''Choirs of the Eye'' is the debut studio album by Kayo Dot, released on

Tzadik Records Tzadik Records is a record label in New York City that specializes in avant-garde and experimental music. The label was established by composer and saxophonist John Zorn in 1995. He is the executive producer of all Tzadik releases. Tzadik is a n ...

in 2003. It was released shortly after the breakup of

maudlin of the Well maudlin of the Well (commonly abbreviated as motW) is an avant-garde metal band from Boston, Massachusetts. Their music contains elements from many different genres including jazz, progressive rock, psychedelic rock, post rock, art rock, prog ...

, with the band consisting of several members from the former band as well as guest performers who are friends of band members. The album is titled after a lyric from the maudlin of the Well song "Blight of River-Systems", on '' My Fruit Psychobells...A Seed Combustible''.Lamentations of the Flame Princess Interview with Kayo Dot
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SputnikMusic Sputnikmusic is an American music community website offering music criticism and music news alongside features commonly associated with wiki-style websites. The format of the website is unusual in that it includes both professional and amateur c ...

voted it as one of the best

metal A metal (from Greek μέταλλον ''métallon'', "mine, quarry, metal") is a material that, when freshly prepared, polished, or fractured, shows a lustrous appearance, and conducts electricity and heat relatively well. Metals are typicall ...

albums of the 2000s. The group performed the entire album in 2010 to two sold out nights in

Brooklyn, New York Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

Style

''Choirs of the Eye'' blends aspects of

experimental metal Avant-garde metal (also known as avant-metal, experimental metal, and experimental) is a subgenre of heavy metal music loosely defined by use of experimentation and innovative, avant-garde elements, including non-standard and unconventional soun ...

post-rock Post-rock is a form of experimental rock characterized by a focus on exploring textures and timbre over traditional rock song structures, chords, or riffs. Post-rock artists are often instrumental, typically combining rock instrumentation with ...

art rock Art rock is a subgenre of rock music that generally reflects a challenging or avant-garde approach to rock, or which makes use of modernist, experimental, or unconventional elements. Art rock aspires to elevate rock from entertainment to an art ...

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...

, and modern composition, with long, predominantly instrumental,

through-composed In music theory of musical form, through-composed music is a continuous, non- sectional, and non- repetitive piece of music. The term is typically used to describe songs, but can also apply to instrumental music. While most musical forms such as t ...

songs. Additionally, the album continues maudlin of the Well's unorthodox fusion of common metal and rock instrumentation with woodwinds, brass, and strings, with the intention of helping the electric guitar, drum kit, and electric bass to become part of the lexicon of modern classical music. These features helped entice

John Zorn John Zorn (born September 2, 1953) is an American composer, conductor, saxophonist, arranger and producer who "deliberately resists category". Zorn's avant-garde and experimental approaches to composition and improvisation are inclusive of jaz ...

to sign the band and distribute the album on his Tzadik label as the first full band in its 'Composer Series'.Tzadik Music page for Choirs of the Eye
/ref>

Lyrics

The lyrics were written by Jason Byron, longtime collaborator of band leader and main composer

Toby Driver Toby Driver is a multi-instrumentalist, composer, songwriter, producer, label owner, and artist, best known for his work as the leader of the experimental bands Kayo Dot and maudlin of the Well. Driver creates the majority of the album artwork ...

, who also wrote for maudlin of the Well. Byron would listen to the instrumental compositions and match lyrics accordingly, which were usually written previously and independently. In some cases, entire stanzas were unable to fit in the song structures, which led to some instances of alternative sound creation and recording methods; the song "The Antique," for example, features a sound recording of an antique

Polaroid camera Polaroid may refer to: * Polaroid Corporation, an American company known for its instant film and cameras * Polaroid camera, a brand of instant camera formerly produced by Polaroid Corporation * Polaroid film, instant film, and photographs * Polaro ...

as it snaps a photo of an unused lyric stanza, thereby making the camera 'speak' the unused words. The lyrics are not published in the album's liner notes.

Track listing

All songs written by Toby Driver. All lyrics written by Jason Byron.

Credits

*Toby Driver -

vocals Singing is the act of creating musical sounds with the voice. A person who sings is called a singer, artist or vocalist (in jazz and/or popular music). Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung with or without ...

