13 April 2011
Bobby Jones AKA I’ve Lost caught my eye and really took hold of my senses in his 2010 release on the Feedback Loop Label entitled Dissociative Fugue, it was a complete triumph in translating the most primordial human emotions through the musical language. 8 months on and I’ve Lost has his follow-up Scáth M’anam released on the Relaxed Machinery label. This album sees Bobby stretching himself into new territory that was not explored on the EP, one might say he has mangled and twisted the sounds he creates with his guitar even further from the source as the 72 minute epic I Wish I Could Fly opens with angelic like choral in the distance before a structured repeating almost synth like sound tugs at your heart-strings.
The first track is divided up into several distinct movement which are signified often by field recordings, these recordings give the track a sense of place and provide a nice stepping stone between the 8 parts of the track, making sure you don’t get lost in it all. Bobby describes the process, or rather the concept behind this record in the press release, explaining that he composed the pieces,
As a reaction to the unstoppable machine of technological advancements, I composed this album as a means to desperately hold on to, and express, my humanity
Bobby expresses his humanity while simultaneously making you aware of your own. The music is fragile and desolate, unafraid to disappear and reform anew. It is ever so cold and mysterious, whether it be the crowing of birds or two objects being thrust together and echoing into the distance, you are touched by his longing for human contact. 14 minutes into the monolith track Bobby somehow manages to make sounds similar to steel pans of the Caribbean, but these sounds are not upbeat but extremely bleak and dark, mangled with crashing water, running cars and random found sounds.
While Bobby used the guitar as his instrument of choice, the sounds are so far removed you would never guess he even played a guitar on this record up until about 22 minute mark, when a heavily reverbed and clean guitar warms your ears. This passage of music, in contrast to the opening 20 minutes is warm, hopeful and ever so innocent. At 35 minutes, Bobby’s guitar is rising to the sky like a beam of light being shot from the ground, quivering like the instrument is just about to break down in tears. What I notice about Bobby’s music is that when he finds that perfect place, those ever so perfect notes that hit you right in the chest, he will not let them go.
The album closes with Ghosts in the Wind, an 8 minute cleanser after the cinematic 72 minute opener. The track is considerably lighter, but just as powerful and emotive as it’s predecessor. Shimmering notes spring from his guitar, almost like they are telling you everything will be alright if we just hold on to our emotion, hold on to what makes us human. I find it difficult to say how I feel about Bobby’s music in words, he translates human emotion through his playing so well, so coherently, so decisively that you just have to listen to it for yourself. So do just that, lose yourself in the conversation between a man and his guitar, you will not regret it.
Source – http://wtyf.wordpress.com/2011/04/13/ive-lost-scath-m%E2%80%99anam/