To call the guy prolific doesn’t even really do justice. Sergio Chotsourian, frontman of Soldati, formerly of Ararat and Los Natas, has already in the last year overseen the release of a box set of his first three solo albums done under his chosen moniker Sergio Ch., as well as a trilogy of solo singles, the debut of the trio BRNO (review here) late in 2020 and more. He’s got more waiting to come out too. “Desde el Adentro” was first posted in April and already he’s got a new song on the South American Sludge Records Bandcamp page in the seven-minute instrumental take on BRNO‘s “You Are the Moon” re-dubbed “Soy Luna Soy God.” I have a tendency to admire work ethic, and Chotsourian‘s creative pulse beats fast.
“Desde el Adentro” is a partial departure from his solo fare. Not for being produced, recorded, performed and topped with cover art by Chotsourian himself so much as by pushing deeper into South American folk stylings than he’s gone since his first solo record, 1974 (review here). The progression of his craft in the five-plus years since has been toward an experimentalist blend of drone, electric and acoustic guitar topped generally but not always with his vocals, and “Desde el Adentro” is comparatively minimal. Guy-and-guitar. It may be that Chotsourian will rework the song in some form down the line — it could end up anywhere and for all I know it already has and there’s another recording in the can waiting to come out on one or another album-to-be — but for now, the mostly-subdued, contemplative feel suits the melody well and plays to a traditionalism Chotsourian often engages but rarely so directly.
I’ve done any number of premieres for Sergio Ch. and his bands over the last however long. Simple reason is I believe in what he’s doing. I dig it, and though I’ve followed his career for the better part of two decades at this point, he still manages to offer up surprises on the regular. This is one of them.
So please enjoy:
Sergio Ch., “Desde el Adentro” official video premiere
VIDEO OFICIAL DEL SINGLE DE SERGIO CH. – “DESDE EL ADENTRO” VIDEO REALIZADO POR SERGIO CH.
SERGIO CH. – DESDE EL ADENTRO [S.A.S. 118]
SERGIO CH. – GUITARRA & VOCALS
GRABADO, MEZCLADO Y MASTERIZADO POR SERGIO CH. EN DEATH STUDIOS ARTWORK POR SERGIO CH. PRODUCIDO POR SERGIO CH.
Conceived and executed remotely, one has to imagine BRNO have never had all three members in the same room. Does that make them a project instead of a band? I don’t think it matters, but it’s a debate for a different time anyway. The outfit’s debut release, self-titled and out through South American Sludge and Interstellar Smoke Records, includes seven cuts and introduces an atmospheric sprawl born intentionally of blending goth and heavy rock, with the ever-prolific Sergio Chotsourian (current of Soldati and solo work, formerly Los Natas, Ararat, etc.) in the Andrew Eldritch/Peter Murphy role as vocalist while Lucio Ceretti (El Huésped) handles guitar and programming/keys and the Czech Republic-based Martin P?ikryl of post-punkers The Prostitutes brings further guitar contribution. Maybe that’s the shred you hear in the standout solo of “Sick Boy,” I don’t know.
The order of the day across the 42-minute outing is chug, and in a song like the later “Wails,” the three-piece use that to blur the line between heavy goth and post-metal as keyboard melodies surround a steady-rolling groove and Chotsourian‘s vocals. In comparison, the prior “Daddy’s Home” is downright danceable, and plainly intended to be so, but the record already took its time in opening cut “Broken Wings” to introduce these elements — the spaciousness of the mix, the ringing lead lines topping said chug, the keys, the straightforward but necessary programmed drums, and so on — so nothing feels out of place or like it’s coming from nowhere. The aforementioned “Sick Boy” recalls Fields of the Nephilim in its dramatic chorus and underlying keyboard line, and the subsequent “Fuck Hate” serves as the longest track at 11:50 and is hypnotic in its unfolding in addition to being a more patient presentation — the two are no doubt related — and its a precursor to the also relatively-extended “You are the Moon” (9:11), which waits on the other side of “Daddy’s Home” and serves as the apex of BRNO‘s BRNO with its resurgent riffy core and less-manic but still forceful guitar soloing, the lyrics a gothy romance with sunshine chasing the moon.