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected stri ...

cello The cello ( ; plural ''celli'' or ''cellos'') or violoncello ( ; ) is a Bow (music), bowed (sometimes pizzicato, plucked and occasionally col legno, hit) string instrument of the violin family. Its four strings are usually intonation (music), t ...

double bass The double bass (), also known simply as the bass () (or #Terminology, by other names), is the largest and lowest-pitched Bow (music), bowed (or plucked) string instrument in the modern orchestra, symphony orchestra (excluding unorthodox addit ...

, bells,

synthesizer A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis and ...

tuba The tuba (; ) is the lowest-pitched musical instrument in the brass family. As with all brass instruments, the sound is produced by lip vibrationa buzzinto a mouthpiece. It first appeared in the mid-19th century, making it one of the ne ...

*Greg Massi - vocals,

electric guitar An electric guitar is a guitar that requires external amplification in order to be heard at typical performance volumes, unlike a standard acoustic guitar (however combinations of the two - a semi-acoustic guitar and an electric acoustic gui ...

*Nicholas Kyte - vocals,

bass guitar The bass guitar, electric bass or simply bass (), is the lowest-pitched member of the string family. It is a plucked string instrument similar in appearance and construction to an electric or an acoustic guitar, but with a longer neck and ...

*Sam Gutterman - vocals,

drums A drum kit (also called a drum set, trap set, or simply drums) is a collection of drums, cymbals, and other Percussion instrument, auxiliary percussion instruments set up to be played by one person. The player (drummer) typically holds a pair o ...

percussion A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Exc ...

*Terran Olson -

flute The flute is a family of classical music instrument in the woodwind group. Like all woodwinds, flutes are aerophones, meaning they make sound by vibrating a column of air. However, unlike woodwind instruments with reeds, a flute is a reedless ...

clarinet The clarinet is a musical instrument in the woodwind family. The instrument has a nearly cylindrical bore and a flared bell, and uses a single reed to produce sound. Clarinets comprise a family of instruments of differing sizes and pitches ...

alto saxophone The alto saxophone is a member of the saxophone family of woodwind instruments. Saxophones were invented by Belgian instrument designer Adolphe Sax in the 1840s and patented in 1846. The alto saxophone is pitched in E, smaller than the B tenor ...

grand piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...

Hammond organ The Hammond organ is an electric organ invented by Laurens Hammond and John M. Hanert and first manufactured in 1935. Multiple models have been produced, most of which use sliding drawbars to vary sounds. Until 1975, Hammond organs generated s ...

Rhodes piano The Rhodes piano (also known as the Fender Rhodes piano) is an electric piano invented by Harold Rhodes, which became popular in the 1970s. Like a conventional piano, the Rhodes generates sound with keys and hammers, but instead of strings, t ...

*Sam Minnich -

French horn The French horn (since the 1930s known simply as the horn in professional music circles) is a brass instrument made of tubing wrapped into a coil with a flared bell. The double horn in F/B (technically a variety of German horn) is the horn most ...

*Benjie Messer -

trombone The trombone (german: Posaune, Italian, French: ''trombone'') is a musical instrument in the Brass instrument, brass family. As with all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player's vibrating lips cause the Standing wave, air column ...

*Todd Neece -

recitation A recitation in a general sense is the act of reciting from memory, or a formal reading of verse or other writing before an audience. Public recitation is the act of reciting a work of writing before an audience. Academic recitation In a ...

* Mia Matsumiya -

violin The violin, sometimes known as a ''fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone (string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in the family in regular ...

viola The viola ( , also , ) is a string instrument that is bow (music), bowed, plucked, or played with varying techniques. Slightly larger than a violin, it has a lower and deeper sound. Since the 18th century, it has been the middle or alto voice of ...

*Alex Nagle - electric guitar *Adam Scott -

trumpet The trumpet is a brass instrument commonly used in classical and jazz ensembles. The trumpet group ranges from the piccolo trumpet—with the highest register in the brass family—to the bass trumpet, pitched one octave below the standard ...

*Jason Byron -

lyrics Lyrics are words that make up a song, usually consisting of verses and choruses. The writer of lyrics is a lyricist. The words to an extended musical composition such as an opera are, however, usually known as a "libretto" and their writer, a ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Choirs Of The Eye 2003 debut albums Kayo Dot albums Tzadik Records albums