RANCUNE by Sam Ospovat

Much like the title that his 2019 mathy, avant-jazz-centric head-spinner of a record was slapped with, octopi-armed drummer, electronics tinkerer, aces improviser, composer and noisemaker Sam Ospovat is a ‘ride angles’ brand of musician. Behind the kit, he unleashes a vortex of angular and off-kilter beats, thwacks, rolls and accents that all improbably converge into a single free-flowing compendium of choppy groove and rhythm. The straight-ahead approach isn’t exactly up Ospovat’s alley.

All that has thrust Ospovat deep into New York City’s DIY underground “creative music” scene, where he’s established himself as a cornerstone of the movement. He’s also thrown himself into the fringes of the weird and gnarly where he neatly fits in, guiding the lurching post-punk of Enablers, plus stints holding down the “brutal-prog” blast beats in The Flying Luttenbachers and for no wave queen Lydia Lunch and Retrovirus.

The nine experiments that make up Rancune are akin to shadowy figures lurking in and out of the darkness, bleeding with claustrophobic vibes and hallucinatory endorphins. Conceived and executed with noise-bathed abandon inside a waterfront warehouse in a dystopian, semi-deserted industrial area of Sunset Park, Brooklyn, in close proximity to the nearby Costco hellscape and the neighboring strip club Play Pen, Rancune traverses uniquely sonic vistas - even as it navigates the specific rhythmic vocabulary that Ospovat and his longtime brother in arms (bass extraordinaire Kim Cass) have been honing for well over a decade. Rancune pares down the six-piece iteration of Ospovat’s 2019 Ride Angles to a trio lineup as Ospovat and Cass reteam with one-time Village Voice-voted “NYC Best Guitarist” Brandon Seabrook. What transpires is a heady spray-painting sprawl of brutal, nails-on-chalkboard shards and strange and beautiful soundscapes.

Engineered by Nathaniel Morgan (who originally built out the Sunset Park warehouse space) mixed by Ospovat’s Enablers bandmate, guitarist and engineer Joe Goldring (formerly of Swans and Toiling Midgets), mastered by Alex Oropeza, and produced by Ospovat himself, the pieces appear chronologically as they were caught on tape. Almost nothing was cut, just some fades added to separate the tracks. This DIY approach adds to the primordial nature of the recording, resulting in a haunting mix that creates a spellbinding and hypnotic listening experience.

While the apocalyptic rumble belched out by Seabrook, Cass and Ospovat suggests a doom, jazz and metal hybrid to the outsider looking in, the explorative soundscapes that comprise Rancune were influenced by something else entirely, as Ospovat admits when pressed on the issue. “My main points of reference for this type of playing are Cecil Taylor (who I played with for two weeks as a student at Mills) and the SME (Spontaneous Music Ensemble) - especially the album Karyobin. They are my framework.”

As far as the record’s electronic textures, tones and layers go, that’s Ospovat’s territory. “The kit is prepared with electronics - contact mics on drums and cymbals, going through various pedals and a mixer. There are no triggers. It's more like the pickups on an electric guitar. And it processes the ensemble at times.”

The question that presents itself when diving deep into the ‘expressive olympics’ (actually the title of another forthcoming record of Ospovat’s that he calls “loud and dirty”) of Rancune is this: is the music composed or purely improvised? Ospovat keeps it ambiguous. “Usually, I like improvised music I play and listen to to give the illusion that it could be composed - basically a function of an attention to form and arc,” he explains. “I noticed that was a primary element of Cecil Taylor's improvising and conducting a group from the piano, even through the sonic maelstrom that may have dominated a given improvisation. The compositional structure seems to be there with the SME, too. Kim and Brandon both improvise this way. Kim can give a huge amount of form and structure with his choice of bass notes, framing and steering the choices of the other players, and Brandon is constantly orchestrating with a dialectic between expansive spaces and claustrophobic confines.”

The dizzyingly complex, rapid-fire speed with which Seabrook and Cass operate on guitar and upright bass respectively adds a singular touch to Rancune. As Ospovat tells it, “Kim has a pizzicato game on the upright that is virtually unparalleled, especially when it comes to his use of harmonics in very fast melodic passages, and his unique and innovative hand positions doing this,” he says. “This hasn’t been heard enough, and can frequently be covered up on dense albums. You can hear quite a bit of it here and it's amazing. Brandon also plays so fast sometimes that it's shocking, and fun to respond to in a way that you would to another percussionist—he plays things that are as fast as drums rolls. The speed of both Kim and Brandon together can be very exciting and vertiginous.”

The sonic vernacular and psychic-level interplay that Ospovat, Seabrook and Cass exhibit is next-level. That isn’t lost on Ospovat. “I love them both as composers and as players. Playing with Brandon and Kim feels very focused and intense, even though their voices are familiar to me. And the ideas always come fresh and effortlessly, every time no matter what.” –-Brad Cohan, Brooklyn, New York, March, 2023

Originally from Lincoln, Nebraska, Sam Ospovat played piano and sang in boys' choir before picking up his first pair of drumsticks in 5th grade. He made his recording debut at Fantasy Studios playing bell tree on Lou Harrison's “Threnody for Carlos Chavez.” He can be heard with Enablers, Flying Luttenbachers, Brandon Seabrook, Angelica Sanchez, Lydia Lunch, Ava Mendoza, and in his own contexts…

samospovat.com