(person) by Serial Number Sun Feb 03 2008 at 13:03:45

65daysofstatic

65dos 65days 65

Rumour: "65daysofstatic was formed to compose music for a largely unknown John Carpenter film 'Stealth Bomber'" - False. Whereas 65daysofstatic sounds like it would be a soundtrack thrown in your face, it was formed as a three-piece by Iain Armstrong, Paul Wolinski and Joe Shrewbury (also known as Joe Fro). There are some theories for the name: one says that the name comes from the 1954 CIA coup d'etat in Guatemala, during which the CIA disabled the communication of the country for 65days while spreading propaganda. New Statesman believes that the name comes from psychological experiments in the 1960s: the find in these experiments was that 65daysofstatic drives a person insane.

65daysofstatic's music is instrumental post-rock, but if you consider post-rock to be relaxing ambient music, it's not, even if there are parts. Especially the back beat of sampled drums (or something for a drum) is something that wakes you up better than the heavy prog guitar-driven sections. Not to even mention the electronics giving their beeps. Some call it industrial, but that's obviously false. I just call it gritty.

Iain Armstrong left in May 2003 to form Actioner. Feedle joined for some time and wrote a part of Retreat! Retreat!. In the end of 2003, Rob Jones had joined to play the drums, and Gareth Hughes for bass. Around when The Fall of Math was released in September 2004, he left and was replaced by Simon Wright. The Fall of Math opens with electronic stutter, followed by some semi-gloomy piano tunes and another grinding electronic noise. After some crashing electronic beats are added, comes a sample, or simply spoken word:

The explosion that destroyed our city, razed our homes, and transformed our fields into wasteland was nothing compared to what's now happening to those who survived.

Then 65, slowly and gracefully.

And I quote agent_tuesday: Then chaos. The rest of the short song takes you to a post-apocalyptic world and leads on to the rest of the album, consisting of such heartful songs as the "Install a Beak in the Heart That Clucks Time in Arabic" (Post-rock points for a long name) that comes next, but also the chaos, evident in songs like "Default This", which sounds more like a breakcore song with a piano in the background. The name track of the album is one song to listen to if you have the chance, as is the last song, "Aren't We All Running?". Both of them showcase well how 65daysofstatic be calm yet anxious during the same song: sometimes during the same part.

One Time for All Time opens in the same style, piano tunes under attack of an incoming beat. The difference is how long they manage to go without bringing in the chaos: in fact, this was the first record I heard from 65daysofstatic, and I was kind of weirded out when I listened to The Fall of Math. That's not to say the mob-shout-sample midway through the first song wouldn't creep you out, however. Whereas the record has its noisy parts, it rarely gets to the anxiousness of the first album. In "Await Rescue", this chaos is back, but in a distinctly positive, more human tune as opposed to the destroying electronic sounds of the first album. As the chaos chart goes down, the "calm" comes up and you can note many of the songs on the album as that. "The Big Afraid" is a good example. The last song, "Radio Protector", was also released as a single and it deserves a mention for being anxious yet positive.

The Destruction of Small Ideas has a notably shorter time of piano before being crushed with guitars and drums. 65daysofstatic once again do their thing in new ways. You can't say that they would incorporate something incredibly new on each record, but each sounds different and, at least to my ear, good. One of their faults is that they have to put a part that breaks out in each song, even ones that don't really need it. This, sadly, applies through all their records I have heard.

DISCOGRAPHY

Static for eyes

I like it! 2 C!s

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