No Julie Andrews and no hills alive on this Sound of Music. Instead, the avant-garde New York City trio Zero Times Everything has crafted an expansive two-CD set divided into “Back Hole” (10 tracks) and “White Hole” (6 tracks). This is heady stuff that requires patience and perseverance.
According to the band’s press materials, the album’s title “is derived from the Pythagorean theory of musica universalis, or the ‘music of the spheres,’ wherein Pythagoreas states that if objects in motion create sound then the planets forever in motion must forever produce sound. There’s also the notion present within the record itself of the dangerous existence of black holes and white holes within this planetary harmony. If the theory is that the movement of the stars produces a harmony then these holes in space create danger within that harmoniousness.”
Are you still with me? If so, it’s obvious musicians Tony Geballe, Pietro Russino and Richard Sylvarnes are ultra-smart guys, and you are the type of listener Zero Times Everything is relying on to keep track and process all the chaos that’s going on during the course of these instrumental pieces punctuated with background voices, digital noises-slash-screeches, spoken-word passages and even a few actually sung lyrics. The trio is joined by a handful of guests, including Markus Reuter and the late actor Frederick Neumann, and the pièce de resistance is the 26-minute apocalyptic epic “Lux Aeterna,” which the band calls “our ‘Supper’s Ready.’” Arguably, it emerges as the most accessible song here.
The packaging is as engaging as it is enigmatic, the song titles as riveting as they are beguiling. But be forewarned: With a running time of almost two-and-a-half hours, Sound of Music is an exhausting and difficult listen.
Track Listing:
Disc 1: Black Hole
1. You Are Here
2. Razorblade Keychain
3. The Same Flat Field
4. Ice Report
5. Blisterine
6. Milky Black Sun
7. Sound Tenement
8. Tears in the Waterfall
9. Die Nacht Ist Leben
10. Coda
Disc 2: White Hole
1. You Are Hearer
2. Third Uncle
3. Oculus
4. Two Dead Stars Falling Into a Catastrophic Embrace
5. Lux Aeterna
6. The Sound
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