Jason Calhoun – practice

As the figure behind naps, Jason Calhoun has reliably and semi-prolifically created beguiling drone for the last few years. His first release under his own name, and his fourth on Lily Tapes & Discs, new tape practice sees Calhoun continue to evolve and perfect his style. Although all the familiar elements remain, the name change proves to be more than cosmetic. Lily Tapes promise “a deeply felt shift in energy,” albeit “one that takes root and reveals itself slowly.”

As with prior releases, that slow part is important. Calhoun makes music as patient and imperfect as the world around us. These are songs crafted from thick welcoming textures and a quiet cacophony of thuds and clicks, at once richly detailed and strangely spare, as if Calhoun is holding up a microphone to the hidden corners of the world, all dust motes and creaking beams and pale lemon sunlight. Practice is “as much an album to listen to as a room to inhabit,” reads the apt description from Lily Tapes, “the details are all right in front of you, but you take them in differently as the world turns, as the light on the wall shifts and fades.”

Songs like ‘labor day’, based around a recording of gently lapping water, have a calmness and a brightness at their core which is hard to describe, the background atmosphere sounding at once melancholy and affirming, like jubilant swells of church organ drifting in from a distance. ‘string’ does something similar with the swish of passing traffic, a beautiful collection of tones and textures that highlight the magic in the mundane of our everyday lives.

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But if that’s the kind of thing we’ve come to know and love from Calhoun, practice holds some surprises too. Beginning in a crackling hiss that could be a campfire or a wordless phonecall, ‘route’ patiently unfurls across its eight minute run-time, the subtle ambient recordings anchored by emotive atmospherics. But perhaps the most notable example is finale ‘moving’, which immediately bursts to life in a shimmering blast of noise. The key elements remain, you can still hear the organic hiss and staticky glitches, the slow-aching drones, but it sounds more immediate and, well, louder. Of course, the dramatic is relative, there are still no crashing cymbals or wailing guitars, but by the time the track begins to wane towards its close, you feel like you’ve seen a glimpse of the evolution of Jason Calhoun.

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practice is out now and you can get it on cassette from Lily Tapes & Discs, or from the Jason Calhoun Bandcamp page.

photo of jason calhoun practice cassette tape