DRAM News

DRAM is pleased to add Einstein Records, the associated label of Roulette Intermedium, Inc., an experimental music presenting organization spear-headed by University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign classmates Jim Staley and David Weinstein. Einstein Records' catalog begins with excerpts from their archives of the precious incubation years of New York's notorious Downtown scene.

This scene was characterized by an anything-goes spirit that broke free from the rigid austerity of the then-hegemonic minimalist trend (by 1980, Philip Glass and Steve Reich were dominant composers) with an exciting embrace of multiple compositional methodologies that featured a prominent thread of improvisation, stringing disparate sonic elements into a new form of musical art.

Anything was a potential avenue for musical exploration, and any source materials and sound making devices (electronic, classical, rock/pop, non-musical) were considered usable, even “dirty” amalgams of various styles and degraded samples. Roulette was a crucial venue for this burgeoning community, and Einstein documents the growth of those musicians, and furthermore, the world of composer-trombonist and Roulette Director Jim Staley.

Einstein Records' world of sound, in keeping with the aesthetic of the time, is no singular style, but offers the output of a community built around Jim Staley. Staley's collaborators within the New York Downtown scene included John Zorn, Ikue Mori, Zeena Parkins, Elliott Sharp and Shelley Hirsch; as well as his cohorts that shared time, space and blossoming musical ideas from the University of Illinois, such as Morgan Powell, Michael Kowalski and others from a collective known as the Tone Road Ramblers.

The first two Einstein releases, A Confederacy of Dances, Volume 1 and A Confederacy of Dances Volume 2, provide an exciting introduction to the activity and artists in the early years of Roulette. These two records present archived live recordings from Roulette's first decade, by list of composers and improvisers that now reads like a who's who list of New York experimentalists. Avant-Jazz, game structured pieces, turntables, electronics and spoken word are just a few of the wide array of sounds featured in these recordings.

Furthering Staley's relationships with collaborators he first met at the University of Illinois, listening to Tone Road Ramblers, The Ragdale Years demonstrates that over distance and time, this early-formed community of improvisers and composers made a lasting connection. One will hear textures that reflect the sonic palette of both contemporary classical chamber music as well as the more raw edge of the eclectic New York Downtown sound.