Outside The Dream Syndicate: 30th Anniversary Edition

jo - "...Conrad's constantly shifting, layered violin - thoroughly exploring the instrument's harmonics - is the perfect foil for Faust's relentless rock drive..."

ant-garde polymath Tony Conrad has, since the `60s, led trailblazing paths in the fields of minimalist composition, structuralist film, and arts education. Notable among his body of work is a brief tenure (in the mid-`60s) with LaMonte Young's drone music collective, the Theatre of Eternal Music. TTEM's sustained, long-form explorations into just intonation tuning systems impacted everyone from the Velvet Underground (whose John Cale was also a member of TTEM) to the underground fringe of Germany's late-`60s rock movement. Among the most visionary of the German groups were the W mme-based hippie-art collective known as Faust; OUTSIDE THE DREAM SYNDICATE marks Tony Conrad's 1973 recorded debut, here, in collaboration with the celebrated Krautrock pioneers.
The album was initially hatched from a chance meeting between Conrad and Faust's producer/Svengali, Uwe Nettelbeck, and in many respects OUTSIDE. represents an artistic detour for both parties involved. A product of willful asceticism applied with a rigorous mathematical logic, Faust's usual anarchic, Dadaist-inspired hysteria is toned down to a supple motorik swoon. Side One's "From the Side of Man and Womankind" strikes a deliberate, magisterial pace; buoyed by the rhythm-section of bass guitarist Jean-Herve Peron and drummer Zappi Diermaier, Conrad unfurls a single mournful note from his violin, distending the buzzing purity of the drone into rising and accumulating thickets of overtones. The ensemble's zen-like concentration continues on Side Two's "From the Side of the Machine", which contrary to the title, is the more organic of the two sides. Here, Conrad takes a more aggressive tack, his hypnotic rasping ascending to higher registers as the band roils along in the rhythmic undertow. A long out-of-print and often overlooked link between early minimalism and the rock avant-garde, the 30th Anniversary reissue adds a bonus CD containing three previously unreleased outtakes, restoring OUTSIDE's rightful place as a historically significant document of underground music.|