The Chutneys – HOME

released on CD and digital on November 15th, 2019

Gelsey Bell – vocals
Fast Forward – percussion
Chris Cochrane – electric guitar

HOME is the debut album for NY experimental improvisation trio the Chutneys. First formed in 2011, the Chutneys draw on a multivalent lineage of avant-garde, noise, folk, and punk music forms to create a unique style of creative song that often travels paths both cacophonous and serene, haunting and ebullient. Cochrane and Forward, who have been stalwarts of New York experimental music since the 1980s, are joined by Bell, a generation younger but of complementary aesthetics. Forward’s percussion combines a traditional frame drum with a variety of unusual metal, and found objects from resonating bicycle handlebars and large sauce bowls to bamboo skewers and hand bells. Cochrane’s signature guitar style often converses with Bell’s noisy vocal multiphonics and long straight-toned glissandi until it is hard to tell who is who. Bell’s vocals slip from pops and screams to lush melodies and evocative lyrics like a werewolf on a partly cloudy night. One of Robert Ashley’s favorite bands in his later years, Home represents the arrival of a true New York gem.