Perpetual Mutations is an instrumental album of the highest quality; it doesn’t waver. I became aware of Antoine Fafard’s music through his electric bass playing and work with drummer Gary Husband on the 2016 album Sphere. What I wasn’t expecting was an album encompassing all the frequencies across classical guitar, piano, cello and more alongside electric bass.
This is Fafard’s second collaboration with drummer Gavin Harrison – an alumnus of King Crimson and Porcupine Tree – and unsurprisingly Harrison brings a lot of complex rhythmic ideas to bear in their collaboration, but never to the extent of being cloying.
Opener Dark Wind begins with a sumptuous slap bass riff comped by ‘stretched’ phrases on soprano saxophone by Canadian hero Jean-Pierre Zanella, and offers up bold time change choices and overlapping melodies that keep the listener guessing.
Deadpan Euphoria introduces the cellos of Joanna Cieslak and Isidora Filipovic. The cello works here alongside Farfard’s fretless bass and, interestingly, hard pans. The cellos take over low-end bass duties, giving Fafard more room to explore. Harrison’s drumming is impeccably ‘on point’, in terms of driving the composition along at pace.
Vital Information starts off morse code-style motif, with thumping slap bass contrasting with the classical guitar’s thinner tones; the track gets going right from the first bar, and Ally Storch on the violin augments the two main players well with her swooping interjections.
Objective Reality opens with harmonics from Fafard’s bass that will have dogs howling, but the interesting part of the trio mix is Rodrigo Escalona on oboe. The oboe is an instrument I rarely encounter, but here it sits in the middle of the mix and provides a reedier counterpoint to the thick bass and heavy drums that I found surprisingly enjoyable.
It’s evident by this point that Fafard is willing to reach right to the back of the music cupboard to find sounds which might otherwise be overlooked, but which here turn a solid composition into an enjoyable sonic journey.
Spontaneous Plan starts with marimba, piano and bass, creating almost a cine-noir feel, the chopped phrasing and pulsing trumpet and trombones of Dale Devon filling out the mix and adding tones which help the melody soar and swoop with vigour.
Pentalogic Structure has, unsurprisingly, a 5/4 time signature, which creates a degree of insistence that is smoothed out by simple cello strokes from Cieslak and Filipovic over Fafard and Harrison’s descending bass and drums; when the track opens up, the cello/classical bass interplay develops satisfyingly.
Across nine tracks it’s clear Fafard and Harrison play well off each other, each bringing to the table ideas which spark the other composer into bouts of one-upmanship. As Frasier Crane once famously said in a very different context, “if you’ve got really fine pieces of furniture, it doesn’t matter if they match – they will go together” and create a pleasing whole. Eclectic musical choices in the hands of professionals – as demonstrated on Perpetual Mutations – can indeed create something next level interesting.
Release date: 26 July 2024