Only closer “Pregnancy” follows “You Are the Moon,” and though by no means insubstantial at a little under six minutes long, it is an instrumental intended to bolster atmosphere more than broaden the palette or serve as the culmination. Of course the title is evocative in itself, a portending maybe of things to come from BRNO as a project (or band) as and if they move forward from this beginning toward further creation. I don’t know that that’s happening and I don’t know that it’s not, but taken especially as a pandemic-era happening, the advent and realization of this debut not only finds Chotsourian exploring a side he’s never publicly shown before as an artist, but doing so with a surrounding awareness of the tenets of genre and how to enact those without falling into the trap of base loyalism. And for those who might listen to the full album streaming at the bottom of this post, his lyrics are also in English, and it’s been a long time since that last happened.
The video for “You Are the Moon” premieres below. Culled together from various presumably public domain sources as it is, it still serves to highlight the track, which in turn is a highlight of the record from which it comes.
I hope you enjoy:
BRNO, “You Are the Moon” official video premiere
Buenos Aires 2020:
Lucio Ceretti tells his idea about a song to Sergio Ch. (Los Natas), who goes back to him with another, a full album. That’s how BRNO was born, with a back and forth of samples, recordings and vibes WeTranfers from studio to studio, with multritracks, mixes and masters along with the production of videos for every song of the album, done with wicked archive content from the dark pirate side of internet pages.
Martin Prikyl (The Prostitutes) joined in collaboration from Prague.
In a way, the pandemic shortened distances and helped shape the debut album, BRNO.
The first song we had was BROKEN WINGS, which was conceived spontaneously from a one take, and lopped back and forth. Followed by WAILS, a silent, broken, rotten song BRNO is a city, dark, questioned, subordinated. BRNO is furious light and darkness, an intimate collapse from each of its members reflected in the music and poetry.
Join the feast.
SERGIO CH. – VOCALS LUCIO CERETTI – GUITAR & TECH MARTIN PRIKRYL – GUITAR
Drone folk has kind of become the bread and melted butter of Sergio Chotsourian‘s solo work as Sergio Ch., but the new 10-minute single “Manto Negro” brings the two sides together in especially coherent fashion. Atop waves of organ and minimal guitar lead lines about four minutes into the proceedings, the vocals are a procession unto themselves; melodic and downtrodden-feeling without melodrama. I’d be surprised if this is the last incarnation this song will have, since Chotsourian has a tendency to revisit material and offer different interpretations through various recordings and outfits — his current trio, Soldati, released their debut album, Doom Nacional (review here), amid the global panic of Spring 2020 — and there seems to be plenty of ground to explore here. As it is, however, the immersion is palpable.
The song cycles through twice and makes short work of the 10 minutes it consumes. Organ is constant, but the guitar comes and goes, trading off with the vocals. Self-recorded, mixed and mastered, not to mention released, “Manto Negro” is a solo effort in the purest sense, and it has an intimacy to coincide.
…I’m gonna be honest with you. I firmly believe that the only reason you don’t hear Chotsourian‘s name in the same breath as people like Dylan Carlson is because he’s from Argentina. I’m not trying to belittle Carlson‘s history or Earth in saying that, but if Sergio Ch. was working in English and was a white dude from wherever, people would be lining up to fawn over his shit, critics included. I can think few songwriters in a heavy sphere who have a mindset as genuinely open and forward thinking as he does. Sorry, that’s just how I see it. He’s a key figure in South American heavy, and South American heavy is some of the world’s finest.
I got all wound up. I’ll take a deep breath and count to four. You enjoy the track:
Sergio Ch., “Manto Negro” official video
VIDEO OFICIAL DEL SINGLE DE SERGIO CH. – “MANTO NEGRO” PRODUCIDO POR SERGIO CH. VIDEO REALIZADO POR SERGIO CH.
[S.A.S. 115]
SERGIO CH. – GUITARRA, PIANO & VOCALS
GRABADO, MEZCLADO Y MASTERIZADO POR SERGIO CH. EN DEATH STUDIOS ARTWORK POR SERGIO CH. PRODUCIDO POR SERGIO CH.
Posted in Whathaveyou on November 2nd, 2020 by JJ Koczan
It’s been more than half a decade now since current Soldati and former Ararat/Los Natas frontman Sergio Chotsourian released his first solo album under the Sergio Ch. banner. In that time his creative reach has only grown broader, and over the past few tumultuous months that has continued to manifest in new materials. Released in May, September and last week — which was October for those of you in the pandemic’s sphere of timeless drawl — a series of three singles brings this breadth into focus with the sheer differences between them.
