Track Listing:
part one
1. on awakening
2. stillness
3. shimmering
4. rift
5. certainty
6. a radiance
7. clouds like choirs
8. four vistas
9. labor and breath
10. forms, shapes, and silences
11. will without reason
12. revealed
part two
13. forgiveness
14. episode of beauty
15. exultation
16. night
17. three notes of reverence
18. devotion and dance
19. the nature of solitude
20. theme taken from a master
21. emanations
22. reflections of a small room
23. the sacred nature of despair
24. beginnings and afterwards
25. invocation
26. fulfillment
$15.00
all music arranged and composed by: jeffrey roden
electric bass: jeffrey roden
recorded and mixed by: john “tokes” potoker
produced by: steve roden
mastered by: william cooke
copyright 2005/2006 jeffrey roden bmi
Jeffrey Roden - Seeds of Happiness
They say that the iPod and e-music has killed the album. I think it was the cd. A vinyl album was about 20 minutes a side (30 if you pushed it like Elvis Costello on Get Happy!). But the standard was 30-50 minutes of considered music over 2 sides. Artists decided what opened and closed a side, how it flowed. Listeners consciously chose to play one side or the other or both in sequence. A double album was an extravagance, a triple bloated (usually live [I exempt Sandinista! from both charges!]). The cd introduced an expectation of 70-80 minutes, so people filled them out, and have thought less about the total flow. Let alone the physical beauty of the 12" album. Even then people bought an album for a track or two - but the whole seemed more focused. What I think it means is that people don't listen through a whole cd. You put it in - listen for 30-40 minutes and then have moved on - although with random-shuffle later numbered tracks get a chance.
What has this to do with Jeffrey Roden's new album Seeds of Happiness? (New Albion, NA133) Well, it is composed of two parts which would fall nicely on the two sides of a vinyl album, where the listener would get to decide whether to listen to Part 1 or 2 or both. But it isn't, so people will have to make sure they listen to it all (though I note on the website that Part 1 was released separately). Years ago I reviewed his earlier album The floor of the forest (and yes he is related to Steve Roden) and this one continues his use of the bass guitar as a solo instrument - in fact the tracks are recorded live in a single take with some background parts overdubbed.
The result is a sublime simplicity. Each track is only a few minutes long, in which time Roden explores minimal themes, that are melodic and warm - the quality of the closely recorded resonance of the instruments is a feature of his work. The overdubs are generally simple though in Rift there is a fast repeat motif, that sounds like a loop, and a slower one under Forgiveness or Devotion and dance, that adds a complexity which is perhaps not seen (heard) enough in the album. You sometimes feel that more colour would be an advantage - but that isn't the artistic paradigm. This is an intense album, not specifically in relation to the mood or even the method, but rather because it is focused on such a restrained palette for both instrument and composition. However, Episode[s] of beauty, to commandeer a tracktitle, describes this music perfectly, because that is what this is, each one delicately formed.
The tone of the instrument, together with the deliberate (and I mean that in both senses) pace of pieces, create a solemn contemplative mood. Even the closing track of Part 2 - Fulfilment - maintains the atmosphere, rather than a celebratory conclusion (there is a passage of joyful complexity in the penultimate Invocation). Which brings me back to my opening - the intensity of the music makes it difficult to listen to the whole cd in one go - while the length of each part seems about the right time to be able to focus. And the music is well worth giving it the attention.
textura
september 2007
Jeffrey Roden: Seeds of Happiness Part 1
The Big Tree Music
Given the purity of its presentation, Jeffrey Roden's The Seeds of Happiness Part One might be seen as the culmination of multiple decades of music-making. In the '90s, the California-based Roden turned towards composing music for solo electric bass, twelve results of which are presented on the fourth release issued on his own Big Tree Music imprint (also available is a two-part New Albion set which includes twenty-six pieces recorded over two separate days). Using nothing more than his 1961 Fender Precision Bass and an Ampeg Rocket Bass amp, Roden played every note live (on January 27, 2005) and subsequently overdubbed background tracks sans loops or other devices.
There's much to applaud here. First of all, the release isn't about pyrotechnics, despite the fact that there's ample evidence of his technical command; the pieces are instead all in the two- to three-minute range, indicating that Roden's focus is on communicating a given piece's essence succinctly; furthermore, the twelve pieces are rooted in melodic themes as opposed to wayward soloing. The pace is measured and unhurried, the mood ruminative, and, in those moments when a 'lead' bass solos over a background, every note is meaningfully connected to the thematic essence of the piece. The material is by turns solemn, stately, meditative, and, though voiced by a single instrument, varied. Roden's use of silence deserves mention, too, something heard to strong effect in "Clouds like Choirs," for instance, where the rumbling sustain of the bass vanishes into the pauses that breathe through the material. Though I've not heard the New Albion release, I can't help but wonder if The Seeds of Happiness Part One might not be the more preferable of the two, despite being much shorter, simply because its thirty-three minute length seems like the perfect amount for a recording of this type.
