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The debut self-titled album Hotel Neon (56'17") exhibits this trio's sonic, sensuous interaction with the world. Guitarists Michael Tasselmyer, Andrew Tasselmyer and Steven Kemner capture the languorous ebb and flow of life in seven vignettes structured and strung together based on instinct rather than any overt narrative concerns. Everything here is so perfectly in tune with itself. The tracks seem to wander and ruminate, collecting stray moments and fleeting impressions which gradually fit together to avow a possessing pattern of emotion. In the interaction of head, hand and heart Hotel Neon use their electric guitars and processing devices to produce subtle ambient zones and distinctive atmospheres. Breathing chords build and repeat - moving the listener gently across a range of warm, soft textures. Yet, the music may just as easily lead us into subterranean caverns - with lithe timbres and rushing tones reverberating off into unseen corners. While we may believe that most of this album originates in electronic sound, Hotel Neon does respectfully make known their work's stringed origins - in the occasional buzzing and humming associated with an electric guitar. Their outside somber darkness seems best suited for the hours of the dusk - where daybreak may not find them. Hotel Neon offers a place apart from the realms of ordinary existence - a place where music approaches the sacred through the silent avenues of the heart. But the space created by their music is really no different from anywhere else - since beauty and meaning are everywhere, provided we know how to look.
- Chuck van Zyl/STAR'S END 10 March 2016 |
