Squidco Blurb

“Expanding on their 2023 Homunculus, the Boston-based collective ensemble Simulacrum with a core of David Peck on reeds, percussion, keys and direction, Eric Woods on analog synth and Bob Moores on space trumpet & guitar are expanded with Cecil Taylor bassist Albey OnBass, synthesist Eric Zinman, reedist Michael Caglianone and drummer Michael Knoblach.”

Liner Notes by PEK

Simulacrum is an offshoot of Metal Chaos Ensemble that was conceived just prior to the Virus shutting things down.  The ensemble features 3 core members PEK on all my stuff, Eric Woods on analog synth, and Bob Moores on space trumpet, guitar, and electronics.  The basic idea of this band is to increase the amount of electronics, to keep the ancillary percussion and loose the drum set, along with PEK and Bob holding down the horn parts. 

Homunculus, the first 2023 set by Simulacrum (in the newly refurbished Evil Clown Headquarters studio), was a quintet with PEK and Michael Caglianone on woodwinds, Bob Moores on space trumpet, guitar and electronics, Eric Zinman on synthesizers, and Albey onBass on bass.  This was originally set to be a repeat of that lineup, but Albey mentioned that he wanted to bring a new drummer…  Albey is such a heavyweight that I’m always ready to welcome his recommendations, so I decided to do this session with drum set, a first for Simulacrum where the emphasis is generally on electronics.  Also, the lineup is a strict parallel to the Metal Chaos Ensemble line up with Eric Zinman subbing for Eric Woods, Albey subbing for Mike Gruen and the new drummer (Rory) subbing for Steve Niemitz.  Three of the band are Metal Chaos Ensemble regulars – PEK, Michael Caglianone, and Bob Moores.  It is interesting to see how much the music changes when half of the band is present and the same instrumental roles for the other half are filled by different musicians.

Anyway, I was looking forward to the set with these players, but when I sent out my regular two days prior email to the musicians and crew, it turned out that Rory was not available after all.  I sent out a sub request email to a few of the drummers in the roster and Michael Knoblach was good to go.  Michael has been on a lot of Evil Clown records (mostly Expanse and Leap of Faith) since we first met in the year before the just before the pandemic and started the Expanse project.  Ordinarily these days, Michael plays a very unusual selection of percussion instruments from a seated position on the floor, but he did a great job subbing on drum set for Steve Niemitz on Metal Chaos Ensemble – Time Tripping recorded last September. 

So, the set went really well with a rhythm section, and the electronic elements really still played a very prominent role with Bob and Eric’s electronic sounds supplemented by PEK and Michael Caglianone playing the synthesizers and electronic instruments in the Evil Clown Arsenal in addition to their primary woodwind instruments.  Everyone also did some doubling on the percussion instruments…  All in all, an excellent example of the broad palette concept of constantly shifting instrumentation which helps the development of the work to organically move through many sonorities.

I like this set and I bet you will too.

PEK Out – 5/20/2023