The Ensemble of Exquisite Corpses – SubCastC – 2021

An extraordinary collaboration that resulted in an aural Exquisite Corpse.

Long notes below.

At the end of September 2020 I posted an invitation (gloveofbones.com/2020/09/29/the-warlock-tapes-an-invitation/) to collaborate on a fanciful project that had been bubbling around in the fuzzy parts of my mind that occasionally leaks ideas. Thankfully, a number of fellow travellers thought this might work and bravely took a dive.

The 10 pieces here are the result of this collaboration.

Exquisite Corpse was hatched in 1925 by the Surrealists André Breton, Yves Tanguy, Jacques Prévert, and Marcel Duchamp, as a visual pursuit to unlock psychic potential and accidents of chance collision.

Exquisite Corpse hinged on free play, unpredictability, and collaboration—forces Surrealists routinely used to “[disrupt] the waking mind’s penchant for order.” More on the link below. 

www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-explaining-exquisite-corpse-surrealist-drawing-game-die

For this project, each collaborator provided a piece of sound in response to a root track, unaware of what any other participant was producing for the same piece. Unlike the normal collaborative process where a band works together to weave their ideas towards a common goal, here there is a trust in chance & chaos. The separate parts are then layered together to create an endpoint with its own unplanned character. No material supplied has been left out, although some creative license has been employed in the construction of the pieces in an attempt to give every contribution some space.

The results veer from sparse atmospheric dirges to industrial orchestral explosions, Dada-esque poetry to horror movie soundtracks. The participants have bought their many talents and preferred instruments to the table in an open dialogue of sound. The results have far exceeded my expectations and my gratitude to all who joined in is immense. 

GoB/trh – January 2021. 

The Ensemble of Exquisite Corpses features:
Mark Fox, Jaime Munárriz, Rutger Van Driel, Nathan James Carter, Volker Bauland, Hans Castrup, {AN} EeL, Gordon Way, Cousin Silas & Gabriel ON.

Concept, construction and artwork by the Glove of Bones / trh.

Dedicated to George Cockcroft 1932 – 2020

Released March 2021