Big Wad Excisions
Coppice, the Chicago-based duo of Joseph Kramer and Noe? Cue?llar, have released a small, but beautifully formed body of work which asks deceptively simple questions of both their unique instrumentation (pumps, bellows, customized boomboxes and electromagnetics), and their compositional practice. Their new record, Big Wad Excisions, builds on their earlier experiments while tightening the focus, and introducing new, unexpected elements. It also re-launches the Quakebasket label, which has lain dormant for six years, but with its relocation to Louisville, KY, has launched into a riotous second phase.
Using specific preparations with their instruments, and aiming for an ‘impression of transparency’ in their music, Coppice’s compositions are drenched in both clarity and mystery. They are able to squeeze both full-on velocity and lilting beauty out of instruments that seem to be discarded artifacts of unconsidered eras- huffing and cracking, puffing and firing. Coppice achieves these ends using many approaches, though a common thread is a deliberate take on rhythmic gesture. “Both of us are very focused on visceral ways of performing,” they reflect. “[We] let specific gestures and textural changes draw an audience into a special experience.” All throughout Big Wad Excisions, you can hear music coming into being.
There is no group that sounds quite like Coppice. Taking into consideration the overall state of technology and society, they shouldn’t be making music like this. BUT, the brilliance of their musical concepts have proven otherwise, and have now blasted open the gates for them to rip through the status quo of musical law, and help redefine the future of music. Coppice’s compositions parlay a double-tease of seduction and nuance: the humming and wheezing of the universe, breath by bellow breath.