Jeffrey Roden - Seeds of Happiness (New Albion)
by Ewan Burke
Fiftysomething LA resident Jeffrey Roden has been making music for a number of years, and has concentrated on composing music for electric bass guitar since the 1990's. Seeds of Happiness pt 1 was his fourth album, originally issued on his own Big Tree Music label in 2005. This album has now been augmented and expanded with a further fourteen tracks and released on New Albion as Seeds of Happiness.
An album consisting of solo bass guitar improvisations - this did not at first sight strike me as the perfect recipe for musical satisfaction. It was with some trepidation that I placed the disc into the player - and was then pleasantly surprised as the opening notes of 'On Awakening' slowly coalesced in the room. Jeffrey Roden creates his own unique soundworld. The sound of his bass guitar is rich, full and pensive. He knows exactly where he's going - he's calm and unhurried, and quite happy to stop and have a wee rest on the way.
The closest musical comparison would be The Return of the Durutti Column. Of course the records don't sound exactly the same - The Return . . . is an electric guitar record, whereas Seeds . . . is a bass guitar record, and Roden's tunes move at a much slower pace - but there's the same sense of a musician totally in control of his instrument, able to make it express whatever feelings he wants to express; and there's the same sense of a music which is gentle and contemplative - light years away from rock bluster. Or imagine the opening notes of Tortoise's 'Djed' used as the template for an entire album - bliss!
Two Reviews - New Albion Recordings, by Matt Borghi
Jeffrey Roden - Seeds of Happiness
When I received the package with Erdem Helvacioglu's Altered Realities in it, New Albion, also, generously, included Jeffrey Roden's Seeds of Happiness. I looked over the cover notes to this recording before putting it on, and I was quite pleased to see that it was a recording dedicated exclusively to electric bass. I've always felt that the electric bass was an instrument who's timbral possibilities and emotive character hadn't been adequately explored. It was only within the first few measures of Jeffrey Roden's Seeds of Happiness that I was sure that was about to change.
Jeffrey Roden does some incredible work on this disc. It's at once engaging, and evocative. The modal interplay, for me, really reminds me of what some of the early fusion guys were doing, but particularly there's a Tortoise-quality here, and any of my reader's know that I love Tortoise. This disc is spot-on! Jeffrey Roden doesn't just stop at exploring the bass' timbral possibilities but he also goes on to explore textural aspects while playing against, with, and supporting a rich harmonic and melodic tapestry that's also wholly comprised of electric bass. This is a recording that I'm very pleased to hear, and doubly-pleased to know exists. There are parts of this recording that are "ambient" or at the very least contemplative, and this is actually a very moody, almost melancholy recording. So often electric bass takes a prominent role in dance, jazz or funk music, which doesn't adequately allow for the kind of musical space necessary to explore the dark overtones and percussive resonance. Thankfully, Jeffery Roden's Seeds of Happiness we have a master electric bass player who takes world-class chops out of their common musical idiom and places them in a deeply thoughtful musical context that allows the listener to pause, listen, and observe the tonal characteristics of the instrument and Jeffrey Roden's sequencing of chordal variations and melodic development.
I'm trying to find a musical comparison for this recording. The more that I listen to it the more convinced I become that there isn't anything like out there. Maybe there's something obscure somewhere in a record bin, but in the canon of music of this blend and variation I can think of none. Perhaps I can create a conceptual sound for the mind's ear by creating a collage of artists who seems to contribute to the style of Jeffrey Roden's Seeds of Happiness. Think contemplative Wes Montgomery slowed down in his trio days, possibly even some of his solo guitar work with the more contrapuntal aspects of Tortoise with the reverberated melancholy of the opening of Miles Davis' In a Silent Way, now add to that the texture of Harold Budd's piano ala La Bella Vista with just a touch of Claude Debussy, particularly the solo piano piece Etudes Book 2, No. 11 and then, just maybe you can imagine in your mind's ear what Jeffrey Roden is doing on this beautifully composed and performed release.
