Russell Branyan got his first substantial major league at-bats for the Cleveland Indians in 2000; dude always swung from his shoes. There was no in between with Russ. In 193 official at-bats that year, he had sixteen home runs and 76 strike outs. More than 30% of his hits were homers; more than half went for extra bases. When Branyan came to the plate, you knew he was going to get his money’s worth. Tribe fans (and opposing pitchers) had him sorted out after two weeks in the bigs and he was never more than a utility guy after that first summer; this wasn’t the next great power hitter, but it was entertaining as hell to watch him take rips (as long as there wasn’t someone on third). Sinkane works in kind of the same mode. The solo project of indie-drumming wunderkind Ahmed Gallab is not about singles. He’s trying to beat songs out of the park. Sinkane’s second, self-titled album connects on more pitches than it misses. The songs that work are majestic and lofty, just a like a big fly. The ones that don’t are commendable for their ambition, just like a wild cut at a high heat. As a whole, I’m glad I’m in the stands on this one.
Sinkane opens with three and a half minutes of ambient drone with an evolving and wildly diverse drum solo behind it. It’s kind of a Buddy Miles on acid deal, which sets the tone for much of the record. As a listener, I chalk this one up in the miss category, only because it doesn’t really go anywhere. The swirling drums are interesting, but the building anticipation and tension is never really released; this serves a function as it gets the ears ready for the aural assault to come, but to a degree, it seems unnecessary. The album as a whole is a mish-mosh of diverse styles (psychedelic rock, acid jazz, free jazz, heavy drone…) and, probably, this mild freakout at the front end of the record serves to both presage it’s exuberantly moody raucousness and sonic angularity. There are a few other points on the album where Sinkane loses the thread a bit, but as described above, the ambition is laudable. It’s not really my thing, but Gallab is clearly talented and knows his way around both the kit and the studio; that first track, “Desert Blues”; leaves me a bit cold, but the album heats up fast.
If “Desert Blues” is indeed just a kind of sonic palate cleanser, the album starts with a bang on the first thing that’s recognizably a song, “Blown.” Most of the tracks on Sinkane are on the long end and “Blown” clocks in at just over ten minutes; all ten of them are awesome. It’s a pscyh-rock, blues-drenched, distortion laden stomp with wicked guitar solos, bruising, constantly shifting drums and creepy, unintelligible completely fuzzed out vocals. It’s a clear highlight on the album, both a killer track and a perfect showcase for Gallab’s diverse talents. He’s probably best known as the drummer from Of Montreal, and the work on the kits is impressive in “Blown,” but the rest of the work he does here is top shelf. In a lot of ways, “Blown” recalls the Black Angels, but with a slightly less self-conscious tone. In any event, “Blown” is worth the trip to the record store on its own. To head back to the tortured baseball metaphor for a minute, it is a blast to the second deck on a perfect summer day.
The rest of the album moves closer to the noisier realms of jazz music than “Blown.” The next track, “The Glow” opens with two minutes of wild, dissonant, completely rudderless noise. It sounds like someone charged into Gallab’s studio and started beating the shit out of stuff. It is cacophonous and atonal and a bit rough on the ears. At the two minute mark, everything drops out, leaving only a snappy beat and an increasingly complex trumpet riff. For the rest of the track, tension builds and builds. You keep waiting for the noise to come back, but the rhythm and the horn keep lulling you into toe-tapping. The song never gets loud again, but the groove that carries the song out is awesome. This dichotomy is really what the record is about: the loud and broken juxtaposed with the catchy and funky. I’m inclined to label the loud parts misses, but folks more clued in to the finer points of free jazz might well dig it.
Taken as a whole, there’s a lot to like on Sinkane. The floating grooves of songs like “White Light” and “Really Hot but Pretty Awesome,” paired with the pedal-driven brilliance of “Blown” compensate amply for the bits that turn me off as a listener; put another way, there are flaws, but they amount to a pittance against the good stuff. The track below, “Apache Beat” is another winner from Sinkane. If you dig the vibe there, the rest is well worth checking out.
