Sister Phantom Owl Fish

Trevor Dunn's Trio-Convulsant | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (July 27, 2004)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Ipecac Recordings
• ASIN: B0002IQB30
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #227,422 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

39 of 47 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars !#@$ Monoculture!, July 30, 2004

By 

P. Church (San Francisco,CA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Sister Phantom Owl Fish (Audio CD)

If you are reading this review it seems likely Mr. Bungle and Fantomas are bands that blow your mind. Either you like those bands or you don't.

Trevor Dunn is the bass player for Bungle and Fantomas, and his solo Album is nothing like Bungle or Fantomas. And if you are a fan of those bands, this is good news to you because you like DIFFERENT. You are probably one of the few people on the planet who likes new, challenging and difficult-to-categorize music.

I want to keep this review simple. Dunn's bass playing is simply stunning. The album was recorded in three days. It sounds three-days raw, yet also sounds as polished and perfect as something that took a year to record. Dichotomy? Yes.

The album is three-piece. (guitar, bass, drums) It is also Jazz, yet it is not. It is not Zorn-like (Zorn is the Jazz master who produced Bungle's first album.) This music is confrontational, loud and abrasive, yet much of it is mellow, complex and listenable.

This album is theraputic. It will help you puke up the monoculture that surrounds us. It is ugly. It is beautiful. It is pure musicianship and creativity. You will be glad you bought it. For those of you that thought Fantomas "Delirium Cordia" wandered without a point or riffed too much on Zorn's "Absynthe", this album is what you are looking for. It is a dichotomy of simple/complex beautiful/ugly that will satisfy any true music afficionado.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Potential 5 stars. Still growing on me., November 22, 2004

By 

stu - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sister Phantom Owl Fish (Audio CD)

Free Jazz is alive and well and living in San Fran.

I have been a devout fan of Mr. Bungle for quite sometime. All of these guys are great composers, Dunn being no exception. He has written some of my favorite pieces of music, including "Dead Goon," "Carry Stress in the Jaw," "Platypus," and "The Holy filament(sp?)."

With his trio, Dunn indulges his affinity for avant/free jazz with glowing results. There is plenty of structure here. The songs mostly follow a standard jazz format: Head, solos, head, out. The written material is harmonically expanded, very sophisticated stuff (of course) and Dunn really shows off his knowledge and musicality. The solo sections are most often "free" is the best sense of the term, slowly expanding upon the rhythmic, harmonic, and melodic motifs stated in the head.

The guitar playing is extremely odd, always erradic and sometimes annoying. For my taste, there is a bit too much high-pitched, frantic slide noise - kind of a Sonny Sharrock thing. It's interesting at first, but he seems to over-use this trick. But, like I said, it is still growing on me.

If you liked Bungle's Disco Volante and you also appreciate good avant improvisational music, this disc is perfect for you.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars movin' on with trevor, September 23, 2004

By 

A. G. Miller "sonic streamer" (kentucky) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Sister Phantom Owl Fish (Audio CD)

It seems as if you can't please some people. While Trevor's compositions are as strong as ever on this new offering, there is a large contigencey of Mr. Bungle fans that just won't "get" this record, because it doesn't sound like Bungle. Fortunately, for the rest of us, it reflects more upon Trevor's personal influences, e.g. metal, jazz, and especially the 20th and 21st century "classical" music of which he is an avid student. While the bass parts are strong, they rarely dominate the songs; in fact, they are the result of Trevor's years as a sideman in all genres of music. So, if you are looking for a funk-metal bass virtuoso revival, this record will disappoint; however, if you like to hear unique approaches to compositional forms, melody/harmony, and rhythm, then you will find this record a grand step in our ever-expanding modern musical vocabulary. Oh yeah, and its also fun to listen to.