It goes without saying, at this juncture, that I'm quite pleased with what I have found by digging just a little bit deeper into the New Albion catalog. I'm going to have start looking into more of their releases in the future. Thanks also to Foster Reed for sending the CDs my way and for having such a bold and adventurous musical vision.
kcsn
february 2007
Radio Interview with Jeffrey Roden - download (mp3 - 18mb)
by Martin Perlich
tokafi
february 2007
CD Feature/ Jeffrey Roden: "Seeds of Happiness," by Tobias Fischer
Roden has refused to succumb to all expectations and relied entirely on the moment.
What is perfection? I remember well hearing "Seeds of Happiness Part 1" for the fist time almost two years ago and the way the last deep reverberation slowly faded into silence. For a moment, there and then, I was sure I had found perfection and I thought I had discovered the its key: honesty. There was not a milimeter's worth of distance between Jeffrey Roden and his work, behind these twelve short solo bass pieces there was no mystery, scheme or science, but only himself. Like a soul-searching onion peeling, he had stripped his music down over the course of three albums to the naked flesh, the bare bones, the places where the hurt hid and true joy began. Now there was only him and his instrument and the will to take things as far as need be. The fact that even some experienced reviewers confused it for an exercise in technique took nothing away from that. Already then, it was always clear that a second album was on its way, continuing the spirit of the first one. Released on "New Albion", one of the leading labels for new music in America as a "twofer" (with both disc combined on one) , it is sure to get the attention it deserves. And in musical terms , too, it's been more than wort the wait.
So many similarities, so many differences!
Considering the setup is exactly the same as in 2005 (down to the production team of John Potoker and Steve Roden), it is amazing how familar and yet unexpected this effort has turned out to be: So many similarities, so many differences! Again, the entire album was recorded on a single day in a Hollywood sound studio and again it's only Roden and his bass, using merely a couple of overdubs. What has changed is the absence of any on-the-spot improvised solos and the almost total exclusion of stylistic allusions to Jazz which follows as a direct result. If you are looking for parallels, then you'll rather find them in the visual arts, in calligraphy and the fine and yet determined lines of Japanese pencil scetches. While "Part 1" had a winter feeling to it, oscillating in tall waves and drawing the listener in with a deep and motherly embrace full of warmth and yet a certain inner tension, "Part 2" relates to the seasons of autumn and early spring, with brittle bass lines reaching into the bluishly-grey sky of the first album's cover artwork. If, to you, perfection means not saying a word too much or playing a single not too many, then you have found your desert island record.
Each decision was correct.
Even though with the first episode already out there as a template, recording the second volume was decidedly easier, as Roden admits, the music has lost nothing of its bipolar character between dreamy somberness and hopeful optimism. What is so remarkable is that this is acchieved by very different means. "Part 1" forced you to listen, knocking on the doors of your perception until you would lay everything aside and devote your full attention to it. "Part 2", meanwhile is both more directly accessible and yet more subtle - if played in the background, it almost fades away. Tracks hardly "close" any more, instead they tread forward carefully yet fully concentrated, never knowing beforehand which step will be the right one, only to discover afterwards that the decision taken was always correct, because it relied on "hearing the notes as they are being formed and propelled out into the world" instead of thinking. Just like life never tells you what is going to happen next, the miniatures of "Seeds of Happiness" are often left hanging in the air without a typical ending. Roden has refused to succumb to all expectations and relied entirely on the moment. It is this aspect which lends these pieces an urgency despite their serenity and calmness and which many will consider a sign of perfection, because they depict the world around us more precisely than an art which straightjackets everything into preconceived concepts.
A never-ending process.
The problem with these notions of perfection is that they are temporary and subjective. Just like trends and fads change over time, so will these theories and models of how things should be. And yet, just like Robert M. Pirsig justly claimed that quality was something everybody recognises when faced with it even if they couldn't put it into words, "Seeds of Happiness Part 2" is more than just a record which feeds a current appetite. As Roden put it himself: Perfection is a process, it can exist and become a reality, when "all energy is focused upon each moment, each note throughout the process of creation". It is here that I think, despite the composer's own hesitation, that this album fulfills this ideal. For to sit quietly for one and a half years, spending your time with scetching, playing, improvising and composing, waiting for that one single day, that one chance you have to take those scribbles and notes on a piece of paper and turn them into something tangible and meaningful despite the constant danger of failure or deviation from that straight red line and then to grab that very chance and breath life into those ideas you were carrying around with you all that time and to create an object of beauty inside the superficial wall of a studio what else could it be but perfection? And that is what Jeffrey Roden has done.Of course, this implies the proecess is never "over" or "completed" and "Part 3" is already on its way. But just for a moment, here and now, this is as good as it gets.
