Nation Building, Popebama's debut album from Gold Bolus Recordings, is a 40-minute guide to forging your own sound world. Through concept, play, notation, rehearsal, performance, and extensive touring, four original works (two by Rogers, two by Sullivan) capture the duo’s hallmark performance energy in a refined studio mix. Noisy, experimental, multi-instrument, text-laden, with custom electronics, intricate setups and an unwavering attention to detail, Popebama’s work applies the freshness of experimental sound and free spirit of improvisation to precise execution and formal notation. From their ambitious first ventures in 2016, seasoned composer-performer- improvisers Rogers and Sullivan pooled their collective everythings to uncover new ground in sound and performance.
Known for her work with thingNY, Hypercube, and New Thread Quartet as a saxophonist/improviser and composer, Erin Rogers, applies clever orchestration and lyrical phrasing to junky sound-makers and multitasking instrumentalists in Wormhole (2017) while stepping into a concerto of unconventional saxophone sounds, pushed-and-pulled by an industrial engine of wood, metal, and noise in Light-On-Light (2018).
At home in the percussion/electronics laboratory, Dennis Sullivan explores complex rhythmic and acoustic sound-blending in Shedding Waste (2016), where refined instrumental techniques are tempered by cheap, lo-fi noises at an inconceivable pace. A master solo performer, groundbreaking composer, and founding member of the electro-percussive duo Radical 2, Sullivan piles table-upon-table of instruments, electric and acoustic, connected through endless circuitry in Gamma Chamber (2018), casting the listener into a dark cavern of metallic resonance, with thousands of small sounds bursting to be heard.
credits
released August 7, 2020
All tracks performed by Popebama:
Erin Rogers: soprano/tenor saxophones, vocals, electronics
Dennis Sullivan: percussion, vocals, electronics
All tracks written by Popebama:
Shedding Waste (2016) by Dennis Sullivan
Wormhole (2017) by Erin Rogers
Gamma Chamber (2018) by Dennis Sullivan
Light-On-Light (2018) by Erin Rogers
Recorded by Zach Herchen at Adelphi University Performing Arts Center
Editing, mixing - Zach Herchen
Mastering - Caley Monahon-Ward
Artwork - Christopher Lauto
New York-based experimental duo that focuses on exciting performances of unconventional works. The “slippery duo” (—New
Yorker), of Erin Rogers (saxophone) and Dennis Sullivan (percussion), apply text, electronics, and high-energy instrumental writing to newly discovered sounds....more
supported by 14 fans who also own “Nation Building”
Composition in spite of traditionalism. A sonic abrasion and proof that contemporary classical music is interesting, engaging and intoxicating. jiristepan