Nurse with Wound - Spiral Insana

This probably should have been the first post, because Nurse with Wound is the band that inspired me to create a blog.  And unlike Annwn, I actually have things to say about Spiral Insana.  

I've just recently started exploring NWW, and after a few listens to Homotopy to Marie, decided to pick up this album.  It was really between this and Chance Meeting since those were the only ones that I recognized at Rasputin (basically my home now).  I've heard that Chance Meeting is amazing, but I've also heard that it's nothing but a few kids messing around in a studio, so I went with this.  So far it's been a great choice.

Comparing this to Homotopy to Marie, I guess I'm really surprised that Homotopy is always mentioned as the album to check out for newcomers.  I like it, but Spiral Insana seems a whole lot more accessible if nothing else.  There are still parts of Homotopy that I'm not quite sold on, whereas Spiral easily keeps my interest the whole way through.

One of the things that makes this album so accessible at first is this motif that keeps cropping up at irregular intervals throughout.  Kind of a pulsating low rumble.  I perceive it as this separate entity from the rest of the piece, sometimes coexisting peacefully and sometimes antagonistic.  (I don't think I've anthropomorphized music this much since Peter and the Wolf, but here we are.  And yeah, I had to use google to figure out how to spell that).

Anyway, listening for that motif really gives you an anchor point the first couple times through, just waiting to hear how and when it comes back.  There are certain sounds that precede it early in the peace, and then when the sound comes back I expect that motif to follow.  The anticipation gives the motif a life of its own, and in a way even distracts me from whatever else is going on.  At a point I almost wished it wasn't there at all, but then I wondered, what would Spiral Insana be without it?  Would the "artistic statement" be different?  Do I even care?

Another thing that stands out about this album is this one simple piano ditty that crops up a couple times.  For lack of a better description, it's an excerpt of "normal" music on conventional instruments.  Towards the end of "The Schmurz" on Homotopy there is a similar thing, and in both cases it seems like a musical non-sequitur.  Part of me wonders if it's gimmicky in some way; eclecticism for its own sake.  In the "The Schmurz" it arguably serves the purpose of breaking the tension of the preceding 24 minutes, but at the same time, does that trivialize whatever point the piece was supposed to be making?  On Spiral Insana, I guess I like the inclusion of the piano tune a bit more since the way the ambience builds up behind it is interesting.

I don't know why I'm so trigger happy to call certain aspects of NWW "gimmicky", but I suppose I just feel like I don't totally understand what they do.  I have the sense that their back catalogue is even more eclectic than these two albums, so once I hear it maybe the context will help.

Next on my list to listen to:  A Sucked Orange and Thunder Perfect Mind.  I downloaded both and they sound great so far.  Why do these albums have to be out of print?