Darkness and unpredictability are two words that comes in my mind when I listen to the new record from the Canadian band BIG|BRAVE called OST: a soundtrack that exists before the images, but that creates it.
| I’ve listened for the first time to BIG | BRAVE with their 2023 album Nature Morte. I was intrigued by this band, but honestly I didn’t follow them; when they released A Chaos Of Flowers in 2024 I started to listen to them more and for the second time in a row, I couldn’t be able to see a band that I like and that I’m reviewing due to a sold out. Damn, I need to set some kind of alert when a band that I follow comes near my city. |
This time the band is releasing OST, something different from their regular album: the trio has entered the studio without any preconceived music but with the themes and the concepts carved in mind. In three days they came out with their music made in the moment: when they thought they had a good foundation for a song, the trio and even the engineer/producer Seth Manchester, started to build on it with layers of the same pattern, instrumental improvisations and abstract vocals, until they felt the piece was complete.
The base concept was to realize a film score without having a film and without their canonical band instruments; in fact, they were free to enter the live room and record with whatever instrument was at hand. In addition to forgoing their usual instrumentation, the band built a particular instrument. Guitarist Mathieu Ball took the strings of an old discarded piano and made “The Instrument”; as said by guitarist/vocalist Robin Wattie: “The strings Mathieu used for his instrument came from a discarded piano thatch that had been lying around in the hallway of my tattoo studio for ages. It took a lot of work to get the strings off, but then he made the instrument in only a few days. It blew my mind.”
“The Instrument” is the conductive element of the album, guiding the composition and the album itself: in fact, the cover art of this record is The Instrument, built and photographed by Bell.
As said before, the band has left their usual instrumentation to use various others, like a prepared speaker, tape loops, electronics, Wurlitzer, percussion and much more. Ball, Wattie and the drummer Tasy Hudson were accompanied by Manchester and by Melissa Guion (MJ Guilder) with a sprinkling flute.
Close your eyes: listening to this record, you can imagine a movie in your mind. The ambiences made are all “Innominate”, numbered with Roman numbers from I to VIII. Every single track has its own dimension, but is also the natural continuation of the previous one.
Through all the “Innominate” tracks, the images follow one another, building our personal story on the music. What we can hear is deep, sometimes distressing but at the same time satisfying; everything is in its right place and well-balanced: many instruments and many layers together creates a complex sound texture where the listener is the centre, the moviemaker.
Well, when you score an OST then you need to make a movie, right? Done. The idea beyond OST was to create something complete, something satisfying for the ears, eyes and mind.
| Following OST’s completion, the band contacted director/visual artist Stacy Lee. They asked Lee to visually score the record and, having previously collaborated with the band, they had already established an artistic understanding which allowed BIG | BRAVE to give Lee no instruction, no limitations: the creative process synthesized across film and music. There are plans to bring in future select screenings with live performances of OST. |
I hope that your experience with this record is as positive as mine and if you were at Roadburn, I hope you got to see them.
