I only just got to know (and review) Kali Malone's last album "Living Torch" and here's the next one already! For anyone who might be challenged by Ambient / Drone in general the predecessor had the selling point of its very convenient half-hour length.
For "Does Spring Hide Its Joy" this reasoning unfortunately cannot be rehashed, since even on CD the album comes on three discs with one track slightly above one full hour playing time each!*
So how do you even listen to this?
KALI MALONE feat. STEPHEN O'MALLEY & LUCY RAILTON - Does Spring Hide Its Joy (3CD) (2023)
Well, let's start with how not to listen to this: If you're already tired after a work day and just lie down doing nothing but listening, you'll be lucky to reach the first half-hour mark. At least that was my experience.
My usual answer on how to handle a three-hour album would be that you only listen to half or third of it at a time, because being able to sacrifice your undivided attention to one piece of music for such a long time is quite a luxury, especially if you want it to be a time of the day when it's unlikely that you get drowsy and doze off. And this is a very minimalistic, textural work, which unlike Kamasi Washington's "The Epic" or Swans' "Soundtracks For The Blind" won't entertain you with a multitude of immediately distinctable individual tracks and ideas - and it won't go out of its way to suddenly wake you up if it accidentally lulled you to sleep.
But don't understand me wrong! I'm not saying that "Does Spring Hide Its Joy" is boring at all.
No, even though you will only experience the trio of Lucy Railton on cello, Sunn O)))'s Stephen O'Malley (whose label Ideologic Organ also released the album) on guitar and Malone herself on tuned sine wave oscillators very slowly weaving a never-ending tapestry of subtly changing drones, noises and sparse melodic ideas, this is actually a much more varied and dramatic experience than you might imagine now. But given the stylistic framework in which it happens you still really need to be there for it!
I know, it's always an easy phrase, which makes you look like a proper professional music nerd better at listening than the average listener, to say that an album cannot be heard in the background, but rather demands attention. It is true for this one though.
The good news is that it's also completely fine to randomly pick one of the three parts of "Does Spring Hide Its Joy" and immerse yourself into it, if you only have one hour to spare. I can guarantee you that if you feel any love for Ambient, Drone and Modern Classical experimentalism, these soundscapes have the potential to fill you with an enormous amount of both instinctual and intellectual satisfaction.
But back to the initial question! Here's my success story and personal recommendation if you want to experience the whole thing in one sitting: Pick an activity which keeps you busy, but doesn't command much attention while you put this masterly produced mammoth on your headphones! Seasoned knitters, this is your hour three hours!
For me it was editing, as in removing lint and dirt from scans of film negatives, since I'm always behind with that and still want to publish of last post about my 2022 photography, devoted to medium format, here hopefully this month.
But that of course has nothing to do with why you should check out this album. It's a masterpiece, that's why.
