Laura Kerry
You may have come here to this music blog in search of bands, in which case, I will warn you that Ensemble Pamplemousse is not a band. As their name suggests, they are more of a collective, and their song “Organic Synthesis Vol. 1” is less of a song than a work or composition. Playing together since 2013, the group is comprised of several musicians of different backgrounds and instruments who unified under the banner of experimentalism. In “Organic Synthesis Vol. 1,” Ensemble Pamplemousse continues to stretch the bounds of music, using familiar and unfamiliar instruments and sounds to create an unsettled and unsettling, yet precisely structured and oddly engaging piece.
The video, premiering here, is also atypical. Set against brightly colored solid backgrounds, the three musicians in it—Jessie Marino, Andrew Greenwald, and David Broome—appear outside of space (until around the eight-minute mark, when they appear in a room and then in a tie-dye haze in outer space), which adds to the general sense of disorientation. By stripping away the usual bearings and replacing them with elements of the absurd, the work playfully chips away at the constraints of music as we typically understand it. In the video, sometimes a cello creaks; a bow can play a drum; humans sound like birds; robotics are instruments; and music is a moment humid, sweaty silence. One part of the forthcoming video album, This Is The Uplifting Part, “Organic Synthesis Vol. 1” rewards a sense of humor, curiosity, and the suspension of disbelief.