Karl Blau
Clothes Your I’s
Knw-Yr-Own
On this timely re-release of Karl Blau’s 2001 album, he once again reasserts his position as one of lo-fi’s most diligent performers, proving that there is more to Doing It Yourself than politics and a low budget. There are aesthetic and artistic ambitions as well, the striving for a musical expression not found in, and probably impossible to achieve with, major label releases. It’d be wrong to suggest that Clothes Your I’s (whatever that means) is a landmark release. The songwriting is far too uneven and the performances too eclectic for that. But there’s no denying the uncompromising musicality here, or Blau’s defining sense of dark, tense naivety.
Clothes Your I’s is an utterly lo-fi affair, at times whimsical and seemingly arbitrary, but a complex and un-ironically considered work nonetheless, full of edgy tensions and unsettling, off-balanced sounds. “Fasten Me To You” may offer proof that there’s such a thing as being too lo-fi, but Clothes Your I’s remains a remarkably well-rounded affair from one of the most unique voices in contemporary weirdo-folk.
Knw-Yr-Own Records: http://www.knw-yr-own.com/
