Hidden Music

GABRIELE GAI :: HIDDEN MUSIC :: LP :: VINYL 33RPM:: TOTEM TABOO RECORDS / DISTR. MATERIALI SONORI

FROM LACERBA PROFILE:

Gabriele Gai – multi-instrumentalist, composer, arranger and producer – has scattered traces of his talent throughout a very long career. In the 1980s he was alongside Steven Brown (Tuxedomoon) and Minox in Brown Plays Tenco, a project that put Italian songwriting back on the map of the post-punk generation. For Gabriele, this is just the beginning of a path of continuous exploration. At the dawn of the nineties he appeared on the new electronic folk scene by taking part in the recordings of the first seminal album by the English band Ultramarine, and in 2000 he achieved international commercial success with The Vinylistic and the house and nu-bossa productions for Loud Bit. In parallel, he has countless collaborations with other trajectories to follow, ranging from dub – Dubital with Mad Professor and the recent project with the great old man of dub Lee Scratch Perry – to cultured pop, which he produces with the duo Polychron+ and numerous prestigious guests including Anna Domino, Blaine L. Reninger and Luc Van Lieshout, to jazz, played with his talented ‘family’ of musicians, his lifelong friends. Hidden Music – aptly titled – is Gabriele’s first solo work, i.e., realised alone, without deadlines, without external pressure, in an inner dialogue between the author and the music. It is the result of the convergence of Gabriele’s many souls combined with his craftsmanship of the accumulation over time, of the almost obsessively chiselled detail.
Immersing oneself in listening to Hidden Music means facing the diary of a long musical adventure – written with an extraordinary sensitivity for pure, acoustic sound – that crosses time and space, and seamlessly blends styles and cultures in a highly personal work. Characterised by nocturnal hues and suspended atmospheres, the tracks combine acid jazz tones that fade into abstract soundscapes, moments of instrumental dream pop, soulful inspirations and poetic spoken word. The author’s ability to bring out the less obvious qualities of the compositions through the arrangement work emerges strongly. One example of this is the way Gabriele makes Aphex Twin’s Acrid Avid Jam Shred his own by forcing the breakbeat structure, thus transforming it into what could be the soundtrack of a 1970s noir.

Recorded and mixed :: Gabriele Gai

Mastering :: Gianluca Sibaldi / 5.1 Factory

Cover :: Edoardo Salvi

Graphics :: Filippo Giaconi