The Technology of Tears

The Technology of Tears
Studio album by Fred Frith
Released 1988
Recorded United States, 1986–1987
Genre Avant-rock, experimental
Length 82:59 (LP releases)
60:15 (CD releases)
Label RecRec (Switzerland)
Producer Fred Frith
Fred Frith chronology
Cheap at Half the Price
(1983)		 The Technology of Tears
(1988)		 The Top of His Head
(1989)
Professional ratings
Review scores
Source Rating
Allmusic [1]
Piero Scaruffi (6/10)[2]

The Technology of Tears (And Other Music for Dance and Theatre) is a double album by English guitarist, composer and improvisor Fred Frith. It is the first of a series of Music for Dance albums Frith made, and is sometimes subtitled Music for Dance volume 1. It was recorded between June 1986 and April 1987, and released on a double LP and a single CD by RecRec Music (Switzerland) and on a double LP only by SST Records (United States) in 1988. It was re-issued on CD in 2008 by Fred Records (United Kingdom). All the CD releases omit the Propaganda suite (side 4 of the double LP).

The album comprises three suites:

Frith composed all the music and plays most of the instruments, with assistance from John Zorn, Tenko Ueno, Christian Marclay and Jim Staley.

Contents

The music

On The Technology of Tears, Fred Frith continues his exploration of world dance music he began on Gravity and Speechless, this time supplementing traditional instrumentation with digital technology to generate patterns, pulses and noise. Samples are used throughout, accompanied by horns, sporadic percussion and wordless vocals. The album is a mix of musique concrète, folk music and improvisation.

On the first part of the Technology of Tears suite Frith experiments with Henry Kaiser's newly acquired synclavier, at the time the state-of-the-art sampling and processing technology. On parts two and three of the suite Frith plays mostly "low-grade" instruments with added samples by turntablist Christian Marclay. Jigsaw is a collection of dozens of musical cells, "each recorded separately in increments of between 3 and 12 measures, all at the same tempo, and in the same key".[3] The intention was that the modules could be assembled in any order to create the final piece. The reason for this construction was that Rosalind Newman had requested that many changes be made to the Technology suite; with Jigsaw she could arrange the pieces how she whished. Ironically, she accepted the Frith's demonstration of what was possible as the final piece.[3]

Allmusic described the Technology of Tears suite as "... unrelenting slices of hard-edged sounds over a pulse ...", Jigsaw as "... patterns with constantly shifting accents and sub-divisions ...", and Propaganda as "... a series of brilliantly evocative soundpieces with electronics, guitar, and sound effects ...".[1]

Track listing

LP releases

Side A: The Technology of Tears

  1. "Sadness, Its Bones Bleached Behind Us" (Frith) – 13:05
  2. "You Are What You Eat" (Frith) – 7:22

Side B: The Technology of Tears (continued)

  1. "You Are What You Eat (continued)" (Frith) – 11:39
  2. "The Palace of Laughter, The Technology of Tears" (Frith) – 10:08

Side C: Jigsaw

  1. "Jigsaw" (Frith) – 14:39
  2. "Jigsaw Coda" (Frith) – 3:04

Side D: Propaganda

  1. "Shelter For Them All" (Frith) – 1:36
  2. "A Deeper Understanding of Conflict" (Frith) – 0:54
  3. "The Turning of an Hourglass" (Frith) – 2:04
  4. "Birth of a Rebel" (Frith) – 1:51
  5. "Your Beautiful Corpse" (Frith) – 1:17
  6. "The Excellent Hyena" (Frith) – 1:25
  7. "The Old Man Moves a Mountain" (Frith) – 1:06
  8. "The Wolf Demon (part 1)" (Frith) – 1:07
  9. "Meditation Upon Propaganda" (Frith) – 3:06
  10. "Liberty" (Frith) – 1:59
  11. "The Relentless Landscape" (Frith) – 0:59
  12. "The Gaze That Sings" (Frith) – 1:03
  13. "The Wolf Demon (part 2)" (Frith) – 1:05
  14. "Rashomon" (Frith) – 3:30

CD releases

The Technology of Tears

  1. "Sadness, Its Bones Bleached Behind Us" (Frith) – 13:18
  2. "You Are What You Eat" (Frith) – 18:46
  3. "The Palace of Laughter, The Technology of Tears" (Frith) – 10:16

Jigsaw

  1. "Jigsaw" (Frith) – 14:48
  2. "Jigsaw Coda" (Frith) – 3:07

Personnel

Production

References

  1. ^ a b Tyranny, "Blue" Gene. "Technology of Tears". AllMusic.com. http://www.allmusic.com/album/r57373. Retrieved 2011-06-20. 
  2. ^ Scaruffi, Piero. "Fred Frith". The History of Rock Music. http://www.scaruffi.com/vol3/frith.html. Retrieved 2011-06-20. 
  3. ^ a b "Frith, Fred: The Technology of Tears". RēR Megacorp. http://www.rermegacorp.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=RM&Product_Code=FRO11&Category_Code=CU. Retrieved 2008-05-27. 

External links

Fred Frith
Discography
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