A conversation with Steven Wilson about Bass Communion and more, April 2024
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- Опубліковано 20 кві 2024
- The new Bass Communion album, 'The Itself of Itself', is released by Lumberton Trading Company in late May 2024. The conversation touches on this and other matters related to Bass Communion, Steven's passion for some esoteric music, plus goes off at several tangents that hopefully will also be of interest. Apologies for the raw, blemished and haphazard nature of this at times, but I still need to get used to the time limit on the basic Zoom account and was functioning on very little sleep. All the same, Steven is a charming and engaging subject who rarely discusses Bass Communion and his enthusiasm for certain music the project has an affinity with. I appreciate his making time for this.
'The Itself of Itself' is released on CD in an initial edition of 1000. Bass Communion also has an exclusive 9-minute piece included on the upcoming V/A 'When Worlds Collide' 2LP, also released by LTCo and featuring other contributions from J.K. Broadrick's Final, Edward Ka-Spel, Nick Mott, Alternative TV, Splintered, Kleistwahr, Band of Pain, Senestra and more. Both can be pre-ordered now through the shop linked below:
Shop:
fourthdimensionrecords.bigcar...
More Bass Communion can be found here: basscommunion.bandcamp.com/
Thank you to Alan Rider for the help with this upload.
More content soon coming to the Fourth Dimension channel. It will be more or less the same with its organic and rough-edged approach, but we're fine with that. Alan Rider will appear here soon to discuss Mummies and Madmen, then hopefully Mark Perry of Alternative TV will follow soon after. Keep checking in.
Thank you for a great interview. Always love hearing SW give his insights and knowledge. Looking forward to being challenged by the new album. Keep being different! It's one of the key things that keeps me a SW fan. His ability to continue to develop and create new sounds, new ideas is phenomenal.
Thank you! I stand by what I contended in the interview in that SW is quite different to how most artists operate.
Great interview you did here. Sometimes, Steven Wilsons commentary on where music has been and is going is just as interesting as his actual music, which is to say, very interesting. You got some great answers out of Steven. Thanks for the listen.
I also agree with Wilson, when I listen to music by kind of diy bandcamp artists now, they ARE really focused on novelty and sounds, its almost ironic music, which camofauge the need for crafting songs with actual melodies and structures.
But there is a place for genuinely avant garde music.
Excited for the new record.
Thanks! Steven is a good subject. There's a place for ALL music, as long as it has substance.
Excellent Interview
The public library in Canterbury - snappily rebranded as The Beaney House of Art & Knowledge - had a record borrowing section on the lower ground floor. Rack space was the limiting factor and while it stocked mainly classical and jazz, there was also rock music. Borrowing the LPs was free for library card carriers. There was also the Stereo Cassette Lending Library on a trading estate just outside the city centre which charged a nominal sum for each cassette. This collection was extended weekly with new releases across many genres. I used both of these from the mid-1970s to great effect.
Interesting! I belonged to the far smaller library in Sturry, however, which definitely didn't have records. Of course, I went into the Beaney, as we called it, many times, but I've absolutely no recollection of the music section. Mind you, I had little interest in music until I was 12/13 and punk was still raging. By that point, I was doing paper rounds and buying singles, sometimes secondhand, from a few places in Canterbury.
Great interview!
And maybe the first time he was talking about Bass Communion in such depth.
I really would love him to publish this in Atmos, since it could be even more appealing if you are immersed in it...
Thank you!
This is a great idea! I'd be very interested in a Dolby Atmos mix too. I only discovered Steven Wilson recently when I saw that the best Dolby Atmos albums were all Steven Wilson mixes and I only discovered Bass Communion while tracking down his back catalogue. I'm sure I'm not the only person that discovered Bass Communion via this route. Thus you may find that many Bass Communion fans are also Dolby Atmos fans and they too would love a Dolby Atmos mix.
I have much of the Bass Comm albums, I look forward to hearing the new one. Thanks for the interview.
Welcome!
Good conversation.
Thanks, Dereck!
First time I heard Coil was by taking out the Horse Rotorvator LP from Hounslow library. Libraries were a great source of music for me too.
I'm sure I'd have taken advantage of records kept in our library had there been any! At least I borrowed plenty of books, though!
Interesting interview. I definitely appreciate SW for his unwillingness to repeat himself. I've bought every release of his since 2010 and I haven't always loved everything, but I love that all of his releases exist. From your and Steven's description of the album, it sounds possibly like a stylistic buffet. But then many of Bass Communion's albums have been very eclectic, especially the first couple of releases. And as much as I love Bass Communion, I probably only consider there to be 2 compelling albums: Cenotaph, and Ghosts on Magnetic tape.
As to your comment about the number of realms / music styles SW dabbles in, I couldn't agree more. But I challenge you to name me another artists that can make a 8/10 or 9/10 song over so many different genres; Prog, Metal, Ambient, Electronic, Psychedelia, Trip Hop, Shoegaze, Alternative, Industrial, etc. I would be amazed if there was anyone else.
Thanks. Steven's certainly a man of many musical talents. I like the fact he's got this singular, uncompromising approach to everything he does as well... although I'd level that at absolutely everybody I work with on my labels. Hope you enjoy the new BC album!
I would sign up for a BC subscription that releases those unreleased experiments.
I didn't recognise the music at the front and back of the interview. Is it from the album or is it something from somewhere else. I liked the sound of it whatever it was.
Snippets from the album. Glad you enjoyed!
The interviewer's over-talking and interrupting gets kind of maddening after a while.
It's a conversation rather than an interview, hence being referred to as thus in the title.
“Yeah yeah yeah”…it would be better if Steven just interviewed himself. He already knows what he is going to be asked…they all ask the same questions