New Judeo Psych-Folk Album Blesses Bandcamp Listeners
Bandcamp allows for listeners to support artists directly (minus a small processing fee), and as a result, the platform sees more music made for the sake of music, as opposed to streambait. The only downfall is that a bandcamp-only record is a lot harder to find, if it is not on a Bandcamp’s editorial list. One bandcamp-only gem is ORA, the latest record from Ayal Senior.
Ayal Senior is a 12-string guitar player, composer, and label head of Medusa Editions in Toronto. Senior’s 22nd release, ORA, follows on the heels of Senior’s previous LP, As Yashir, which saw Senior play in Tokyo, New York, Jerusalem and San Francisco. ORA was recorded live off the floor at Palace Sound in Toronto, and produced by Sandro Perri and Ayal Senior.
Ayal Senior photographer by Hiro Ugaya
ORA is entirely instrumental, with a psychedelic folk flare that leans into the ambient and experimental.
There are straightforward arrangements with crystalline, complexly finger-picked guitars that could be the opening to a Sufjan Stevens song, and other moments that feel more progressive-rock and enlist similarities to some of King Crimson’s mellower work. The album opens with “Naomi,” a droning harmonium in some pseudo-meditation-mode, accompanied by chimes and an uplifting melody with a muted vibraphone sound.
A challenge of the instrumental album for inexperienced listeners is distinguishing the songs from one another. However ORA offers variation throughout the pieces, with different instrumentations, tempo’s, and even genres.
Ayal Senior via Mechanical Forest Sound
The third track, “Shekel of Tyre” opens with a bright acoustic guitar picking pattern quickly accompanied by some reverse guitar swells, and the brushed drum pattern. The title calls back to Jewish life in the period of the second Temple. The temple tax as instituted by Moses in Ex 30:11-16 was paid in Tyrian shekel (Mishnah Bekhoroth 8:7; Babylonian Talmud Kiddushin 11a). A tastefully distorted guitar enters to carry the lead melody, with the acoustic pattern answering its phrases in a multi-tonal call and response. The guitar solo expands towards the end with noise and wind-mimicking feedback that carries the piece to its finish.
The album continues with steady acoustic guitar and drums grooves as the lead guitar explores new melodic ideas through other creative titles like “The Book of Ancient Insults,” and “Burnt Lokshen.”
The album then concludes with the 16 minute long and expansive “Ad Olam.” The Hebrew translation of “Ad Olam,” meaning, “forever,” is a fitting title. The song evolves from harmonium, that ties it together with the opening “Naomi,” and grows into a swirling synth solo that swallows itself whole.
ORA is a welcome addition to the cannon of contemporary Jewish music, and an impressive continuation of Ayal Senior’s extensive body of work.
