Moiré by Cold Stars

The long overdue sister album to Summer Thunder (in the sense that they were written roughly concurrently, and therefore from a similar perspective) is finally here. Moiré showcases an entirely different side of Cold Stars than its partner, but the rhythmic complexity and harmonic language provide a clear through-line.

Moiré is an intimate journal of inner life, written while struggling to birth awareness of that inner life into consciousness. Though content and language often reflect the outer world, always they point towards the Self. Visions, dreams, fears, and ideals are at the core of the music. The writing process evidences this, as these lyrics came out slowly, and often with much difficulty; they were not written, so much as they were received - patiently, and sometimes over long periods, despite their frequent brevity.

Musically, Moiré sprouted from a most unusual influence for solo acoustic guitar and voice material: the polymetric rhythms of bands like Meshuggah and Animals as Leaders. The idea was originally to write fingerpicking pieces in which the thumbed bass lines and plucked melodies de- and re-synchronized, cycling through all their possible rhythmic relationships. These entrancing and fiendishly difficult patterns can be found all across the album, interspersed between more gentle, impressionistic rubato segments, and plenty of odd and mixed meters; all this is wrapped up in contrastingly simple song structures (with one exception) with impressionistic and modal harmony that hints at everything from latin jazz to romantic period composition.

It's a joy and a relief to finally release this record after years of struggles, false starts, and interruptions. I hope it may find you in such dim and quiet places as it was written.

Cold stars is the primary music of James Greene in whatever form it takes; heavy or soft, acoustic or electric, instrumental or lyrical.

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