Rooted in South American psychedelia and folk, “Flyfly” and “Panpan” definitely feel of a series — all the more for their titular similarities — but especially as they followed the 36-minute dronefest that was “Death Row Live Foreva,” it brings into relief just how much one never really knows what Chotsourian will do next or where his whims might lead him and thus his listeners. In a year that already saw Chotsourian release the awaited debut of Soldati, Doom Nacional (review here), as well as the solo record From Skulls Born Beyond (review here), these new songs are a hallmark of the relentless creativity that drives him forward as a songwriter and producer. If you do dig into “Death Row Live Foreva,” prepare to be hypnotized.
I read on thee social medias that Los Natas‘ recently announced reissue of Corsario Negro was delayed — due in November sometime, I think — of course due to the ubiquitous concerns that have delayed everyone’s everything throughout this wretched year. At least the dude’s making new music.
Taken from his latest studio solo long-player, From Skulls Born Beyond (review here), the track and accompanying video for “Un Rio” cut a pretty contemplative feel for Sergio Chotsourian, and do so in relatively efficient fashion. The rainy drive, hanging-around-waiting-to-play-a-show atmosphere of the clip is well met by “Un Rio,” an acoustic strummer in the particular style Chotsourian has manifest with his Sergio Ch. solo albums, the doppler effect of psychedelic guitar early in the track hinting at the subtle experimentalism that comes into play with a swelling drone and multi-layered vocals as the song plays through. Chotsourian engages fluidly with a vision of South American acid folk that is stark in its denial of nostalgia — that is, there’s nothing about it that looks backward toward some imagined ’60s or ’70s heyday, and especially as he has progressed since offering up his solo debut in 2015’s 1974 (review here), he’s been able to stay grounded and leave his own footprint in the otherwise ethereal seeming aesthetic he’s adopted.
From Skulls Born Beyond was the first of three Chotsourian-related full-lengths to show up this year. It arrived in March and was followed in April by the awaited debut from his heavier trio Soldati, Doom Nacional (review here), as well as the single-song 36-minute solo release Death Row Live Foreva, also under the Sergio Ch. banner, which hit in May. It was a busy Spring, to say the least. And for Chotsourian, who also runs South American Sludge Records and has lately overseen represses and reissues from his groundbreaking desert/heavy rock outfit Los Natas — whose last album came out 11 years ago, if you can believe that — the next thing is never far off, whatever it might be.
For now, it’s this video. Enjoy:
Sergio Ch., “Un Rio” official video
VIDEO OFICIAL DEL DISCO DE SERGIO CH. – “FROM SKULLS BORN BEYOND” PRODUCIDO POR SERGIO CH. VIDEO REALIZADO POR SERGIO CH.
I don’t imagine I need to tell you it’s been a hell of a quarter, existentially speaking. It’s like the world decided to play ’52 card pickup’ but with tragedy. Still, music marches on, and so the Quarterly Review marches on. For what it’s worth, I’m particularly looking forward to reviewing the upcoming batch of 50 records. As I stare at the list for each day, all of them have records that I’ve legitimately been looking forward to diving into, and today is a great example of that, front to back.
Will I still feel the same way on Friday? Maybe, maybe not. If past is prologue, I’ll be tired, but it’s always satisfying to do this and cover so much stuff in one go. Accordingly, let’s not delay any further. I hope you enjoy the week’s worth of writeups.
Quarterly Review #1-10:
Sergio Ch., From Skulls Born Beyond
Intertwining by sharing a few songs with the debut album from his trio Soldati, Doom Nacional (review here), the latest solo endeavor from former Los Natas/Ararat frontman Sergio Ch. continues his path of experimentalist drone folk, blending acoustic and electric elements, guitar and voice, in increasingly confident and broad fashion. The heart of a piece like “Sombra Keda” near the middle of the album is still the strum of the acoustic guitar, but the arrangement of electric and effects/synth surrounding, as well as the vocal echo, give a sense of space to the entirety of From Skulls Born Beyond that demonstrates to the listener just how much range Sergio Ch.‘s work has come to encompass. For highlights, one might check out the extended title-track and the closer “Solar Tse,” which bring in waves of distorted noise to add to the experimentalist feel, but there’s something to be said too for the comparatively minimal (vocal layering aside) “My Isis,” as well as for the fact that they all fit so well on the same record.
