Review | “Elegant Contact” by GNAC + "All the Hours" by The Hardy Tree
Exquisite new releases by two contemporary masters of the melancholic sublime
“Elegant Contact” by GNAC
The necessity of beauty is a constant preoccupation for Mark Tranmer, a prolific composer, multi-instrumentalist and collaborator of many projects and configurations. For more than three decades, his solo project under the GNAC alias has been transcending any expectation, since the masterpieces released all belong to an alternative timeline of music history, rhapsodizing about a parallel universe where only the most aesthetically refined connotations exist.
Perhaps one visualizes music by GNAC as an oil sketch by Fragonard, lackadaisically capturing the amorous frivolity and picturesque charm of a pastoral afternoon. Maybe, the listener captures lingering afterthoughts of guitar heroes like Vini Reilly and other alternative icons of esoteric independent music-making. Personally, what captivated me the first time I heard of GNAC, a good 30 years ago now, was the elective affinities of powerful melodic lines and how these harmonized perfectly with the yearning romanticism of Italian and French soundtrack maestros, for example, Francis Lais or Stelvio Cipriani.
What is undeniable is that each of Tranmer's releases, under any of his various aliases, is yet another subtle adumbration of an ever-captivating sonic palette painting the most captivating landscape, resplendent in expanse and absorbing in detail.
Offering the listener views from a soaring vantage point afforded by a higher plane of aural sophistication and illustrating the porous borders demarcating the shared edges separating and uniting the outer periphery of lyricism and the deliquescently ineffable, Tranmer practices volatile magic that has cast a spell too often and for far too long to be dismissed as mere prestidigitation or some circus act: this is real magic, performed by a true wizard. “Betweenness” is the apt title of one of his most beautiful tracks.
This latest release is ostensibly a vinyl 7'' single (now sold out) containing 4 tracks (one on the A side and three short instrumental sketches on the AAA side). However, the online edition, includes 8 extra recordings, some under 2 minutes, others longer, including a few demos. It's debatable if the entire dozen count as an album – perhaps, had they been conceived as such; yet as they stand, their tightly cohesive thematics and close tonal affinities align more with a singularly-themed EP.
Ultimately format doesn't matter, since listening to these hypnotic confections is to experience a fragile accomplishment of unique allure, for these enchanting vignettes, perched precariously on the edges of their inherently delicate tension, perform a spectacular high-wire act that breathtakingly connects the most vertiginous emotional peaks with the loftiest summits of wistful serenity, all the while hovering over the call of the void, suspended in disbelief high above the deepest waters of tranquil reflection.
We are honoured and privileged to be in the presence of an authentic magus since, without a shadow of a doubt, Mark Tranmer is a mystic on a par with Moondog, Eben Ahbez, Harold Budd and other such monumental figures of epochal significance.
"All the Hours" by The Hardy Tree
Miraculously, a similar sense of spiritual exhilaration is captured yet again this month, by another giant of contemporary music, the indescribably great Frances Castle, who is the high priestess of the nothing less than phenomenal Clay Pipe Music label, an astonishingly perfect imprint representing a cataclysmic cascade of musical geniuses, all of them releasing album-after-stunning-album, their collective creativity making for a roster and discography that takes the breath away even from the most demanding audience.
In this latest EP, issued under her main moniker as The Hardy Tree, Frances Castle takes us by the hand for a lazy stroll towards the pensive circumference of a musical amour fou: an instantly overwhelming sense of dizzying alertness, inducing a fever dream whose intensity is paradoxical since its escapism is achieved most languidly, lulling the listener into a form of instant emotional captivity and leading the mind towards a total immersion in blissful disassociation, as if the lilting sounds are pointing towards an exit sign, guiding us towards a complete break from any other reality but this specific frequency that makes it possible for anyone to exist in a dimension of gentle, life-affirming harmonies, their soothing tintinnabulations celebrating the full-circle joy of being alive and privileged enough to listen to such delicate assemblages of sonic beauty.
Released in two versions, as a 20-minute long-form version and a companion edit meant for radio, “All the Hours” was initially composed for a live performance at The Betsey Trotwood pub in London last February. The piece serves as the soundtrack to a slow-moving animation inspired by the cover art of The Hardy Tree’s previous album, “Common Grounds”.
According to Castle, “…it takes listeners on a journey from night to day and back again, unfolding through delicate looped woodwinds and melodic soundscapes. The music was created using an Elektron Syntakt and an Elektron Digitakt, and the limitations and constraints of the instruments helped define the sound of the music.”
Text written by Panagiotis Chatzistefanou, exclusively for the Psychonaut Elite, Berlin, September 2024