This second album from Bitchin’ Bajas’ Cooper Crain and Bill MacKay is more composed and less improvised than its predecessor Foreign Smokes, its ideas worked out not on the fly but over time as the two musicians honed their tunes in the live setting. These tracks pursue intricate, repeated riffs that are more regular, almost geometrical, than the ones on the debut album, which tended towards spreading pools of tone washed sound.
Category: BCMC
BCMC :: Foreign Smokes
Bill MacKay and Cooper Crain run in the same Chicago circles, MacKay tilting, maybe, a little further towards folk and blues and Crain of Bitchin Bajas and Cave leaning harder into krautish experimental drone. There’s certainly plenty of common ground, however, judging from this four-track collaboration, as both work to find magic in still, pooling reservoirs of sound that do not move so much as they glisten in unearthly light.