Originally from the Black Country (the glottal rich manor of Walsall to be exactE), John Twells is now based up north in Manchester from where he runs his Type imprint and casts out dark, yet never suffocating, compositions under the Xela pseudonym. Having recorded silicon-rinsed soundtracks alongside Gabriel Morley as Yasume, Twells is best known for his work released under the Xela appellation. Showing an astonishing evolution in sound from early releases such as 'For Frosty Mornings and Summer Nights' and 'Tangled Wool', through to the ink-blot atmospherics of 'The Dead Sea', what originated in the clinical environs of digitalis was gradually eroded by thickly hued instrumentation and sublime arrangements with Twells incorporating a vast palate of sounds and influences that retains sharp and piquant flavour despite the rich ingredients. Featuring a fantastically macabre set of illustrated cover art from Matthew Woodson (www.ghostco.org), 'The Dead Sea' is Xela's ode to all things maritime with the album's thematic thread detailing a doomed oceanvoyage that meets an abrupt end amongst a swarm of malignant zombies. Drawing on the work of 1970's horror directors (Dario Argento, Lucio Fulci and George Romero et al.) and their respective soundtracks, 'The Dead Sea' pays a considerable debt to the likes of Goblin or Fabio Frizzi albeit frayed with a bloodied disposition that reveals a love of Earth, Circle and Wolf Eyes. Nowhere near as oppressive as this description could have you believe, Xela also exposes a deep seam of kaleidoscopic folk amongst his collection, with generous nods going to the freewheeling antics of labels such as Fonal and The Jewelled Antler Collective. Opening through the lace-curtained drone of 'The Gate', Xela manages to be both wilfully obtuse yet unremittingly focussed as a cold-water batch of foggy soundscapes briefly parts to reveal some insistent percussion. Next up are the heat- haze melodies of 'Linseed' and its tender coalition of acoustic shards and mealy rhythms, before a Victorian music box is exposed to some virulently thrumming necromancy for the startling 'Drunk On Salt Water'. From here Xela continues to coax both light and dark from a palate of instruments he's accrued whilst travelling the globe, ranging in style from the throbbing Theramin-heavy electronics of 'Creeping Flesh' and the tarnished grandeur of 'Savage Ritual', through to the seething distortion of 'Humid At Dusk' and nervous shimmer of 'Briefly Seen'. Horrifically good!
Xela
For Frosty Mornings and Summer Nights
[Neo Ouija; 2003]
Rating: 7.2
There's something familiar about Xela's sound, a feeling that you've heard this chord, that click, this melody somewhere before. It doesn't nag at you or scream "derivative"; it's not, for example, like hearing a sampled loop and not resting until you've pinned down the source. Instead, one gets the feeling from For Frosty Mornings and Summer Nights of settling into old pajamas, sitting in oversized chairs on the beach, getting lost in the woods behind your house on purpose. A nostalgic mood tints the whole album, creating an aural equivalent to Super 8 home movies-- taken, most likely, on Mars. Like Boards of Canada, whose artwork and imagery intentionally conjure visions of nylon jackets, sepia tone and childhood circa 1977 in general, Xela (John Twells) crafts songs that are clear in their emotion, focused and difficult to misread.
Not a little of the album's approach is inspired by Twell's friend Lee Norkin and his work under the guise of Metamatics; his Neo Ouija album is a definite mentor here, though without the more dance-fueled rhythms Norkin flexes with that name. "Under the Glow of Streetlights" and the ponderous, patient "The Long Walk Home at Midnite", whose pleasures are revealed slowly and with keen pacing, are good examples of the beats to be found on For Frosty Mornings: as fractured as Dos Tracks or early Pole, but with a wide berth between the pieces. At their most coherent, the rhythms on the record are inspired click 'n' cut textures, lazy BPMs that ride the ambience through till the end. The closer, "Last Breathe", pulls off a beat I can only describe as tropical, and backs it with a crying trumpet and the sobs of a woman, and while Manitoba and Marumari can conjure similar vibes, it's impressive how well Xela works it.
It's the ambient elements, the gentle ebb and flow of layers of synth and extended chords, where the influences show the most. Marumari, Selected Ambient Works, WE; all of them know how to pull this technique off, and Xela adds himself to their ranks by copping a few licks here and there: "Afraid of Nowhere" bears The Mark of the 'Twin, and as excellent as "Japanese Whispers" gets, it's still leaning a bit heavily on the shoulder of Prefuse 73, with Music Has the Right to Children driving it to the airport. The sullen "An Abandoned Robot" fares better, raining down shimmering chimes into a thick soup of chords, rippling out and out and out, punctuated with Oval-ish skips and crackles provided by Stefan Lewandowski.
I drive through the woods to work now, and with all the partially sunny days lately, For Frosty Mornings has been perfect for a sleepy, half-lit drive home over the mountain. It gets under your skin not with hooks or basslines, but with a mood that the chosen tones and pacing enforce for the duration of the record. It plays like a cohesive whole, a steady set of hills and valleys with perfect curves. It may go unnoticed on a label like Neo Ouija, whose content can often be described on similar terms, but Xela has put out a fucking nice record, a chill-out album that makes the term "chill-out" respectable again. This album is a sleeper in every sense of the word. Funkstorung for the content and drowsy.
-Mark Martelli, June 13, 2003
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