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Steve Reich

It's about time I get some releases by Reich. Ever since I started listening to Philip Glass, I've always been quite fascinated with american minimalist music and along with Glass, La Monte Young, Reich was another big name one couldn't avoid (there are many others of course, but these have always been the big three for me). The same friend who me listen to Glass's Glassworks is the same friend who introduced me to Reich. We were in University, working on a small film project and they had a copy of Reich's Music For 18 Musicians which I got to hear in the studio. Although I did not fall in love with the music right away, my curiosity was definitely sparked. It's after my first move to Sweden that I actually bought my first Reich record: Early Works (which I found in this puny record store in a small industrial town for a few pennies). This one was nothing like Music For 18 Musicians, but it single handedly made me obsessed with the artist. This was completely new to me. Gone were the melodies and patterns, this was simply sound experimentation at it's most basic form and I loved it! I don't know why I haven't bought any more works by him since then, perhaps it's because I was constantly listening to them in the music store where I used to work in downtown Stockholm; Tehellim, Drumming, etc.. it drove the customers mad, but it was always on if it was my turn to work in the classical section. I was also surprised when I heard his organ work in an Arrabal film (although I despise this director's work, it did add a certain exoticism to Reich's work.

In those years since my two returns to Canada, I sort of forgot all about Reich's music and concentrated on a bunch of new musical genres and scenes: glitch electronica, krautrock, post-rock, noise. It would be almost ten years later before I finally started getting some of his albums again (thanks to a used copy of my favorite Early Works I found in a small store in Montreal). There will definitely be more on the way as I find them.

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