To be a reviewer around here you have to be at least part sleuth. Information is not always forthcoming from labels and tapes. That said, what we have here is a split tape between Mid-Air! and DDDDDDDDD’s-that’s nine “D’s” friends.
Side one is Mid-Air! and that begins innocently enough with some simple repetitive piano and percussion. This doesn’t last long and before I can clean up my spilt coffee they (he, she, it?) are expanding on this theme and then taking it in new directions altogether. Uh-oh, now we’re beating on the pots and pans. Simple is gone. Innocent is hiding. A simple cymbal tap in succession. About midway we are treated to some grunts and groans accompanied by a sinister backward piano. Some sense of rhythm returns and on it goes. And this is only side one.
The D’s, as i lovingly refer to them (him, her, they?) are a little more on the dark side. Subterranean. This is the soundtrack for the subway to hell. About half way through the side, everything stops and a voice announces “side two”. Well thanks, it’s been side two for 15 minutes….all is forgiven though as the music returns to twisting and turning like a day-old taco in your large intestine-all with a touch of low-fi to boot.
Don’t be mistaken, these are two separate and quite different performances on the two sides of this tape. The originality is the common theme.and not much else.
Aptly titled as its a total 92 minute tape, these guys call this “trip-hop”-which sounds about right. It’s not music in any traditional genre nor is it strictly electronic or ambient or even experimental. There’s some structure here. it’s not really free-form. It’s none of these and all of these. It defies categorization. Both bright and dark, silly and serious. This tape has found the lonely path of uniqueness. This is good stuff.
https://midair.bigcartel.com/product/92-minutes-in-the-tea-room
-Robert Richmond
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