new album “3 Heads Tame” from guitarist TOM CREAN (KSE #385)

TOM CREAN, “3 Heads Tame” (KSE #385), CDR album

7 String Guitar, Classical Guitar, Classical Banjo, Bass, Production, and Engineering – Tom Crean

Compositions by Tom Crean with contributions by Matt Robidoux and Ernesto Brute

KSE is happy to present our fourth album from Western Massachusetts guitar/banjo innovator  TOM CREAN. His first album, WIRED LOVE, featured solo guitar and banjo; his second was a duo album with electronic musician Mike Barrett (aka Belltonesuicide); his third was a duo album with fellow stringed-instrument player Matt Robidoux (which is still available!); and now comes his fourth, 3 HEADS TAME, a solo album quite different from any of the others.

As someone who grew up listening to albums by guitar experimentalists such as Derek Bailey, Fred Frith, Sonny Sharrock, Jean-Francois Pauvros, Hans Reichel and many others, I have wanted KSE to get behind today’s creative guitarists (and banjo players and bajo sexto players, etc.) and give them an outlet to explore new territory and create new works without worry of commercial concerns or marketing. We’ve issued dozens of albums featuring guitars behaving non-traditionally, but in particular we’ve given an annual platform to Ernesto Diaz-Infante out on the west coast (in the SF Bay area) and Tom Crean on the east coast (in Western Massachusetts). Tom has put a lot of time and thought each year into the concept and execution of these albums, and they’ve been very well received by our listeners, underground radio, music bloggers, etc. When I asked him about the genesis of this new album, he stated,

“Half of the compositions on this recording are inspired by various unidentified “Transcriptions” compositions. “Transcriptions” are the appropriation of non-art musics and scoring for experimental music ensemble. The “Transcriptions Manifesto” was recently released, this document describes the process of writing “Transcriptions” with the open invitation and intent that others will score “Transcriptions” as part of the Transcriptions Project as a whole. Besides these fragments of “Transcriptions,” the rest of the performances of my works are improvised. Ernesto Brute’s piece is a graphic score and Matt Robidoux’s piece is from one of the rock bands he played in called Pony Bones, which put out a tape 3 years ago and lent itself well to a classical guitar arrangement. Almost all takes were done the first time. There is no multi-tracking (except the last track.) All the electric instruments were recorded straight into the computer from a multi-effects processor (I’ve found this more effective especially with 7 string guitar.) The other pieces were recorded in a spacious room at home.”

3 HEADS TAME is not an easy album to categorize–it tends to be understated, and though I’ve listened to it a dozen or more times as I’ve been getting the release ready, it has an inscrutable quality to it, a quality that compels you to listen again and investigate further. I’ve been re-reading the late-period poems of W. S. Merwin recently, and they seem to have a similar quality. Neither can be unraveled easily, and neither depends on some facile “concept” or faux-avantgarde game-playing.

Another snapshot taken on the fascinating musical journey of Tom Crean. And while  you are at it, why not also pick up his earlier duo album with Matt Robidoux, and album I’ve been playing regularly for the last year and which still challenges me.

KSE #385 (CDR), TOM CREAN, “3 Heads Tame”

NOTE: ALL CDR’s  ARE NOW PRICED @ $8.00, postpaid in the US.

OUTSIDE THE USA , one album is $18.00 postpaid, first two albums are $20.00 postpaid, then $8 each postpaid after that—sorry, but it now costs almost $14 US to send one CDR overseas….you save A LOT by buying more than one—in fact, the price on an order of two or more HAS GONE DOWN!

1 album= $18, 2 albums= $20, 3 albums= $28, etc. Thanks for your understanding of this. The Post Office now charges $14.50 to mail ONE cdr without a jewel box to Europe or Asia!

Payment is via paypal, using the e-mail address   django5722(at)yahoo(dot)com   . It might be helpful for you to also shoot me an e-mail telling me you’ve sent funds and what items you want…or if you prefer, tell me what books/cdr’s you want, and I’ll send you a paypal invoice.

NOTE: you can STILL get Tom Crean’s previous KSE album, a duo with Matt Robidoux, 

KSE #359 (CDR), TOM CREAN & MATT ROBIDOUX, “Blank Space”–cover art by Jennifer Baron

also available, FOUR albums from Alfred 23 Harth:

KSE #379 (CDR), SHANGHAI QUINTET (featuring Alfred 23 Harth), “ShangShan/Stone Age Music” (Harth and young Chinese musicians, recorded live in Shanghai, China, October 2016)

KSE #363 (CDR) ALFRED 23 HARTH’s BERLIN ENSEMBLES

KSE #336 (CDR), ALFRED 23 HARTH, “Kepler 452b Edition”

KSE #318, ALFRED 23 HARTH & JOHN BELL, “Camellia”

and also….

KSE #371 (CDR), SAMUEL DUNSCOMBE & TIM OLIVE, “Zanshi”

KSE #377 (CDR) JOHN BELL , ‘Cambridge Surprise Minor and other peals’….new compositions for percussion from Bell, well-known for his collaborations with Alfred 23 Harth….

KSE #373 (CDR), DANE ROUSAY, “Anatomize” , solo percussion from the San Antonio-based composer and multi-instrumentalist

KSE #375 (CDR), MASSIMO MAGEE & JAMES L. MALONE, “The Limits Of The Possible” … one of .KSE’s most acclaimed artists,  saxophonist-composer-theorist Massimo Magee is back with a blistering duo album with guitarist James L. Malone

KSE #381 (CDR), BILL SHUTE, “Bridge On The Bayou: Bill Shute Reads the Arnaudville Poems”….readings of the five poems composed in Louisiana in 2016, soon to be published in one book-length volume

KSE #372, ERNESTO DIAZ-INFANTE, “Manitas” solo classical guitar

KSE #369, A. F. JONES, “FOUR DOT THREE TO ONE”

KSE #362, FOSSILS & BILL SHUTE, “Florida Nocturne Revisited”….new interpretations of Shute’s Florida Nocturne Poems

KSE #370, “KSE 11th ANNIVERSARY ALBUM” featuring newly recorded, exclusive tracks from members of the KSE family and friends: JEN HILL, VANESSA ROSSETTO, ERNESTO DIAZ-INFANTE, LISA CAMERON, BRIAN RURYK, FOSSILS, MORE EAZE, JOHN BELL, MASSIMO MAGEE, MATTHEW REVERT, STEVE FLATO

KSE #355 (CDR), MORE EAZE, “wOrk”

KSE #357 (CDR) SMOKEY EMERY / VENISON WHIRLED, “turning into”

KSE #359 (CDR), TOM CREAN & MATT ROBIDOUX, “Blank Space”–cover art by Jennifer Baron

KSE #336 (CDR), ALFRED 23 HARTH, “Kepler 452b Edition”

KSE #351 (CDR), MASSIMO MAGEE, “Music In 3 Spaces”

KSE #350 (CDR) ANTHONY GUERRA / BILL SHUTE, “Subtraction” KSE  reissue of album originally released in 2011 on Black Petal Records, Australia 

KSE #335 (CDR album), REVEREND RAYMOND BRANCH, “Rainbow Gospel Hour…On The Air!”—a wonderful hour-long AM-radio broadcast, mastered from cassette, capturing the warmth and joy of Rev. Branch in both music (lots of it) and spoken message

Thanks for your support over the years….stay tuned for the rest of our Fall/Winter 2017 releases, from MATT KREFTING, LISA CAMERON/ROBERT HORTON, MORE EAZE, and ERNESTO DIAZ-INFANTE….