Raybeats

Guitarist Jody Harris had been frequenting the metropolitan venues of the rock avant-garde since the mid-1970s, when he led a ragtag group of desperates, including the young James Chance, under the name Screws. After evolving into Contortions (with bassist George Scott and drummer Don Christensen) for the triumphs of No New York, and assisting the hysterical saxophonist for a couple more years, Harris conceived the idea of founding a sui generis instrumental rock band.

Meanwhile (in 1980) George Scott (aka Jack Ruby) had helped Lydia Lunch record Queen Of Siam, with Pat Irwin on sax (practically co-author of the album) and Robert Quine on guitar (the former guitarist for Richard Hell who had also produced for Teenage Jesus). Harris gathered this band of champions (Scott, Irwin, and Christensen) and together they recorded under the name Raybeats a purely instrumental album that serves both as Harris’s personal manifesto on the new negative guitar approach (reinterpreting the centuries-old twangs of Link Wray, Hank Marvin, and Duane Eddy through the lens of the avant-garde) and as a brilliant revisitation of surf culture.

The music of Guitar Beat (Don't Fall Off The Mountain, 1981) represents one of the peaks of the “no” generation. Christensen imposes constant rhythm changes on Harris’s flying guitar, fast and impeccable in its contorted interventions. The obsessively déjà-vu rhythms, supported by a shining Farfisa and a laughing “yakety sax,” are punctuated with carefully measured doses of dissonance and minimalism. It is a narcissistic practice of mini-collages that, from the scorching tribal R&B of Tight Turn to the destructive crescendo of the samba International Operator, and through the duets in Searching between a flaming surf guitar and a shrill atonal guitar, paints the glorious fun civilization in surreal colors. Irwin’s trumpeting exudes heartfelt nostalgia, but Christensen’s percussive storms and mechanical iterations estrange the program, returning it to the realm of acute neurosis.
Clear references to stereotypes (the epic Morricone-style surf of Guitar Beat and the relaxed easy listening of Holiday In Spain), culminating in the psychedelic flourishes of Big Black Sneakers and its poignant organ flight, are echoed by illuminating contortions like Tone Zone, a Martian and frenetic electronic petulance at the rhythm of icy tribalism, and Piranha Salad, a surreal nightmare migrating from Arabia to the disco, charming snakes and stunning teenagers, through overlapping sax solos, abrupt drum accelerations paired with electronic pulses, guitar feedback, Shepp-style fiery “obligatos,” and Caribbean rhythms.

On It's Only A Movie (Shanachie, 1983), David Hofstra on bass (replacing the late Scott) adds a funk pulse, Christensen expands the percussive arsenal with a “disco” flair, and Irwin experiments on synth. The alienated rockabilly of Sad Little Caper and the ragged jazz-blues of Buddy Lonesome coexist with the monotone cyber-disco of Instant Twist and the eccentric disco-psychedelia of Doin' The Dishes. The sound settles onto more “creative” tracks, in a sort of experimental funk jam (The Big Country), revealing all the underlying melancholy and pessimism of their revival. Stripped of the skin-deep riffs and beach melodies, what remains is an anemic sound.

The frenzied shrieks of the guitars, when one’s shards collide with the other’s dull visceral ostentatious riff, produce something that is neither psychedelia, nor revival, nor avant-garde, yet is simultaneously reminiscent of all.

Harris also formed a guitar duo (Stratocaster) with Robert Quine, which, making skillful use of electronic percussion, masterfully wanders into electro-disco territory. Escape (Lust, 1981) is divided into five long instrumental tracks that formulate theory and practice of guitar virtuosity in the “disco” era. Flagpole Jitters is the duo’s tour de force, a bacchanal of metallic detunings and manic trills, supersonic vibrations, minimalist iterations, para-violinistic meows, and sitar plucks. The collection also includes tropical muzak (Don't Throw That Knife) and freeze-dried acid rock (Up In Daisy's Penthouse). Dominating the album, however, are the industrial riffs of Termites Of 1938, a delightful surreal piece of a guitar mimicking the jaws of an army of termites, while the other vibrates random stabs and cuts, and the effervescent rockabilly of Pardon My Clutch, the final breathtaking flourishes of Harris’s sharp, delightfully “antique” guitar and Quine’s flat, irreversibly introverted guitar (a low, vibrato murmur almost like an accordion or sitar, repeating the partner’s folk tunes in slow motion), a nostalgic flashback to dance halls of twenty years earlier. The trick of recording the guitars and then playing them back at double speed to distort their rhythmic qualities, along with the technique of performing without changing the harmonic part, allows a surprisingly free flow of musical ideas.

Escape, in its insistent form of chamber music for two guitars, bass, and electronic drums, becomes a grotesque summa of styles—from Hendrix to Garcia, from Santana to jazz-rock, from heavy metal to atonality—a parade of instrumental disguises, from mandolin, organ, violin, to accordion, a special for comedian and sidekick, during which he parodies the classic skits of rock's variety show.

The same game of layering gives rise to It Happened One Night (Press, 1982) by the Raybeats, where Harris is framed by a drummer (Christensen) and a bassist (Hofstra), and his virtuosity benefits from the timbrally deformed counterpoint of another guitar (pre-recorded). The flowing, swinging interplay, the formal elegance of the parallel lines, and the impeccable “sixties” touch now verge on mannerism. The beach-pop of the title track, whipped by “Hendrixian” feedback, the frenzied swing of Fairly Modern laced with dissonances, the rockabilly of After Hours with Chuck Berry-style attacks, the dragging rhythm and blues of You Better Read This, and the two longest pieces—the psychedelic jam My Uncle Bill and the spacey jazz-rock glissando of Coal Black Mamas—now feel like passing amusements, however impeccable.