A Short Film - The Rest is Silence
Jazz musicians, (and I very much include myself in this motley bunch) are generally horrendous with coming up with band names. The process is normally insufferable, with everyone offering their suggestions and no one ever able to agree. I sometimes wonder how many bands have split up before they ever began as a result of rifts caused during the naming process. For jazz musicians, this process is far too confronting, so we generally opt out. The result is a lot of band names that are a series of last names followed by some collective noun for musicians eg trio, quartet. (A good example would be the Albanese, Morrison, McMormack and Bandt Quartet – I highly doubt they could agree on a band name but oh boy what a band!)
And so, I remember, many years before the Carbo family dynasty was a ubiquitous part of the Australian improvised music scene, the first time I saw the band name Carbo, Carter and Gunnoo Quartet. I spent a good minute pondering who the fourth member of this band was and why their last name was not included. Was it a seemingly obvious typo? Perhaps an example of mean-spirited bullying? Maybe their last name was too long and too confusing to spell? I was beginning to have bad feelings about this collective and felt sorry for the poor mystery fourth member. However, the answer was far simpler and less sinister than expected... Flora and Theo were siblings! It seems obvious now, but at the time they were just high school students, about whom word was quickly spreading amongst musicians.
Recently, the quartet renamed themselves The Rest is Silence in preparation for the release of their debut album, A Short Film. It’s a good name and, without wanting to evoke the obvious cliches that tend to come up when writing about music, I think this music feels and sounds cinematic, as if it were underscoring different scenes in a short film. It’s filled with so much variety, each track very different in mood and character from the last. I think this is one of the really cool things that can happen when a band is led collectively. Each member contributes a few compositions and the result is this melting pot of voices that, despite the old “too many cooks” adage, seems to work so well in this instance.
One of the things that keeps popping up as I listen to this album is “how on earth did they make that sound?”. My natural musical curiosity means I have a hundred questions about the recording process, the post-production, the instruments, the compositions and what the charts might have looked like. But just like a magician who should never tell the secret to their tricks, that little bit of mystery in the music is what keeps the listener coming back and a part of me never really wants to know the answers.
One these mysteries is a moment precisely 4 minutes and 50 seconds into Theo’s Gesualdo that, after a big build up, feels like the heavens open up in the sky; some trickery in post-production creating a literally breath-taking effect. Coupled with Maddison’s epic drum-fills that collide with soaring saxophone and guitar overdubs, it is my personal highlight of the album and I always have to re-wind and listen to it a couple of extra times just to marvel in wonder and consider becoming a Catholic. There is another mystery moment through Flora’s Anything Else in which, against a backdrop of a driving ostinato in the bass and drums, there is this bizarre “solo” of an instrument that I have never heard before and likely will never hear again! The more I listen to it, the less I think I know what it is. What’s so special about these instances, is the way that these effects add such detail to the music – it’s so much more than an overdub here, a harmony there: it’s integral to the overall sound of the record.
The group are able to balance this with the beauty of just simply playing the song, a prime example the final track, For Walter penned by Isaac. The song ambles along beautifully, the melody slowly unfolding, taking its time to develop as the musicians improvise in around it, never losing the essence of the tune. It’s somewhat reminiscent of the music of Paul Motian but at the same time sounds very Australian (whatever on earth that means!). I’m a total sucker for a nice melody and catchy song and Theo’s title track, A Short Film, certainly doesn’t disappoint. It’s expertly crafted, with Merinda Dias-Jayasinha’s vocal cameo adding a new colour to the palette. It also features a fiery guitar solo from the author, whose overdriven sound and long, flowing notes evoke the image of wide-open plains. I’m always amazed by Theo’s ability to generate a lot of material out of 3 or 4 notes, really developing these ideas with a maturity well beyond his years!
Whether it’s the Carbo, Carter and Gunnoo Quartet or The Rest Is Silence, A Short Film is such a great example of a collectively led band working well together. The variety that stems from having all members contribute, adds to the music and the listener can hear the feeling of collegiality that the musicians share. It certainly helps that all are high level improvisers with their own voices, sense of craft and ideas about how music should sound and be played.