Nurse With Wound - Homotopy To Marie

From out of the spiraling dark abyss that is Steven Stapleton’s mind comes the ultimate expression of horror, Homotopy to Marie. This is music for a horror film (assuming the director likes avant minimalism). In fact, I’d go so far as to say that this album is the scariest I’ve ever heard. There is simply nothing like it. Cymbals crash as a mother tells her daughter, Don’t be naïve, darling. Urgent women speak rapidly in Spanish, only to be interrupted by a terrifying piano motif backed by a line of static. Drums pound forward like machine guns, soon dispelled by a classical melody, which is itself soon replaced by more speaking women, then a child talking over a theme you would expect from a wind-up toy. This is music that will warp your brain, but if you unafraid to let it do so, you will find that it is a milestone in avant-garde music.

Before I go into more detail about Homotopy to Marie, however, let me touch on the prog status of this band. Many people probably wouldn’t consider them prog, but I don’t see the logic in that. With their debut album (back when they were a band, not just a name under which Stapleton recorded), they released the infamous Nurse With Wound list, which named all the bands that influenced them. Most of these bands are considered either avant-prog or krautrock. Clearly then, Nurse With Wound takes root in progressive rock. As for their music, it uses production techniques perfected by bands like Can and Faust, and every song has several distinct themes (if you can call them that) that come together to form a cohesive whole. If that is not prog, I don’t know what is.

Whether the music is prog or not, however, it is certainly progressive. While the production is certainly inspired by that of the krautrock greats, Stapleton adds layers to it, perfecting the technique of tape splicing to create this minimalist masterpiece. In fact, this album is not music in the traditional sense. There are no instruments here, no definable notes. Instead, we have various snippets of sounds that Stapleton so masterfully combines. Some of these are musical (like the traditional Jewish melody that ends The Schmurz), but most of them are not, by themselves, musical. It is Stapleton’s work in putting them together that makes them musical.

In case any of you are still laboring under the delusion that this is going to be an easy listen, even after all I’ve said, you probably won’t appreciate this album. I got Homotopy to Marie with no idea what was inside after hearing about the Nurse With Wound list and after seeing this album on Pitchfork Media’s Top 100 Albums of the 1980s (I didn’t know they appreciated difficult music like this). It took me about five tries to sit through this album all the way, and several more listens before I really began to appreciate it. Now, it is one of my favorite albums, but you must be warned that there are absolutely no hooks in this album (not counting the aforementioned end of The Schmurz). There are moments where it is similar to some of Merzbow’s music (Merzbow the pseudonym for a Japanese progressive electronic noise composer, and his music is some of the most difficult ever written). I will warn you now, if you know Merzbow’s music and like it, you will probably like this (I like both, but I prefer Nurse With Wound). If you don’t like Merzbow, I find it hard to imagine that you will like this.

There are no songs on this album because, as I said, there really isn’t any music until you look at the album as a whole. Each piece is a sound collage (at least as I understand the term), and so that is what I will call them from now on. My favorite of these collages is the title track, Homotopy to Marie. This is the song with the don’t be naïve darling that I mentioned earlier. I don’t know why, but I find that, along with the seemingly random cymbal crashes, rather entrancing. Speaking of these cymbal crashes, they represent a clear trend of this album. It is very quiet a lot of the time. Every so often, however, a loud burst of noise will come blasting through your speakers. I have earned plenty of funny looks listening to this on headphones when these noises happen. The other major highlight of the album is the epic The Schmurz, a twenty-five minute uncompromising monster that doesn’t hold back. Also, my version has an additional track, Astral Dustbin Dirge, which builds upon the theme of the title track (some versions only have four tracks).

This album is definitely not for everyone, especially not the faint of heart (or those easily frightened). It is not for those who need hooks in their music. It is for those who wish to expand their horizons, who don’t mind noise, and who are unafraid of the unknown. This is a CD to listen to in the dark (with headphones, of course). You cannot share it with others; it is a purely personal experience. I happen to like this style of music, and this is one of the best examples of it, so I give it a high recommendation and an A (masterpiece) rating. If you like this, check out Merzbow and Horde Catalytique Pour La Fin. If you like either of those bands, check out this.