Guitarist
Spider Taylor
and keyboardist
Michael Ely
used to work the Los Angeles
alt-rock
scene, but have now settled down in Tucson, AZ, where they record under the group name
Smoke & Mirrors
and make instrumental music that has more to do with the
environmental
/
ambient
tradition than
post-punk
rock & roll
. Inspired by the serene beauty of the Sonoran Desert,
Perfume of Creosote
melds elements of
rock
and
film music
with Australian,
Latin
, and South African rhythmic and textural influences. Fans of
Bill Laswell
,
Trilok Gurtu
, and
Michael Brook
will recognize some of these musical gestures, though they may be a little bit disappointed by the way this music seems generally to be skimming the surface rather than exploring those elements deeply. Everything here is very lovely and will provide fine background music to a long moonlit drive in the desert or a quiet evening at home by a mesquite fire with a good book. But with the exception of the edgy and gripping
"When the Devil Was a Little Boy,"
none of it will really grab your attention and hold it. To be fair, that may not be the effect they were after. But these 23 slight tracks could probably have been combined, shortened, and deepened into 11 or 12 really fine ones. Not bad at all, but not essential. ~ Rick Anderson