Tabs Out | Nancy Bigfoot – Polyester Honey & Moth Bucket / Women of the Pore – split

Nancy Bigfoot – Polyester Honey & Moth Bucket / Women of the Pore – split

James Searfoss is everywhere, all over the floor of your local noise labels; in the liner notes, under a gaggle of names, almost always hoarding the electronics in search of whatever adventure it might bring. The sounds and loops are versatile enough to bounce from Orb Tapes to FTAM and Already Dead, pushing listeners down a breadcrumb trail of various genre spots in search of cosmic gumbo. I didn’t anticipate that I’d ordered such a slab of cosmic gumbo and would soon be into Searfoss’ orbit until I happened to connect the dots with Nancy Bigfoot’s Polyester Honey (ADT364) and a split with Women Under the Pore under Searfoss’ Moth Bucket alias.

The Polyester Honey C36 finds the Nancy Bigfoot seven-piece free jazz ensemble trying to pass between electronic-aided-jazz longforms and scrupulous interludes. The action can turn psychotic or unfathomably chill depending on the side and minute you are attuned to, thus begetting a full listen. Side A’s Mustelid Jabberjaw is a hulking mass much psychotic, actively breaking and tossing everything down in sight, yet twiddling and quivering in brief spurts. It crackles! It tackles! It it-well yeah it electroshocks. Searfoss’ contribution involving tape loops and electronics is a welcomely visceral low end to tango to.

Meanwhile, Searfoss’ Moth Bucket split alongside Women of the Pore (for the FTAM label) is decisively less free-jazz and more “sick set” free noise. Tape splicing and looping techniques abound through the course of Searfoss’ 15 minute side, radiating a misbegotten Radiophonic / Children’s Electric Company aura. Sometimes it crackles like cicadas or murks like bog water, while other times the feature of a disjointed xylophone keeps a perky, upbeat counter. Of course, as the track continues, it devolves further into noise splices that are less privy to bright melodies and more towards twitchy drumming. It’s a well-warranted complimentary piece to Women of the Pore, the New Brunswick “bunker jazz” project that also has been popping up since 2019 from around Orb Tapes and its ilk. FTAM notes the generally noise piece’s strange sonic qualities akin to Ann Arbor noise musics circa 2003; I was five years old and have never stepped foot in the state. You’d be best to trust Mr. FTAM though, he’s quite the hoot and this tape from summer was a well warranted return to Type I tape.

Polyester Honey is sold out at the source! Moth Bucket / Women of the Pore’s split is currently available at FTAM Production’s Bandcamp.