lines.
This synthesis is mirrored by the work carried out between the various instruments by the group, which through a meticulous and measured stratification, manages to blend each element into a pulsating and magmatic sound material.
But let’s go back to the cover: let’s focus now on the background of a natural night landscape. If the shape of the circle represent the musical structure and the material of which it is made, the interaction of the different instruments, the environment in which they are immersed seems to indicate the musical elements towards which the disc tends.
The eyes are at first and foremost attracted by the starry sky which leads us to think of a cosmic dimension while the trees between the zootrope and sky keep us anchored to the ground.
We need to take a step back to analyze this. Mind Over Mirrors was born as a solo project. The music of former Peeesseye Jaime Fennelly was built around synthesizers and the Indian harmonium with the help of occasional collaborators. The mixture of ambient, drone, mysticism and electronic inlays seemed to bring back, even if with a strong identity and personality, the spirit of the German cosmic couriers of the 70s.
Then with the previous album “Undying Color” an important change came. The album was made by a group of collaborators made up of Janet Beveridge Bean (Freakwater, 11th Dream Day) on vocals, zither and percussion, Jim Becker (Califone) on violin and Jeff Mueller (Collections Of Colonies Of Bees, Volcano Choir) on drums and percussion. Thanks to the entry of new instruments and collaborators, Fennelly’s music began to look towards a more earthly dimension thanks in particular to the interaction between acoustic and electronic instruments, the tribal component embodied by Mueller’s percussion and a measured use of influences ethnic.
The synergy that originated among the musicians has in fact led to the transformation of the moniker from a solo project to a full-fledged band.
The achieved stability has therefore allowed Fennelly to find the ideal conditions to complete the electro-acoustic integration of the previous work and to end the ambitious work “Bellowing Sun” to which he was working since 2015.
So the choice of this image could come from this new condition , showing the synthesis between the earthly component of music represented by the acoustic and cosmic instrumentation symbolized by synthesizers.
Listening to the record, the mystical and ecstatic dimension that brings to mind the Germans Popol Vuh, masters in the representation of spirituality and the tension between heaven and earth, emerges forcefully.
The work is conceived as a single performance and therefore must be listened to in its entirety to be metabolized but the initial triptych consisting of “Feeding On The Flats”, “Matchstick Grip”, “A Palinopsic Wind” mixed seamlessly, shows off already many of the features that we will find in the rest of “Bellowing Sun” from which we point out at least the kraut-ethnic excursion of “Zeitgebers” , the ecstatic trance of “Vermillion Pink” and the electronic-tribal bluegrass of “Oculate Beings”.
So abandon your defenses and let yourself be captured by the endless circle of “Bellowing Sun”. These 74 minutes will seem like a small but dizzying eternity. (grade: 8)
By Mason
Originally published in italian on May 13 2018
Republished in english on May 12 2019