The follow-up to DOOL‘s 2017 debut, Here Now There Then (review here), does no less than to see the Netherlands-based outfit led by singer Ryanne van Dorst answer the potential of that album while pushing forward the particular vision of Dutch heavy progressive rock that emerged in the wake of The Devil’s Blood, acknowledging that past — Farida Lemouchi (now of Molassess) stops by for a guest spot — while presenting an immersive and richly arranged 54-minute sprawl of highly individualized craft. Issued through Prophecy Productions, it brings cuts like the memorable opener “Sulphur and Starlight” and the dynamic “A Glass Forest” as well as the classic metal chug of “Be Your Sins” and the reaches of its title-cut and acoustic-inclusive finale “Dust and Shadow.” DOOL are a band brazen enough to directly refuse genre, and it is to their benefit and the audience’s that they pull off doing so with such bravado and quality of output. For however long they go, they will not stop progressing. You can hear it.
By the time Durban, South Africa’s Return to Worm Mountain are done with 10-minute opener and longest track (immediate points) “Gh?l” from their second album, Therianthropy, the multi-instrumentalist duo of Duncan Park (vocal, guitar, bass, banjo, jaw harp) and Cam Lofstrand (vocals, drums, synth, guitar, bass, percussion) have gone from High on Fire-meets-Entombed crunch to psychedelic Americana to bare-essential acoustic guitar, and unsurprisingly, the scope doesn’t stop there. “Mothman’s Lament” is folksy sweetness and it leads right into the semi-industrial grind of “Mongolian Death Worm” before “Olgoi-Khorkoi” sludge-lumbers into Echoplex oblivion — or at very least the unrepentantly pretty plucked strings of “Tatzelwurm.” The title refers to a human ability to become an animal — think werewolf — and if that’s a metaphor for the controlled chaos Return to Worm Mountain are letting loose here, one can hardly argue it doesn’t fit. Too strange to be anything but progressive, Therianthropy‘s avant garde feel will alienate as many as it delights, and that’s surely the point of the entire endeavor.
Primo weedian stoner sludge doom of precisely the proportion-of-riff one would expect from Polish bashers Dopelord, which is to say plenty huge and plenty grooving. “The Witching Hour Bell” sets the tone on Sign of the Devil, which is the fourth full-length from the Warsaw-based four-piece. They lumber, they plod, they crash, and yes, yes, yes, they riff, putting it all on the line with “Hail Satan” with synth flourish at the end before “Heathen” and the ultimately-more-aggro “Doom Bastards” reinforce the mission statement. You might know what you’re getting going into it, but that doesn’t make the delivery any less satisfying as Dopelord plod into “World Beneath Us” like a cross between Electric Wizard and Slomatics and of course stick-click in on a quick four-count for the 94-second punk blaster “Headless Decapitator” to cap the 36-minute vinyl-ready run. How could they not? Sure, Sign of the Devil preaches to the choir, but hell’s bells it makes one happy to have joined the choir in the first place.
Numbered instrumental progressions comprise this third and self-titled offering from Peruvian trio Ancestro (issued through Necio Records and Forbidden Place Records), and the effect of the album being arranged in such a fashion is that it plays through as one long piece, the cascading volume changes of “II” feeding back into the outset count-in of the speedier “III” and so on. Each piece of the whole has its own intention, and it seems plain enough that the band composed the sections individually, but they’ve been placed so as to highlight the full-album flow, and as Ancestro move from “IV” into “V” and “VI,” with songs getting longer as they go en route to that engrossing and proggy 13-minute closer, their success draws from their ability to harness the precision and maybe even a little of the aggression of heavy metal and incorporate it as part of an execution both thoughtful and no less able to be patient when called for by a given piece. Hard-hitting psychedelia is tough to pull off, but Ancestro‘s Ancestro is no less spacious than terrestrial.
In 2016, Lithuanian two-piece Hellhookah made it no challenge whatsoever to get into the traditionalist doom of their debut album, Endless Serpents (review here), and the seven songs of The Curse make for a welcome follow-up, with an uptick in production value and the fullness of the mix and a decided affinity for underground ’80s metal in cuts like “Supremacy” and “Dreams and Passions” to coincide with the Dio-era-Sabbath vibes of centerpiece “Flashes” and the nodding finisher “Greed and Power,” which follows and contrasts “Dreams and Passions” in a manner that feels multi-tiered in its purpose. Departing from some of the Vitus-ness of the first full-length, The Curse adopts a more complex tack across its 38 minutes, but its heart and its loyalties are still of doom, by doom, and for the doomed, and that suits them just fine. Crucially, their lack of pretense carries over, and their love of all things doomed translates into every riff and every stretch on offer. If you’d ask more than that of them, well, why?
