If a Body Meet a Body by Squanderers
On their surface, Squanderers resemble a “blues summit,” a meeting of and jam session among like-minded musicians in roughly the same genre. Yet Wendy Eisenberg, David Grubbs and Kramer work mostly beyond or outside genre, and that becomes evident within a single listen of their (first?) collaborative studio full-length.
If a Body Meet a Body sounds exactly like what it is: two guitarists—Eisenberg in the right channel, Grubbs in the left—and one bassist, Kramer, improvising places in which they can coexist.
Considering that the credits state that the entire album was “[r]ecorded May 30, 2024 (before lunch),” Squanderers build those places quickly and sturdily. With the opening track, “Theme for Squanderers,” Eisenberg wanders decisively across the tidal pools Grubbs fills with chords, while Kramer simply rumbles underneath them.
True to its title, the opener establishes the methodology of three very experienced and varied players: Eisenberg an essayist as well a soloist; Grubbs a professor of music as well as a former Gastr del Sol member; and Kramer a producer as well as owner of the Shimmy-Disc label. Their previous collaborators include Will Oldham, John Zorn, and Allen Ginsberg.
Inevitably, some improvisations don’t fully cohere: “Theme for Pattern Recognition” searches for patterns more than it recognizes them, and “Theme for Squanderers (Reprise)” doesn’t offer a fulfilling restatement of the opener.
Still, when coherence occurs, as in the Kraftwerkian “Theme for Quiet Car” or the surprisingly variable 10-minute meditation of the bonus track “Theme for Setting Out,” Squanderers nudge each other toward the ideas they can best explore together.
And If a Body Meet a Body feels like more than an intellectual exercise. It also feels like the promising start to a longer exploration that might become more coherent, and thoughtful, if and as it continues. In that way, it is a summit.
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