''Instrumental Tourist'' is a collaborative

studio album An album is a collection of audio recordings issued on compact disc (CD), Phonograph record, vinyl, audio tape, or another medium such as Digital distribution#Music, digital distribution. Albums of recorded sound were developed in the early ...

by Canadian musician

Tim Hecker Tim Hecker is a Canadian electronic musician, producer, composer, and sound artist. His work, spanning atmospheric ambient albums such as ''Harmony in Ultraviolet'' (2006), ''Ravedeath, 1972'' (2011) and ''Virgins'' (2013), has been widely cr ...

and

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

musician Daniel Lopatin (who records as Oneohtrix Point Never). The album was recorded over several improvisational

jam session A jam session is a relatively informal musical event, process, or activity where musicians, typically instrumentalists, play improvised solos and vamp over tunes, drones, songs, and chord progressions. To "jam" is to improvise music without exte ...

s, and was released in November 2012 under Lopatin's Software Records imprint to generally positive critical reviews.

Background

Lopatin and Hecker were admirers of each other's work but had no formal connection when Lopatin suggested a collaboration between the two in 2012. They met at Mexican Summer Studios, with recording sessions occurring over several days in the form of improvisational

s which were later edited down. Lopatin cited producer

Teo Macero Attilio Joseph "Teo" Macero (October 30, 1925 – February 19, 2008) was an American jazz saxophonist, composer, and record producer. He was a producer at Columbia Records for twenty years. Macero produced Miles Davis' ''Bitches Brew'', and Dave ...

tape editing Reel-to-reel audio tape recording, also called open-reel recording, is magnetic tape audio recording in which the recording tape is spooled between reels. To prepare for use, the ''supply reel'' (or ''feed reel'') containing the tape is plac ...

work with Miles Davis in the late-1960s/early-1970s as an inspiration for the sessions. Lopatin stated that "I'm not sure how it emerged, but we pretty quickly got into this idea that we could paint an extended portrait of a sonic world that is filled with stock musical motifs and sounds," later saying that "we wanted to take those sounds, scrub away the cliché and see if they were salvageable." Hecker noted that "we didn't cut a path in advance. It sort of took shape very quickly in a non-contrived, almost unconscious level through joking around and talking in the studio."

Reception

''Instrumental Tourist'' received generally favorable reviews from critics, with an aggregate score of 73 out of 100 on Metacritic. AllMusic wrote that "Lopatin and Hecker take the sounds in their intentionally limited palette to places they may never have been expected to go, and the journey is intriguing and frequently lovely." '' The Observer'' wrote that "the strength of this record comes from their disregard for coherence and disinterest in finding common ground. Their warring improvisations are intriguing, unsettling and often exquisite." In a less positive review, '' XLR8R'' wrote that "despite scattered flashes of brilliance, too often it's an album that feels unambitious, as though it's content to dwell in the middle ground where the two producers' back catalogs intersect rather than forge something new." ''

Uncut Uncut may refer to: * ''Uncut'' (film), a 1997 Canadian docudrama film by John Greyson about censorship * ''Uncut'' (magazine), a monthly British magazine with a focus on music, which began publishing in May 1997 * '' BET: Uncut'', a Black Enter ...

'' wrote that "as sublime as much of ''Instrumental Tourist'' is, it rarely fulfills that promise of

improvisation Improvisation is the activity of making or doing something not planned beforehand, using whatever can be found. Improvisation in the performing arts is a very spontaneous performance without specific or scripted preparation. The skills of impr ...

, of a real sonic engagement or play, and struggles to exceed the sum of its parts."

Track list

Personnel

*Tim Hecker – producer, mixing, amplifiers, Eventide Modal, synthesizer (

Clavia Nord Modular The Nord Modular series is a line of synthesizers produced by Clavia, a Swedish digital synthesizer manufacturer. The Nord Modular series, in common with their sister range the Nord Lead series, are analogue modelling synthesizers, producing sou ...

), saxophone (Vapour), effects (Lexicon Unity, amplifier expansion) *Daniel Lopatin – producer, synthesizer ( Roland Juno 60, Alesis Ion), performer (Monks), lap steel guitar (Ur-Do Lapsteel), koto, electronics (Fm Wand) *Al Carlson – engineer *Rob Carmichael – graphic design *Paul Corley – special assistance *James Plotkin – mastering

References

{{Authority control 2012 albums Tim Hecker albums Oneohtrix Point Never albums