ORB

Bobby BeauSoleil's Alchemy of Sound

True Magic, as opposed to mere prestidigitation or trickery, has been defined as “the Science and Art of causing Change to occur in conformity with Will.” In our contemporary materialistic world, it is generally assumed that the sole goal anyone might have for working Magic would be that of personal gain. But according to an older and nobler way of thinking, Magic was a discipline which demanded the strenuous perseverance of the practitioner and offered him ever more difficult challenges: fittingly, the entire endeavor was known as the Great Work. The modern definition quoted above also points to the fact that occult practices were always considered “arts”—alchemy being the Ars Regia, the Royal Art itself. By turn, the creative arts are also Magic. When properly executed with passion and will, they allow both the artist and the audience to transcend their surroundings—even if only for a moment—and directly experience another realm. This other reality, depicted through the vision and voice of the artist, is the product of a deliberate act of spiritual conjuration.

The most developed of the modern arts is probably the cinema, or at least it is the medium most capable of directly transporting the audience into an alternate world that is alive in three dimensions. Image, sound, and the movement of time itself all fuse together into an intoxicating audio-visual cocktail. Music, on the other hand, generally operates within two of these three dimensions. It may excite the emotions—or, more often, simply play on sentimentality—but only at its utmost heights does it transcend a two-dimensional form and provide the listener with a vivid visual component as well. The musicians who achieve such effects thereby elevate themselves to the category of cultural Magicians.

Considering all this, it is not just a quirk of fate that composer Bobby BeauSoleil's most noted musical work thus far in his career is a film soundtrack. As a young inmate of the grim California prison system in the 1970s, Bobby surmounted nearly impossible obstacles to record a full score to Kenneth Anger's Lucifer Rising, the end result being one of the most intense pieces of dark psychedelia ever created. In the years since then he has painstakingly pieced together a state-of-the-art digital A/V studio, and taught himself professional videography—all while stuck behind bars. True Magic is always done against the odds.

The music you hold in your hands is Bobby's fourth album, and represents the latest era of his work. Like all of his recordings, Orb is an emanation from the realms of the imagination. It is a moving travelogue of places he has visited in his mind: a musical mystery tour that—were it transposed to another genre—might have been scripted by L. Frank Baum or painted by Edmund Dulac. Despite the elaborate texture and dramatic complexity of the songs, a few brief comments about them will suffice. They need no lengthy analysis, for they are best simply experienced. The album is bookended by “Dreamways of the Mystic” which showcases Bobby's expressive guitar work. The ringing voice of his instrument erupts like a lava stream from below the nervous, pulsating rhythm track. “Punjab the Barber” and “Punjab Returns” are revisitations and variations on an old tune called “Punjab's Barber” which was played by Bobby's “psychedelic chamber music” group The Orkustra back in the Sixties. “Songs for the Forest People” is a fantasy based on dreams of the lush jungle and its buzzing underbelly of sounds. A recurring theme throughout Orb is “In the Temple of the Moon,” a tone poem dedicated to the lunar muse which joins together the other pieces of music. This final element might seem unexpected from such a “solar” artist (whose last name aptly translates into “beautiful sun”), but Bobby knows full well that the synthesis and transcendence of opposites is one way to work Magic.

Like Baron von Munchausen traveling to exotic locales in his hot air balloon, Bobby BeauSoleil journeys through time and space, setting down here or there just long enough for a few adventures, in order to report back what he has seen. The delightful Baron's travels took place in a land of self-stirred make-believe, and Bobby's excursions occur entirely in the expanses of his own mind. The images he conjures up may not reflect any place that exists in mundane reality, but so much the better—the “real” world is often no more enlightening than the concrete walls that Bobby BeauSoleil faces every day. At least he has found a way to rise above it and soar, and more importantly, to communicate his visions to us. That is the mark of a true Magician.

Michael Moynihan, Samhain 2001

from CD Baby

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