You remember Boxhead Ensemble, don't you? They're the revolving-door indie pseudo-supergroup who provided the improvised soundtrack to that lovely documentary film Dutch Harbor a few years ago, and then toured with it, performing the soundtrack live (and kicking off something of a micro-trend in the process).
This time around, Boxhead Ensemble isn't providing a movie soundtrack -- they're playing for the simple pleasure of creating music. Hell, after three releases culled from Dutch Harbor and its screenings, it's about time they dropped the movie music crutch. But can they deliver the goods? The Dutch Harbor soundtrack was surprisingly good, but it was intended as part of a multimedia package; divorced from the film, it seemed, like any film soundtrack, to lose a great deal of its purpose. Improvised music, by its very nature, lacks pre-ordained intent. Charged with nothing more than travel from Point A to Point B, it either flails uselessly as the performers attempt to hammer their styles together, or slows to match the abilities of the least-talented player. The post-rock explosion has exacerbated the problem, unleashing a bunch of mildly talented musicians who assume that their music need only interest them, and the dozing audience be damned. Is it, therefore, reasonable to expect Two Brothers to be more than marginally coherent?
Fortunately, in addition to its slew of capable musicians, the Boxhead Ensemble boasts a strong director. Michael Krassner (The Lofty Pillars) not only provides empirical guidance for the group, but also alters it stimulus by gradually adding and removing musicians. These dynamic shifts help steer Two Brothers clear of the majority of possible creative ruts. It also helps that the album isn't another helping of bog-standard, jazz-derived post-rock noodling. Instead, it walks a crooked path between neo- (and not-so-neo) classical structure and the aching angst of early-1900s folk music. Modern, sometimes abrasive elements keep the disc from slipping into pastoral reverie; for instance, prudent applications of abrupt, incendiary electric guitar texture jolt the epic title track out of its nostalgia, and later in the piece you'll wonder if that same guitar is being dragged backward through a hedge. When a police siren invades the music, it's an abrupt time-stamp, jolting you back to the present.
From a purely referential standpoint, more extensive credits would be appreciated. Listeners who follow the bands from which the Boxhead Ensemble culls its core members may know Krassner as a pianist/organist/guitarist, Scott Tuma as a guitarist, and Truckstop Records stalwart Fred Lonberg-Holm as a cellist, but it would be interesting to know more about the roles each musician played in each of these nine pieces. Without this frame of reference, only Lonberg-Holm's contribution is distinctive; his mournful cello is Two Brothers' most familiar voice. Likewise, the efforts of the supplemental musicians -- who include Jeff Tweedy (Wilco), Jeff Parker (Tortoise), Jim White and Mick Turner (Dirty Three, Nick Cave) -- can only be identified by truly rabid fans. But such is the nature of an ensemble.
While it never quite evolves beyond improvised music's fundamental obliqueness, Two Brothers meets its primary challenge with admirable aplomb. Intelligent without being inaccessible, and unpredictable without being unlistenable, it embodies the spirit of twenty-first century music as well as anything I've heard.
