Unwed Sailor’s Little Wars deserves the creation of a whole new entertainment format.
It seems like soundtrack music written for a yet to be filmed movie. However, that soundtrack wouldn’t be the same unless performed live, the band taking the place of the piano player at a silent film. And this isn’t the kind of soundtrack that fades to a background emotional pulse. Instead, the seats in the movie theater should be ripped out, allowing the audience to rock out as they would at any live, general admission concert. Yet, the film isn’t simply a series of images meant to enhance the experience of the music; this would be more than typical concert background visuals. The film would contain an entire narrative, any sound/dialogue coordinated with the music/silences, and be a primary focus of the experience.
Therefore, the poster would proclaim: “Come see Little Wars, the new motion picture in concert experience from Unwed Sailor.” The crowd fills in the hall floor, waiting with drinks in hand. They crowd to the front where the screen is center stage amid the speakers, while the band’s equipment adorns the wings. When the lights go out, the crowd erupts in shouts and cheers to a greet both band and film. Let the show begin!
Little Wars rides on guitar vamps and keyboard swirls, gaining much of its atmosphere, texture, and emotion from letting those vamps get rocked out in the ensemble. However, the percussion truly pierces those vamps, pieces them together, and makes the pulse of this film-yet-to-be-made. Like how the editing of a movie controls the pace and emotional gravity of the narrative, so the percussion of Little Wars indicates the different angles, lighting levels, speed, color, and tone of this picture.
Much like Collections of Colonies of Bees, Unwed Sailor can work a vamp like a jazz combo working in an experimental rock band world. It’s ethereal pop vistas exploring worlds unknown while finding that the aliens have human faces. It isn’t what we learned from pop radio, but it isn’t as strange as when we first thought about experimental instrumental rock. It’s soundtrack music for those who are prepared to be rocked. It’s a story that hits high points like “The Garden” and then brings the experiencer (listener/watcher/dancer) to a meditation close with “Numeral.” Lights fade, film ends, and we all go home much better for the narrative we just saw open before our eyes.
That is, at least, how I imagine Little Wars coming soon to a stage/screen near you.
Foxhole’s We the Wintering Tree
Labelmate Foxhole lays out some similar soundtrack music for dancing and rocking on their We the Wintering Tree. Mainly it’s an instrumental affair with the wordless songs moving the story along the best. “The End of Dying” is a great movie scene here, inducing a little head banging, fist punching dance as the protagonist beings to conquer his demons.
