J.D. Robb
title:: Rhythmania: Electronic Music
from Razor Blades to Moog
label:: Locust Music
format:: CD
According
to the cd sleevenotes from Rhythmania: Electronic Music from Razor Blades
to Moog: "In 1941, at the age of 49, John Donald
Robb walked away from a successful international law career, headed west,
set up shop in Albuquerque, New Mexico and later founded the Rio Grande Electronic
Music Laboratory." And thus J.D. Robb (not Nora
Roberts, the writer, aka JD Robb, nor related to
the mid-60s midwestern rock group The Robbs) became one of
the early experimental music composers. Thanks to the folks at Locust
Music, we can once again hear the recordings he originally released
on Folkway Records: Electronic Music: From Razor Blades to
Moog (1970) and Triptych & Other Electronic Musical Compositions (1976).
Judging from his bio, J.D.
Robb recorded these sometime in the 1950s or 1960s (and I don't believe
these were recorded as late as the release date of the Folkway Records
lps these were originally released on). Highlights from Rhythmania
include Collage with it's
quickly whirling sounds. Rhythmania (it should be noted that according
to the Locust Music website, Rhythmania & Canon No.1
were mistakenly reversed in the cd track listing) has clanking alien rhythms
which would make a band like Cluster proud. Rondino
sounds like the music used in those creepy shortwave radio recordings from
the Number Stations. And finally, the tour de force of this
cd - Green Mansions - Abel And Rima - at almost 13 minute long, Green
Mansions is a squelching masterpiece, and sounds like a lost Stockhausen
piece.
---Patrick
