"The Caretaker" And The Human Condition

 

 

A little while ago, the bizarre image of a massive boulder or piece of clay resting on top of a pedestal with an unstruck match prodding its centre took the more curious side of the internet by storm. Even stranger was the music that the painting accompanied. A fifty two minute experience full of suffocating and unrecognizable ballroom music. It took the listeners no time to unravel the themes of mental deterioration, deliberate haziness and human condition. What followed was the revelation that the project was in fact an exploration of the human mind under the influence of Alzheimer’s and how familiar music affected it. The mastermind behind it - Leyland Kirby and his pseudonym “The Caretaker”. The boulder, most likely a harrowing representation of a person’s face from the perspective of someone who’s grasp with reality has become obsolete - the craft of Ivan Seal who’s lifelong friendship with Kirby is now almost synonymous with The Caretaker project. “An Empty Bliss Beyond This World” came out in 2011 and strangely brought itself to people’s attention years later. An almost ironic fate for a project for which the passage of time, as a concept, proved essential.

Kirby dives deep into Plunderphonics. Gathering as many pre-World War II era ballroom jazz records as he can, the England based producer modifies them by means of digital production and creates a specifically weary and uneasy sensation that hastily gets under your skin. The reverb and hardly recognizable original compositions wear the listener down layer by layer. It is by no means a difficult listen, although the haziness does eventually develop into a morbid mood. The previously uplifting and grandiose jazz music becomes sluggish, lethargic and ungraspable. Kirby purposefully messes with sound reproduction on tracks like “An Empty Bliss Beyond This World” as the stereo output jumps back and forth between left and right ear, making it almost uncomfortable to listen to. In addition to being a wonderful piece of music, the record serves as a sonic experience as well. The often ridiculed vague feeling of vinyl “warmth” and crackling is prevalent here on most tracks and adds to the rustic experience quite well. 

 

 

The beauty of "An Empty Bliss Beyond This World" is intertwined with an underlying sense of stifling sadness. Taking it all in at once feels like yearning for fresh air in a stuffy cottage. The sound is absent and engulfing to the point where it becomes meditative. The drowning sea of catatonia is absent-minded, drifting along, uncaring whether anything or anyone is paying attention to it. It carries along with it fractions, memories, sounds, smells, faces. It’s almost natural to think that it was meant to serve as a foundation for people with dementia, lazily trying to recover specific sounds and emotions among the music they grew up with. It is undeniably depressing and yet songs like “Camaraderie At Length” almost revel in the twisted absurdity of it all, one of the more uplifting pieces.

Nowadays The Caretaker is well known for its six part musical project “Everywhere At The End Of Time” that was wrapped up in September of 2016. It dove even deeper into the human condition, exploring further ideas, expanding upon its avant-garde nature and putting the character of The Caretaker as the catalyst of the underlying “story”. Said to have been inspired by “The Shining’s” ballroom sequence, Leyland Kirby has been honoured as the precursor to what people nowadays call “existential dread music”. It is without a doubt a greatly interesting piece of music history. “An Empty Bliss Beyond This World” being a poignant and greatly harrowing listen.