This collection of remixes is not the first time that someone has taken advantage of just how rife for sample-pilfering Philip Glass’s meditative take on minimalist music is. Several years ago, DJ BC, an American mash-up artist, put out a free compilation of hip-hop tunes by The Beastie Boys, Q-Tip and Kanye West, among others, backed by various Glass compositions that showed just how well the composer’s particularly idiosyncratic musical habits could work in conjunction with tropes from other genres.
The scope has increased on this project to include artists as diverse as Beck, Amon Tobin and Ty Braxton of Battles. Initiated by a conversation between Glass and Beck, whose contributions to other artists’ work seems to be where he thrives the most these days, and tied in to Glass’s 75th birthday celebrations, Rework is a fascinating record. With an ouevre as rich as Glass’s, the room for experimentation is vast. Somewhat disappointingly, four of the twelve pieces found here are drawn from Glassworks, a record which was designed expressly to introduce Glass’s work to the general public in an accessible, easily digestible manner. And it worked. The record ended up becoming undoubtedly one of the composer’s defining statements in the eyes and ears of the record buying public at that time. The high quality of the material contained therein cannot be disputed, but it would have been interesting to see the artists involved dig a little deeper and engage with the composer’s lesser known material. The least exciting moment on the record comes from Cornelius, who presents a slightly discombobulated but essentially straight-up cover of ‘Opening’, which lacks the warmth of Glass’s own rendition on Glassworks, and leaves one wondering why it was included at all. Fortunately, almost all the other contributors make the material their own, stamping it with their own identity while the constituent parts used to construct each piece remain indelibly Glassian. Ty Braxton’s take on ‘Rubric’ transforms the piece into a chunky electro wobbler, overlaid with his distinctive loop/delay approach to playing, giving the piece a schizoid urgency that makes it one of the most exciting contributions on the record. Elsewhere, Nosaj Thing turns ‘Knee 1’, the opening of Einstein on the Beach, into a gorgeous laid back techno tune which recalls the gentler moments of Aphex Twin’s Selected Ambient Works albums.
The centrepiece of the album manifests itself in Beck’s ‘NYC: 73-78’, a sprawling 21 minute long Frankenstein’s monster of a song, collating several of Glass’s pieces into one remarkably cohesive whole. There are some lyrics present, but the textural enhancements brought about by the vocals outweigh their importance, adding a layer of gauzy dreaminess to proceedings that, in addition to the skilful manipulation of the raw materials used, speaks to Beck’s ear for constructing a great tune, an aspect of his work that can tend to be overwhelmed by a sometimes forced-seeming ‘wackiness’. Peter Broderick’s sombre version of ‘Island’ closes out the set, converting an already Gothic piece into an almost ludicrously ominous dark folk ballad, which gives away to an insistent beat and Broderick’s swooping, wordless vocals, and eventually to a sample from the original recording, bringing the album back full circle to its omnipresent progenitor.
An appealing and surprisingly playful tribute to one of the most important composers of our time, this is well worth a look for Glass enthusiasts and fans of any of the artists involved.
— Ivan Deasy
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DfvGoAsxY_E?rel=0]
