“Oulipo” is the name adopted by an informal collective of French authors, poets, artists, and mathematicians who use self-prescribed limitations to produce works of art. For example, an author will replace every noun in a piece with a noun seven entries later in a dictionary, or will write a story without using the letter “E.” These experiments in restriction allow the artists to seek new ways to express themselves without using familiar tropes or the limitless resources of words, phrases, and shapes.
While she’s not exactly trying out for team Oulipo, an introduction to tUnE-yArDs’ latest offering BiRd-BrAiNs would be incomplete without bringing up her rather unique method of recording. A solo project of Merrill Garbus, recording under the tUnE yArDs moniker, BiRd-BrAiNs was recorded exclusively on a Sony digital voice recorder, and then mixed using the free shareware, Audacity. tUnE-yArDs’ self-imposed D.I.Y. poverty wraps each song in a sort of aural realism that is lacking from even the most reverb drenched lo-fi experimentalists. While these limitations in recording fidelity do have unintended side-effects, such as the auditory clipping of vocal tracks and tinny sounding percussion, what the listener really hears are Garbus’ true merits rising through a din devoid of any studio trickery.
Though each track retains the same basic approach to recording, a highly diverse range of sound can be found over the course of the album. Most songs are composed around a ukulele, a handful of cheap percussion instruments, vocal loops, a rummage sale selection of found sounds, and most importantly the voice. Damn. That voice! One minute she is cooing like Joni Mitchell and the next she is roaring like Kim Gordon. Garbus’ husky croon bounces from the 70s singer-songwriter crooning of “Sunlight,” to the reggae influenced scatting of “Jamaica,” to straight up hip-hop on “Jumping Jack.”
While the album is incredibly solid as a whole, there are two truly unmissable tracks. “Sunlight,” the record’s first proper song, is a show-stopper. Starting with possibly the most straight forward vocal track on the album, she plods through some heavy percussion and a wicked bass line while crooning, “I could be the sunlight in your eyes, couldn’t I?” By the two minute mark, a ukulele and some clamoring guitars have joined the mix and a sampled vocal loop enters the fray. Thirty seconds later, her voice has gone from Joan Baez to striking an unusual balance between Riot-Grrrl era Sleater-Kinney and the baritone howl of Menomena’s Brent Knopfs.
“Hatari” is the obvious go-to song for showcasing Garbus’ range. Starting off by sampling a Juana Molina-like vocal loop, the tracks switches its tempo and vocal juxtaposition, as jagged ukulele riffs bob and weave through Our Brother the Native-meets-Pharoe Sanders-like call and response babbling. The noise is overwhelming until Garbus just kills it with her a-cappella moan: “Oh will you hear the sound/Ten thousand voices lost and found.”
As it stands, tUnE-yArDs sits comfortably along side other outsider pop phenomena such as Kurt Weisman, Bird Names, and Sister Suvi (of which Garbus is a member), as well as found-sound collage artists, the Books. Much like the French Oulipo collective, tUnE-yArDs chooses a lo-fi approach to force her big ideas to the surface instead of swimming in a never ending sea of loose ends and possibilities. These self-prescribed limitations give context to moments of unspeakable beauty, such as in “Hatari,” when all percussion and vocal loops stop cold in their tracks and Garbus’ solo voice, in that half-warble/half-war cry of hers, forces out the lines, “There is a natural sound that wild things make when they’re bound.” It is only within these limitations that the wild things in Garbus can be fully unleashed - face paint, feathers and all.
Track List:
1. For You (1:49)
2. Sunlight (3:47)
3. Lions (4:59)
4. Hatari (5:39)
5. News (3:24)
6. Jamaican (3:54)
7. Jumping Jack (3:16)
8. Little Tiger (4:59)
9. Safety (4:37)
10. Fiya (5:28)
11. Synonynonym (3:49)