Bluesy in opener “Demons,” grunge-tinged in “Lily” and fuzz-folk-into-’70s-soul-rock on “How Can I Love You,” Daisychain‘s self-titled debut EP wants little for ambition from the start, but the Chicago-based four-piece bring a confidence to their dually-vocalized approach that unites the material across whatever stylistic lines it treads, be it in the harmonies of the midtempo rocker “Are You Satisfied” or the righteously languid “Fake Flowers,” which follows. With six songs and 21 minutes, the self-released outing is but a quick glimpse at what Daisychain might have in store going forward, but the potential is writ large from the classic feel of “Demons” to the barroom spirit of closer “The Wrong Thing,” which reminds that rock and roll doesn’t have to sacrifice efficiency in order to make a statement of its own force. There’s plenty of attitude to be found in these songs, but beneath that — or maybe alongside it — there’s a sense of an emergent songwriting process that is only going to continue to flourish. What they do with the momentum they build here will be interesting to see/hear, but more than that, they’re developing a perspective and persona of their own, and that speaks to a longer term ideal. To put another way, they don’t sound like they’re half-assing it.
Capping with a slide-tinged take on the traditional “Parchman Farm” (see also: Blue Cheer, Cactus, etc.), Ohio’s The Burning Brain Band‘s self-titled debut casts a wide net in terms of influences, centering the penultimate “The Dreamer” around 12-string acoustic guitar on an eight-minute run that’s neither hurried nor staid, but all the more surprising after the electronica-minded “Interlude (Still Running),” which, at four minutes is of greater substance than one might expect of an interlude just as the seven-and-a-half-minute warm-up “Launch Sequence” is considerably broader than one generally considers an intro to an album. There isn’t necessarily a foundational basis from which the material emanates — though “Brain Food” is an effective desert-ish rocker, it moves into the decidedly proggier “Bolero/Floating Away” — but “Launch Sequence” is immersive and the four-piece bring a performance cohesion and a clarity of mindset to the proceedings of this debut that may not unite the songs, but carries the listener through with a sure hand just the same. Who ever said everything on a record had to sound alike? For sure not The Burning Brain Band, who translate the mania of their moniker into effective sonic variety.
Count Slump in a freakout psych renaissance, all punk-out-the-airlock and ’90s-noise thisandthat. Delivered through Feel It Records, the Richmond, Virginia, outfit’s debut, Flashbacks From Black Dust Country indeed touches ground every now and again, as on “Desire Death Drifter,” but even there, the vocals are so soaked wet with echo that I’m pretty sure they fucked up my speakers, and as much as “Tension Trance” tries, it almost can’t help but be acid grunge. In an age of nihilism, Slump aren’t so much unbridled as they are a reminder of the artistry behind the slacker lean, and in the thrust of “(Do The) Sonic Sprawl” and the far-out twist of “Throbbing Reverberation,” they affirm that only those with expanded minds will survive to see the new age and all the many spectral horrors it might unfurl. Can it be a coincidence that the album starts “No Utopia?” Hardly. I’m not ready to call these cats prophets, but they’ve got their collective ear to the ground and their boogie is molten-core accordingly. Tell two friends and tell them to tell two friends.
It’s a ripper, inciting Larry David-style “prettay good” nods and all that sort of approval whatnot. If you want to think of Canyon as Philly’s answer to Memphis’ Dirty Streets, go ahead — and yes, by that I mean they’re dirtier. EP III boasts just three tracks in “No Home,” “Tent Preacher” and “Mountain Haze,” but with it the classic-style trio backs up the power they showed on 2018’s Mk II (review here), tapping ’70s blues rock swagger for the first two tracks and then blowing it out in a dreamy Zeppelin/Rainbow jam that’s trippy and righteous and right on and just plain right. Maybe even right-handed, I don’t know. What I do know is that these guys should’ve been picked up by some duly salivating label like last week already and they should be putting together a full-length on the quick. They’ve followed-up EP III with a stonerly take on The Beatles‘ “Day Tripper,” and that’s fun, but really, it’s time for this band to make an album.
At the time it came out four years ago in 2015, Sergio Ch.‘s first solo album, 1974 (review here), seemed to take shape directly from out of the third offering from his band Ararat, 2014’s Cabalgata Hacia la Luz (review here). The two shared several tracks, among them “La Familia y las Guerras,” and both had an overarching purpose in introspection, an intimate feel that manifested in experimentalist-tinged folk in one and brash heavy punk/rock in the other. Still, they were linked, and with Sergio Chotsourian‘s songwriting at the epicenter, they held a consistency that went beyond whatever sonic disparities there may have been. Different appeal, same level of quality between them.
