These days, it seems as though Alan Licht is as recognized as a writer about music as he is a performer of it. The New Yorker’s discography has been a tad scant of late, with 2003’s A New York Minute his last major solo statement, though, to be fair, the last six years have been peppered with collaborative guitar albums with such heavies as Nels Cline, Oren Ambarchi, and Loren Connors. Still, YMCA is a welcome arrival. Combining two live performances in 2004, the album may not offer the perfect look at Licht’s contemporary work, but given his relatively meager solo output, any release, even if it’s a few years late, is worthy of note.
YMCA is meant to be heard as a triptych, a product of Licht’s enthusiasm with the then-contemporary work of Oren Ambarchi and Tetuzi Akiyama. The halving of the vinyl-only release into two sides foils its three-part structure a tad, but the record’s evolution is hardly less effective. Ambarchi’s influence lords heavily over YMCA’s first section, a series of tones that fade in and out, like dolphins just visible as they crest the surface of the sea. The intermingling tones become more numerous, crowding each other slightly, though things never quite reach the expected intensity, and the meditative feel with which the piece begins falters, but isn’t squelched. The gentle notes that creep out from underneath these tones do so with a delicate restrain. Licht picks a simple melody that patiently repeats until the remnants of the record’s first section have finally faded away, and by the time side A comes to a close, only minute changes have been made.
Soon after the album’s second side begins, the tones that populated its beginning resurface underneath Licht’s meditative melody. The swooping sounds, more active than in their first incarnation, gently build, encrusted with the detritus of a manipulated delay effect. These “imperfections” slowly become more prevalent, building into a flurry of distorted bluster. Now with jagged edges and prickly tails, the once tranquil tones swirl in a soup of damaged beauty. Looped and laden in all manner of effects, Licht’s guitar speaks in tongues in a multifarious and mangled oratory. The intensity level isn’t consistently high, but when Licht lets rip, the leap in level is enough to startle the unwary listener.
As Licht lets things fade to a more subdued level after YMCA’s brief climax, the wispy trails flying by like ghosts. Light brings thing full circle before the guitar fades away and the audience’s cheers bring side B to a close. The conclusion of the record is what one might expect, and, in general there’s a predictable progression to the whole album. Still, as a document that might’ve been lost in the dissolution of Idea back in 2007, YMCA’s reemergence on Family Vineyard is a welcome one. Though this might not be Licht’s most singular effort, it’s nice to see an addition to the guitarist’s solo catalog, which is, one hopes, a portent of further solo productivity.
