quiet by bindlestiff

here is a reproduction of the original 1998 CD liner notes:

bindlestiff is a remarkable group. born out of the ashes of the now sadly-defunct dozey lumps, who silently collapsed under the weight of their own impossible-to-execute new standard tuning acoustic guitar repertoire, bindlestiff came into being during early January 1991. the original premise was to move away from the acoustic guitar duo format, and branch out into the world of electric and electronic music. at that time neither of the members could have dreamed that the group would continue evolving in the unusual and startling way that it did, moving from the totally experimental to a full-fledged real-time electronic looping duo in just a few short years. various recording and performance opportunities presented themselves during those formative times, and the band continued to carve an unsteady path toward it's own final identity.

by 1995 the band was at the height of its musical and performance prowess, able to lock into and execute a broad repertoire of pieces both structured or totally improvised. often the duo would arrive at the studio for an evening's recording burdened down by the cares of their day. the equipment would be set up, and without a word, the music would begin to unfold. an intensive series of recordings were undertaken during the summer of 1995 in an attempt to document this remarkable musical experience. it should be noted that almost all of these recordings are live and in the moment. there are absolutely no overdubs of any kind, and essentially no mixing or post- performance sonic manipulation. this is the sound of two loopers, syncing without benefit of MIDI or other technology, pulling these "live loop duets" out of the ether. the band ceased live performance in late 1995 when the duo became geographically separated. these recordings are the legacy of an almost magical time...when all cares would be set aside in the glow of atmospheric ambience.

all songs composed and performed in real time by bryan helm / dave stafford.

the phonographic copyright in these performances / compositions is operated by pureambient records on behalf of the artist, with whom it resides. pureambient,com accepts no reason for artists to give away such copyright interests in their work by virtue of a "common practice" which is out of tune with the times, was always questionable, and is now indefensible. copyright 1999 (the world) bryan helm / dave stafford.


2013 notes:

"quiet" is our masterwork, of that, there is no doubt; the concept was simple - to try and record every song from our live repertoire, and then select the best of those for the ultimate ambient album that would represent our music.

why? the reason is simple: bryan helm was leaving, he was moving from california to colorado (where he still lives today) so we had to record our songs "now or never". what happened practically, is that without intending to, we actually made two albums at once - an album of ambient music ("quiet") and another album that we called "LOUD", these were simply the songs that were too active, or were downright wild prog / ambient jam sessions, that didn't quite fit onto "quiet".

the main purpose of the sessions was to produce "quiet", and that worked fine; we recorded the repertoire that we'd been performing live for the past couple of years, and even managed to create a few new pieces (such as "this quiet moment" or "signs of spring") in the process.

"quiet", for me, remains the benchmark, that I tend to measure a lot of music against, if I feel that a new piece would have been good enough for "quiet", then I know I have an exceptional piece of music on hand.

bryan and I worked together almost telepathically, and some of the musical accidents and events that occurred while recording "quiet" and "LOUD" were absolutely astonishing, things that you really could not plan kept happening, and the tape was thankfully, always rolling.

as it should be.

this was, and is, our ambient masterwork.

dave stafford, pureambient HQ, november 2013