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WRITHING SQUARES

Writhing Squares

Chart For The Solution

    Philadelphia duo’s third album. Features mbrs of Ecstatic Vision, Astute Palate, Rosali & the Middlemen. Mastered by Mikey Young (Total Control / Eddy Current). Writhing Squares - the Philadelphia duo of Kevin Nickles (sax, flute, synth) & Daniel Provenzano (bass, vocals)  have been refining the nuts & bolts of their sound over their previous two albums.

    Their latest (and second for Trouble In Mind), "Chart For The Solution" is a double album chock full what makes them tick; heady, progressive, psychedelic space-rock-cum-minimal synth slop, punctuated by MacKay/Chance-style blasts of brass & woodwinds that definitely scratch an itch. Over the course of "Chart For The Solution"s four sides, Nickles & Provenzano utilize the extended format to stretch out & settle into a groove all their own. From the relentless synth pulse of opener "Rogue Moon", thru the aggro-throb of "Geisterwaltz" & four-on-the-floor scree of "Ganymede", The Squares have no mercy for your weary ears.

    After a brief, (slightly) mellow respite thru three tunes ("The Abyss Is Never Brighter"/"A Chorus of Electrons"/"The Library"), the band ratchets up the intensity with the cacophonous clatter of "NFU" (featuring Philly legend "Harmonica" Dan Balcer RIPPING thru runs on his harp) leading right into the album's centerpiece; all of Side Three's "The Pillar", a near-nineteen minute epic suite that launches the listener straight into the maw of a black hole & thru the other side. Side Four closes out "Chart For The Solution" starting with the slinky stomp of "North Side of The Sky" into "Resurrect Dead On Planet Whatever"s unsettling, cosmic-funeral dirge.

    Fittingly, "Epilogue" closes out the album, with Nickles' sax dive bombing around Provenzano's bass throb like an alien interpretation of "Funhouse"s howling anarchy, augmented by live drums by John Schoemaker & organ by Alex Ward. Recorded by the band themselves & utilizing recordings made from 2015 all the way thru earlier this year, "Chart For The Solution" really is a ZONE, & the perfect auditory cleanser to scrub away the stain of the previous year. 


    TRACK LISTING

    1. Rogue Moon
    2. Geisterwaltz
    3. Ganymede
    4. The Abyss Is Never Brighter
    5. A Chorus Of Electrons
    6. The Library
    7. NFU
    8. The Pillars
    9. North Side Of The Sky
    10. Resurrect Dead On Planet Whatever
    11. Epilogue

    Writhing Squares

    Out Of The Ether

      RIYL: Suicide, Hawkwind, The Stooges, The Contortions, King Crimson. Philadelphia band’s second album, following their debut on Siltbreeze. Kevin Nickles also plays in Relapse Records band Ecstatic Vision. Writhing Squares have been conjuring up cosmic slop from the Philadelphia underground for a few years now, mixing growling bass, motorik synthesis, and skronking sax into a heady brew of punk-laced progressive R’n’R. The duo of Daniel Provenzano (Purling Hiss, Spacin, Rosali & the Middlemen) & Kevin Nickles (Ecstatic Vision, Taiwan Housing Project) emerged in 2015 with their self-released “Gemini Blues” 7-inch, following it up the next year with their debut album “In The Void Above” for the renowned Siltbreeze imprint. “Out of The Ether ” is their sophomore effort, & first for Trouble In Mind. “Out of the Ether ” kicks off with the metronomic throb of “Dirt In My Mind’s Eye”, setting the stage for the album’s 5 tracks of minimal, droning ambience, overtaken at times by Nickles’ wailing, saxophone skronk; a mixture of the soulful runs of The Stooges’ Steve McKay & the no-wave stabs of James Chance.

      “Steely Eyed Missile Man” picks up the pace, with a four-on-the-floor drive underneath Provenzano’s guttural basslines. “Bloodborne Hate and Black Book Mass” and side one closer “I Turned To The Mirror ” add the industrial menace of Cabaret Voltaire to a locked-in groove and lysergicly introspective lyrics. Album closer “A Whole New Jupiter ” takes up all of the LP version’s side two, slingshotting the listener over the event horizon and thru the center of a sonically sculpted black hole, it ’s relentless motorik dirge evolving over the course of the track’s 19-minute run time into an abstract pulse before lurching back into the groove, riding it into the sun.


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