Quodia, featuring Trey Gunn (King Crimson) and Joe Mendelson (Rise Robots Rise) "is a synthesis of music, theater, video art, and animation; a psychedelic contemporary parable." - BBC Moscow. Using video projection and live instruments (including 10 string touch guitar, keyboards, and electronic percussion) Quodia creates an experience that is part movie, part theatre, and part concert.
Quodia has toured in Russia, Norway, Spain, Italy, Chile, Argentina, Mexico and the USA. Each Quodia show is a little different, with improvisationas built into the score and performance adaptations to the given space and the particular audience.
The new double-disc CD/DVD, "The Arrow", is divided into seven chapters. The CD contains the full piece in audio form, while the DVD adds the visual aspects of the story along with an innovative approach to sound placement in the 5.1 suround sound mixes. In addition, the DVD included a children's audio commentary track (which is a fascinating perspection on the piqued imaginations of our youth when fertilized by modern/ancient storytelling) and special performance-only videos of the "Water Woman" story told in Russian by Regina Spector and in Spanish by Nadia Velencia Mazuela.
The Arrow weaves an intricate tale with myth-like characters who seem to exist outside of time: A boy who finds a gold hand, a woman who consumes water to her own undoing, a dark presence that builds sculptures in the forest, six plotting birds...
Special guests on the discs include:
Azam Ali
Regina Spektor
Pat Mastelotto (King Crimson)
Matt Chamberlain (Critters Buggin', Bill Frizell, Tori Amos)
Dave Revelli
Michele Kinney
Gino Yevjedevich (Kulture Shock)
digital copies here (mp3, FLAC, AAC & more) hard copies here
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Reviews:
"Kate Bush meets Carla Bley out in the poppy fields with David Lynch capturing it all on a hand held camera. That’s pretty much what this King Crimson very off shoot project will leave you feeling. A multi media presentation that can be brought home in ways never before available, Trey Gunn rounds up an unlikely crew including Azam Ali, Regina Spektor, Matt Chamberlain and others for a psychedelic experience that will make you think the 60’s came back on a wave of Monterrey nostalgia. Uber creative in a good sense, this work is not for the average Britney fan. A head trip like we haven’t seen/heard in years, get your buzz on, slip on the earbuds and lose yourself in this spiritual great grandchild of the works of Lewis Carroll. A truly wild experience for those with heavily left leaning tastes."
-- www.MidwestRecords.com
"A synthesis of music, theatre, video art, and animation -- a psychedelic, electronic, contemporary parable."
-- BBC Moscow - Central Artists House - Moscow, Russia
"Quodia is an advanced step in the tradition that unites Literature and Music. Channeling both Brian Eno and Jack Kerouac, they unfold an elegant spectacle, telling histories with surprise, mystery, fear, and salvation. Quodia is a loaded weapon of the future."
-- Toma Review -Teatro Oriente -Santiago, Chile
"On the screen, words arose then vanished, sometimes developed in phrases. Pictures replaced one another: A waving seaweed...a rusty ancient anchor circuit...ominously black lightnings in the bright-red sky... a girl with a violin...such video releases consciousness into free flight...
-- Samara Today - Opera Theater St. Petersburg, Russia
An authentic engagement between the word and the sound; musician and poet were one single voice. A great night and a powerful spectacle."
-- La Nacion -Teatro ND Ateneo -Buenos Aires, Argentina
"The music acts as a narcotic. It penetrates you, speaking the language of orginal symbols and energies.The performance subordinates to itself your thoughts and feelings, conducted by the paths of the subconsciousness. Inside the mystical cloth of the compositions intertwine the sounds of nature, the timbres of intricate rare Arabic and African tools, and strange electronics."
-- Rossiya News -Central Artists House Moscow, Russia