I finally got my copy of Nurse With Wound's latest release, "Salt Marie Celeste". What a beautiful album. It's one track, 62 minutes long. From the press release:
Similar in concept to Gavin Bryars' The Sinking of the Titanic. Salt Marie Celeste delves even deeper into the theme of dropping into unknown darkness and ultimate demise.This release apparently expands upon last year's Music for Horse Hospital, a CD of sounds that accompanied a joint art exhibit by David Tibet (of Current 93) and Steven Stapleton (of Nurse With Wound). Salt Marie Celeste builds up a couple of chords, over and over. They're simultaneously warm and cold, some sort of haunting bellows type sound, rolling in waves under the entire piece. Already meditative and somber, this listener found himself in rocks and crags and encroaching fog at the tip of some island. As the piece continues, new sounds emerge: a rattling kind of hissing, some nearby horn. By thirty minutes in, the creaks and groans of an old ship are keeping time with the rolling drones and horn.
Of course, while listening to this in the background (and reading a great entry by Lewis H Lapham in the May 2003 Harper's), the apartment (an old 1910 unit) decides to add in its own noises. First, one of the smoke alarms has been making occasional (every 18 hours or so) chirps. I think it needs some TLC. Anyways, it chirps briefly but loudly. I go back to reading, keeping one eye towards the real clouds outside and another listening to the creeping changes in this track. It sounds like the old ship is falling apart - extra creaks and door sounds can be heard until, nearing the fifty minute mark, a bicycle bell. The creaks stop, but the drones continue. And there's something more sinister: the sound of water dropping in. Those dark dripping subterranean sounds. Around the 55 minute mark, I thought I heard a sudden (brief) new sound - like a gull or baby crying. Since there were a surprising amount of gulls flying around my window when I got home, and since the outside sounds (I forgot to mention a sudden thud which rattled much of the building, a few minutes after the fire alarm chirp) had found great timing already, I actually did stop and back up the track. Nothing. I let it go, the water was stopping, the horn was gone, and soon the drones of the bellows faded out.
It turns out there's a history to the name Mary Celeste. Originally launched under the name Amazon, she was a half-brig that apparently found itself going through many owners and accidents at sea. Purchased years later at a New York salvage auction, she was renamed "Mary Celeste". In November 1872, she departed from New York bound for Italy, but the captain, his family, and small crew were never seen again. The ship was found floating derelict, apparently missing one hastily boarded lifeboat, with no evidence of piracy or foul play. The story inspired Sir Arthur Conan Doyle to publish a fictional short story (under a pseudonym) about a derelict ship called the "Marie Celeste". Some more can be found here and here. An excerpt of the track is available from Brainwashed. I think it accurately captures the feeling of despair on a derelict ship.
Salt Marie Celeste easily finds itself fitting in with some other rainy sit-still-and-don't-move-high-above-the-pavement day music, although it shines best in evening on such a day.