Three-Layer Cake | Stove Top
RareNoiseRecords
The recipe alone is enough to make a certain music fan’s mouth water: Hudson Valley percussionist Mike Pride was enlisted by legendary hardcore bassist Mike Watt to record tracks during the COVID shutdown, sending them to Watt to record over, and guitar/banjo shredder Brandon Seabrook rounded out the remote trio. Startling and as multifaceted as a well-cut gem, Stove Top capably displays a shared, shrewd compositional approach to socially distanced recording. Whether weaving disparate lines together to a satisfying conclusion on the opener “Beatified, Bedraggled and Bombed”; unleashing tough, skronking grooves against chiming chromaticism on “Big Burner”; or engaging unison guitar/glockenspiel lines swept along by fuzz bass on the Canterbury-esque “Tiller,” the trio takes monstrous advantage of Seabrook’s buzzsaw virtuosity, Watt’s full-frontal rectitude, and Pride’s grace and ferociousness (often on the same track) behind his instruments. That stove is sure to blow its top once Three-Layer Cake are finally in the same room.
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This article appears in December 2021.
