| Had I not known better, I would have thought Painting Monsters on Clouds was actually Qua’s debut full-length. Much more experimental than its predecessor, the album, though it retains traces of Qua’s signature sound art, is almost a complete re-tooling of the existing formula. In fact, there is something almost retrograde in Wilczek’s reinvention of the Qua franchise. The spirited electro-acoustic vignettes of Forgetabout have given way to dense, stuttering, and almost primitive sound collages that are far more demanding than those of Qua’s debut. Wilczek devotes a considerable amount of effort on this outing to exploring harsher textures (“Stranger Comforts Have Slipped By”) and rhythmic abstraction (“Happy Domestika”). Wilczek’s guitar playing is clearly more adept on Painting Monsters on Clouds, but the patterns have become more firmly integrated with the music’s electronic component, resulting in more processed and refined six-string tonal shapes (like “Devil Eyes”). Even the more melodic pieces on the record, such as “Night Sailing,” are suggestive of a more subdued, compressed compositional approach and come off as being less fully-realized than those of the debut. (On successive spins, they reveal themselves to be much more demanding upon the listener.) Although Painting Monsters on Clouds may not be as initially captivating as Forgetabout, the record is ultimately at least as rewarding. - Grooves |
