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The Scorpion Sways in the Moonlight (A Mostly Sinister Soundtrack for A Dusty Western That is Yet to Exist)

by Man of Multnomah

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about

REVIEWS:

"One thing that always appeals to me is playing with the balance between repetition and sameness vs variation and difference. Too much of one is boring. Too much of the other is chaos, noise. So in this suite you have a consistency of atmosphere, some sameness in instrumentation, but interesting differences in texture and theme. A good mixture for a soundtrack that is mixed with the visual information of a film, in this case, imaginary. One's imagination is free to 'see pictures'. I like it."
— David Kelley

"A remarkably evocative, western-themed collection of aural images that are intensely rhythmic and unsettling. Native American cadences interspersed with the sound of muffled hooves plodding a rocky path. The image of bleak, foggy landscapes with an undercurrent of approaching danger. Strained, discordant cries of travelers approaching in the distance. A trill of banjo conveying the numbing, endless struggle against the elements. All supported by an exceptional range of rhythmic and percussive structures. Overall, a unique musical depiction of our Western heritage you won’t soon forget."
— Mark Connell

"From the first listening you go with the flow. Its like a soundtrack to a spaghetti western horror movie. This one man band is a diamond in the rough. The Scorpio Lp has the atmosphere of Claudio Simonetti's Goblin with carefully placed (evil) melodies on top of a nightmare-ish sound scape. As a big horror fan I would love to hear this music in a horror film. Maybe that is the next step for this project."
— Nikolaos Angelopoulos

“This is so beautiful, eerie, expansive.”
— Orion Landau

"At first listen, 'The Scorpion Sways in the Moonlight' is just as advertised– the soundtrack to a western that doesn't yet exist.
However, on closer listen the sound owes more to the expansiveness of open western landscapes and their place in our collective memory than it does to the actual sound of westerns, even the 'alternative' canon of Jarmusch, Cohen, late-period Tommy Lee Jones and their ilk. Straying furthest from the genre are off-kilter tunes like 'Eat the priest or go on a-starvin',' where the plaintive plonks of banjo join forlorn upright piano in replaying themes more suited to a half-imagined horror than an imaginary western, or 'She said yes in the church and no in the bed,' where organs compress and feed back into a crescendo of revulsion. Other tunes like 'Them jokes 'round the fire ain't so funny now that y'all burnin'' stick closer to the western premise. The picked banjo dances around soft strumming in the same way a madman would dance about the fire in the imagined western film while watching his former friends, (now his victims) consumed by flames. On 'Trading Whores for Gunpowder', droning tones ring while notes slide up and down the fretboard and percussion makes a rare appearance, with an effect reminiscent of Tuareg music from that other great Western desert in North Africa. Overall, the album is more of a collection of similar moods than a score. A soundtrack indeed, but one to the landscape of feelings overlaid on physical landscape as much as to a film. If you've ever driven hours along an open two-lane road and felt the aching emptiness of the west, this is an accurate evocation of that mood in that precise moment. This is music for starvation, for drying of thirst, for freezing in the winter or suffering sunstroke. This is music for drowning in a river in the middle of the desert; aware of the irony of the situation but powerless to change it, taking in the harsh beauty of the scene as you slip under."
— Nick Wood

"Man of Multnomah uses the brushes of his imagination to paint us vivid pictures of aural atmospheres vast and delicate. This work breathes both bliss and trouble. It offers a moment's peace, always with the potential of danger, as if continuously struggling to hide from it. The desert is wild and unrelenting, and this is her soundtrack."
— David S. Fylstra

"Like walking on barren land until reaching an empty circus. Aaron beautifully balances acoustic melodies and rests."
— Pierre Carbuccia

“The American west, before the proliferation of shopping malls and drive-ins, was a place of idealism and the harsh realities of making it in an environment that is unforgiving at its core. Aaron's take on the Western landscapes and folklore is that of windswept Tundra and lonesome mountainsides with the hope of salvation around the bend. Set to a tone of Cohen Brothers bleakness and beauty, ‘The Scorpion Sways in the Moonlight’ is the perfect soundtrack to a movie not yet filmed.”
— Brandon Day

"It's got great energy, 'kinda music that makes me feel productive, like I'm starring in my own training montage before the climactic battle with the big boss in a noir western."
— Eric Trenchard-Smith

"I fell asleep while listening to this album (exhaustion not boredom) anyhow, I came to in a dream, sleeping in the dirt of a familiar but bygone landscape. With nothing but my sleeping roll, boots, rifle and six shooter on my hip I set off across the grassy plain for the distant mountain pass. After being chased by animals, scuffling with miscreants and criminals I finally came to my long awaited and much anticipated destination... then I woke up. ( isn’t that always the way?) This is the perfect soundtrack to the dark and grim western I wish I could write. I will leave that to someone else however, and just spend my time listening to these tracks while daydreaming of my western adventures."
— Seth Von Gretlein

• • •

I’ve always loved everything about Western flicks:
The inspiring heroes, the dastardly villains, the innocent folks trapped in-between them and the uncertainty of anyone surviving until the last scene. The slow and long panning shots of vast, lonely, open plains. The stories told by the characters along cruel journeys, from tough scene to tougher scene, on the roughest of blood-soaked roads. The feather width of hope that you grasp tight to your heaving chest, that hope that the hero finds safe passage while dragging the evil to judgement or to the reaper.

The Western soundtracks—like the films themselves—ARE America… gritty, raw, and with survival at the forefront. The music sets the mood, creates tension, and brings breath to the visuals. You are cold, alone, with only a single bullet left in your pistol. Best of luck.
— Aaron D.C. Edge / Man of Multnomah

• • •

credits

released April 8, 2019

All instrumentation, audio sensations, photography as well as this record's design was created, performed and executed by one Aaron D.C. Edge. This collection of tracks was documented and recorded with him at the helm at Myelin Studio in Portland, Oregon, with mastering by Nick Angelopoulos at Dope of Sound Studios in Athens, Greece.

“I would like to dedicate this recording to my very supportive and loving Father. This was recorded with his banjo.” — Aaron D.C. Edge

© and Ⓟ 2019 Your Throws Shall Return

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Man of Multnomah Portland, Oregon

The solo moniker of multi-instrumental American musician, Aaron D.C. Edge, who has been writing and recording music since the mid 80's, in over 50 musical endeavors.

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