Last August 18, I wrote about forming a band. Nothing resembling that band has come to fruition, and I wasn't expecting it to. It was mainly a paean to "music I'd like to make, somewhere and sometime". It's good to get these things down on e-paper for posterity, so I can at least look back on it and think of what a great idea I have and aren't I a musical voyeur and supergenius for thinking of it, etc.

Then I stumbled across a CD by the Wharton Tiers Ensemble whose back cover clearly stated "five guitars, bass, sax, drums". The CD is called "Twilight of the Computer Age", I gave it a spin, and whaddaya know, it's filled with pounding drone rock and spacey semi-improvised FX pieces. It's times like this when one realizes there is no justice in the world and all the best ideas are truly taken. I should have expected this. I've heard that Lee Ranaldo had a project with 16 guitars and one hi-hat. If true, similar ensembles of guitar excess must surely be out there, so my idea couldn't have been as unique as I'd hoped. Coming from Tiers, who has been a figure on the NYC underground scene for twenty years and has worked with the likes of Sonic Youth, Helmet and Dinosaur Jr (but I hadn't heard of him until today).

The recording featured some strong guitar sounds but I found it ultimately lacking. Much like the Warlocks' recordings, it's an album loaded with guitar and is quite good, but disappointing in the sense that I'd expect an album with that many guitars to sound, you know, a hell of a lot HUGER. I can't even begin to imagine the technical difficulties in recording a large ensemble while not bleeding the tracks into another, but nonetheless, I need a bit more bang for my five guitar buck.

Next, I listened to "The Orbit of Eternal Grace" by Grasshopper and the Golden Crickets, a side project by the Mercury Rev guitarist. And whaddaya know, it's filled with loads of the wide-eyed psych-folk you'd expect from Mercury Rev, but with oodles of tape loops, moogs, shimmery noises, flutes, and about a million other things, all vying for your ears attention at the same time. Sometimes you find your Wall of Sound in unexpected places.