Chotsourian has since gone on to form the trio Soldati and begin to dole out singles and other short releases ahead of an eventual full-length, and he’s also put out the second acoustic-ish album, 2017’s Aurora (review here), as well as several collaborative efforts of various stripes, but I still break out 1974 on occasion, and songs like “La Familia y las Guerras” are a big part of why. Arrangement-wise, there’s nothing outlandish about it, and it’s not as drone even as some of the material on the subsequent full-length would be, but it carries a nonetheless open feel and is spacious thanks to a bit of echo while still staying intimate in a close-up-to-the-mic vocal-style from Chotsourian, who if he didn’t record it live certainly gives a convincing facsimile of having done so.
As to why now would be a time to make a video for a song on a record that was released so long ago, I’d only ask the obvious question: “Who cares?” In addition to the aforementioned and long-bandied Soldati long-player, there’s been word that Chotsourian will do another solo offering under his own name, and that will be something to look forward to, but in the meantime, why not shut up and take what one can get? If that’s going for a backwards walk in some hot-looking desert space, then so be it. One could, of course, do a lot worse, both in the video and in life generally.
I’ve also included the full 1974 stream below, in case it’s been a while.
Enjoy:
Sergio Ch., “La Familia y las Guerras” official video
VIDEO OFICIAL DEL DISCO DE SERGIO CH. – “1974” PRODUCIDO POR SERGIO CH. VIDEO REALIZADO POR MILAGROS ARROM Y LUCAS MARTINEZ
I’ve never actually seen 1971’s Twins of Evil, from which the footage for the new Soldati video was culled, but I kind of feel like I get the point anyway. There’s Peter Cushing, there’s super-red blood, there’s evil, there’s ’70s boobage, the end. I’m sure if you actually watch the full feature film, there’s a plot that’s about Satan or vampires or whatnot, but you know, the gist of it kind of still works out to be the same. I guess I’ve never really been much for the Hammer Horror scene, but, you know, I’ve never really had the chance to sit down with those movies either and really get to know them one from the other. It’s all just a blur of Christopher Lee and the aforementioned Peter Cushing.
But it makes decent video fodder, if nothing else. Soldati posted the single “El Fuego Quema” last month, and at that point, I noted how it was a departure for the three-piece of guitarist/vocalist Sergio Chotsourian, bassist LucasCassinelli and drummer Alfredo Felitte, in that the latter two don’t play on it. It’s just Chotsourian, and in that regard, “El Fuego Quema” is way more like the solo work he does under the moniker of Sergio Ch. than anything Soldati have yet made public. As it turns out, that may remain the case, as Chotsourian says the awaited Soldati full-length, which is set to record this summer, will be in a more doomed vein. We may have a bit to go until we get there, but we know from Chotsourian and Felitte‘s output together in Ararat that that can work out just fine. I’ll take it however it comes, I guess.
And in case I need to say it, the clip is NSFW, unless you work at a place that’s all about ’70s boobage, in which case you should probably get a new job.
Enjoy:
Soldati, “El Fuego Quema” official video
VIDEO OFICIAL DEL SINGLE DE SOLDATI – “EL FUEGO QUEMA”
VIDEO REALIZADO POR LUCAS MARTINEZ CON IMAGENES DE LA PELICULA “TWINS OF EVIL” [1971]
SERGIO CH. – GUITARRA & VOCALS
GRABADO, MEZCLADO Y MASTERIZADO POR SERGIO CH. EN DEATH STUDIOS ARTWORK POR SERGIO CH. PRODUCIDO POR SERGIO CH.
SOUTH AMERICAN SLUDGE RECORDS
Soldati is: Sergio Ch. – Guitar & Vocals Lucas Cassinelli – Bass Alfredo Felitte – Drums
and topped with cover art by Chotsourian himself so much as by pushing deeper into South American folk stylings than he’s gone since his first solo record, 1974 (review here). The progression of his craft in the five-plus years since has been toward an experimentalist blend of drone, electric and acoustic guitar topped generally but not always with his vocals, and “Desde el Adentro” is comparatively minimal. Guy-and-guitar. It may be that Chotsourian will rework the song in some form down the line — it could end up anywhere and for all I know it already has and there’s another recording in the can waiting to come out on one or another album-to-be — but for now, the mostly-subdued, contemplative feel suits the melody well and plays to a traditionalism Chotsourian often engages but rarely so directly.
