San Franciscan artist musician and visual artist Christopher Willits creates dense suites of ambient electronic sound on his latest long player. In the past he has collaborated with the likes of Ryuichi Sakamoto (on his previous album Ancient Future), Taylor Dupree, and Zach Hill on releases from labels as diverse as Sub Rosa, Room40, 12k and of course Ghostly International.
He views Opening as a fusion of his visual and audio work, with 45 minutes of visual video footage shot over the last 4 years to accompany the release in the live setting.
Removed from the visuals there’ a real ethereal feel to the music, almost new age in parts, these smooth electronic sweeps of sound, with periodic accents bathed in heavy reverb, with a deep languid electro pulse. As a guitarist there are plenty of jammy guitar type noodles, though Willits has always used the guitar as a base to launch into the netherworld via his processing, washing everything out – or perhaps blissing everything out more to the point. It’s extended meditative music, with long patches of droning, often with lethargic quasi world textural beats, not necessarily big on complex developments, seeming to be more focussed on creating and then maintaining the deep languid immersive mood.
There is plenty of space on Opening, in fact this appears to be his modus operandi – create the structure and then allow the listeners the opportunity to drift off and paint the canvass themself. It’s this approach that can at times make the music feel a little like audio wallpaper, though to be fair it worked for Eno’ ambient music and there’ much more complexity here. There are however no sharp edges, nothing to burst Willits dreamy lithium bubble – with the tunes all encased in a lush wash of dreamy electro sheen. It’s this uniformity of sound, not the gentle barely there developments so much that make the album feel a little samey.
The best moments are when he breaks free of his self imposed structures, such as Connect, where gets more of a swing to his percussive groove, borrowing more from ambient electronica, breaking down into acoustic guitar and the sound of a babbling brook. Later on Wide he enters ambient house territory – complete with handclaps, and thanks to clearly defined sections somehow it feels more purposeful. In fact it’s these pieces that offer a novel interpretation of what’s happening here. Opening can feel a little like deconstructed, or perhaps reformed house music, a kind of minimalist house, withholding all but the most rudimentary of beats with all the club elements removed, leaving only the warmth, the lushness of the timbre and the good vibes, but somewhere along the way its been warmed by the sun and embraced a new age hippie mentality.
Whilst it’s easy to lament where it could have or should have gone, or even pine for different timbres, this is not what Opening about. There’ something very considered about this work, Willits seems to have very clearly designed this as a tool for looking inward and in the live sense for connecting with the natural world – perhaps slowing down our rhythms to be in tune with those of nature.
Anyway you know what they say, one man’ wallpaper is another man’ transcendence.
