Lavatone – s/t
5.7.18 by Ryan Masteller

The warped ambiance of an unforgiving prairie night on the Texas panhandle captured to cassette tape for secret gatherings around secret fires, “Lavatone” should never have even been discovered and pressed here in the present day. Indeed, its origins date from 1994, almost twenty-five years ago, an eternity in the music biz, a footnote in the modern era famous for … what? MLB’s labor strike? Please. Although I guess if there aren’t any Ranger games on TV you could do worse than recording some music. That’s what “drummer and noise cartographer” Drew Holder did as August raged outside and gave way to September, an equally horrifying month to be wandering around anywhere outdoors in Texas. It’s the reason buildings often have air conditioning.

On “Lavatone,” Holder mucks about in his Amarillo studio, matching up drum patterns against heat-warped sonics. These uniquely Texan experiments are like big-sky séances trying to raise the spirits of thunderstorms, which approach from across great distances with much advance warning. A thunderstorm even makes an appearance here, its field-recorded rumbles and raindrops a nice touch as they kick up the dust in their passing. But it was sheer luck that we even have the pleasure of hearing Holder’s “Lavatone,” as a wayward Amarillan musician named Hayden Pedigo stumbled upon what he calls “Stone Face” in Holder’s current studio, which just so happens to be the same studio in which Holder recorded “Stone Face” in 1994. What are the odds! Probably not too bad, actually. But the good folks at Full Spectrum, meaning Andrew Weathers, remastered this sucker and released it once again. It’s like a lost child has come home to my ears … which, somehow in this metaphor are the child’s parents?

Let’s leave it.

You can cop one of these tapes from Full Spectrum, edition of 100.