HD Hausmann
Album: Wring The Moisture From The Surf
Label: Self Released
Tracks: 7
Website: https://soundcloud.com/h-d-hausmann

When is a band not a band? Answer - When they're HD Hausmann!

"I liked the idea of a band going under a moniker that could umbrella them as a single individual", say LP, the primary songwriter behind this geographically disparate group of musicians. "I wanted to create ambiguity and a certain amount of anonymity". And this idea is the foundation on which "Wring Moisture From The Surf" is based - a sonic collaboration from musicians who have actually never been in the same room together.

It's a concept that although not unique, allowed LP to bring in a series of musicians from across the country to contribute to the albums palate. Drums by RH, backing vocals and keyboards by AS, random horn players found online, experimental piano parts played by JH without having heard the songs themselves and all mixed by SD. If this sounds bizarre, (experi)mental and just a touch avant-garde then of course that's exactly what it is. There is an inherent massive drawback to travelling this route though the whole project could have lumbered uncontrollably into unlistenable territory, and whilst artistically this may have been some kind of warm blanket of satisfaction, the downside is that in the real world few people would care.

Thankfully LP has created a minor gem on this his (their) debut offering. It's a piece of work that does indeed distort the lines between structure and ambience (although structure is always the ultimate victor), but the harmonic fluidity that is prevalent throughout ensures that although LP got into the project via the route of soundscape and noise music, there is a crisp yet understated melodic sensibility at play.

With that information at hand, its intriguing and clear to see how songs like "Old Satellites" were (de)constructed, painstakingly, layer by layer by the various contributors, building from solitary angular piano notes and LP's deep anti-vocals to a cascading wall-of-sound crescendo of guitar, keyboards, and vocal refrain.

It's an approach that clearly works for LP and his anonymous cohorts, as "I'm Here And I Am Cold In The Water" takes a similar route, based around a simple and slightly discordant three chord progression and straying just the friendlier side of the noise boundary looking towards a touching-distance tunefulness.

With song titles like "An Island Without", "To The Loveliest Ocean" and "Wring Moisture From The Surf" the recurring theme of water is strong. "I've always liked the ocean as a timeless existence", explains LP. "When you can only see miles of ocean you have a viewpoint that could be anchored to any point in the history of time - kind of. I find such expansive images to be quite evocative and they also reflect well against the soundscape floor of the backdrop. An Island Without was written in particular as a response to Joan Eardleay's paintings of the sea. I found them to be unlike anything I'd seen before, and upon reading about her life she came across as such a wonderful inspiration".

LP and HD Hausmann have been brave, and possibly just a little unhinged to have undertaken a project of this magnitude the start of which is fixed by the ideology of the main songwriter himself but of which the end outcome could never have been known. To draw all of those ideas together into a coherent framework and to bridge the gap between drawn out soundscapes and the more traditional song structure is a mammoth and thankless task, but "Wring Moisture From The Surf" bears ripe fruit, and HD Hausmann can be rightly proud of this melodic noise artefact.

Ken Brown
www.squarerootspromotions.co.uk