It takes a lot to be recognized in any kind of instrumental space, and not always for the reasons you might think. You might rip it up like Jimi Hendrix, but have difficulty navigating today’s hyper-social world. Conversely, you might not actually play your instrument terribly well, but your reputation is solid, and your connections vouch for you.
It’s rare that you find both in one place, but Patrick Shiroishi is all that and more – when you combine the qualities mentioned above with a strong conviction, you start saying things like ‘genius’ and ‘generational talent.’ But even if somehow you’re into progressive or experimental music and you haven’t heard Shiroishi’s output yet, from Oort Smog to The Armed and live gigs with SUMAC, after hearing Forgetting is Violent, you’re bound to start calling him those things anyway.
It’s billowing with the uncanny sounds that make for the underpinnings of what you might call his signature sound – punishing brass, abrasive textures, ambient tone-poems and spoken-word segments… but also some new ones. In a discography already brimming with clear goals, Forgetting is Violent still feels intentional, nuanced, and alive, not to mention all too perfectly timed. Check it out below:
Not unlike The Armed’s THE FUTURE IS HERE AND EVERYTHING MUST BE DESTROYED, an album which Shiroishi enhanced with many of the qualities above, Forgetting is Violent feels like a logical statement, even a necessary one, in the face of modern life. Whereas his work with The Armed jets out like steam, Shiroishi’s pace here is that of a shimmering lake, resonating with itself and . Speaking of reuniting, this is also the first time one of his solo works have had official songwriting guests like Aaron Turner and Gemma Thompson. But everyone feels exactly in their right place – pieces like “There is No Moment in My Life in Which This is Not Happening” and “Prayer for a Trembling Body” demand your attention with fragile, constantly evolving cries that pierce deep into the subconscious, language barriers be damned. The record closes with slowly melting perfection on “Trying to Get to Heaven Before They Close The Door,” and in many ways it resembles the actual cover of the album itself.
Here’s a tad more from the press release too though, because this part is important:
Shiroishi’s message on Forgetting is Violent comprises two suites. The first meditates on racism and colonialism from history to the present day. “Mountains that take wing” introduces the first theme of the album, a gentle repetition for saxophone anchored around middle C. While Thompson and Turner’s guitars approach but never quite reach consonance, Shiroishi adds more saxophone. The music spirals. Eventually one hears him, as if from a distance, singing slowly in Japanese. On “…what does anyone want but to feel a little more free?,” Shiroishi’s aunt, an antiracist advocate, speaks to her first experience of racism. The suite recalls the Japanese concept of gaman, or enduring the unendurable. Here, in music and words, are the tensions inherent to racism, part of living in a society that—whether through small gestures of disconnect, forced deportation or concentration camps—wants to make you extinct. “Stemming back to my ancestors, and the stolen land that we live on—there’s just so much of this racism that is so alive and well, and so apparent, and continues to be apparent in our country and around the world,” Shiroishi says. “Something that cannot be forgotten.”
Shiroishi wrote the second suite, which comprises side B, for a family member who died of an overdose. “It’s grappling with what I imagined he would have felt leaving this earth, leaving behind kids—and now being in the sky and watching over them.” These tracks mostly feature Shiroishi solo, singing a simple wordless melody over a soft synthetic drone. But on closing track “Trying to get to heaven before they close the door,” he harmonizes with himself, arranging the melody as if for a choir. Meanwhile, Ball’s guitar exhumes great clouds of static, mixing with Shiroishi’s vocal harmonies and caterwauling saxophone. Here, in miniature, is the simultaneous potency of grief and its aftershocks, the sacred and profane.
“That act of sharing and bringing it up, even though it’s difficult,” Shiroishi says, “it makes us feel like we’re not alone. And I think that’s important, especially in a time where it’s just so fucking grim, that we can support each other and be together, that there is hope in the future….” As time passes and genocide looms, Shiroishi’s music—insistent, liquid, organic—is but one source of hope.
Featuring liner notes by Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Hua Hsu, Forgetting is Violent is released in companion with the third edition of Tangled: a publication collecting stories, poems and essays by Asian-American musicians, including Anne Ishii, Yuka Honda, Satomi Matsuzaki and Kazu Makino.
If you, like most people, need a minute to breathe and centered again, Forgetting is Violent could be the exact thing you need. We know it was for us.
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