Articulate Silences: Remembering Brian McBride

As we get older, life becomes something likened to navigating through a minefield; those blast zones becoming far too frequent.

While Rick Froberg left us earlier this year, sadly last weekend another influential figure followed. The experimental pioneer, Brian McBride, who passed away at the age of 53.

I felt compelled to write about McBride for the same reasons as Froberg just last month. Much of the music referenced throughout this site wouldn’t exist had it not been for McBride’s work; most notably through his beautiful endeavours alongside Adam Wiltzie as Stars of the Lid.

Having met in Austin, Texas back in the early ’90s, Stars of the Lid were the vital portal for many people in discovering experimental music. People in our age bracket might say it was Brian Eno or Steve Reich who guided them to the promised land, but in truth it was more likely Stars of the Lid.

In a rare appearance at 2008’s All Tomorrow’s Parties festival in Minehead, curated by Explosions in the Sky, Stars of the Lid were the main drawcard for many, and those who witnessed their performance weren’t disappointed.

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I wasn’t one of them, however. While it may be criminal in a sense, to feel the full force of Stars of the Lid’s dream-like headscapes, in my mind at least, it was best captured in the realms of solitude as opposed to being amongst a sea of strangers. That’s how I’ve always felt about experimental music, despite Stars of the Lid’s live performances being few and far between.

Drawing from their love of deep-listening, Stars of the Lid’s mission was to draw you out of your mind. Evaporating guitars into exquisite rolling washes of sound via four-track recorders, from their debut LP, 1995’s Music for Nitrous Oxide (which also featured Kirk Laktas who parted with the band shortly after), McBride and Wiltzie experienced their most fertile creative period, delivering four albums in as many years, Gravitational Pull vs. the Desire for an Aquatic Life (1996), The Ballasted Orchestra (1997), Per Aspera Ad Astra (1998) and Avec Laudenum (1999).

While some may see this period as a precursor for the duo’s final two albums, 2001’s The Tired Sounds of Stars of the Lid and 2007’s And Their Refinement of the Decline, both heralded as masterpieces, in many ways the two periods either side of the century could be felt in slightly different ways.

The duo’s ’90s output cross-pollinated more with the drone of kindred spirits, Labradford – both bands giving each other’s works a facelift via the 1997 release, The Kahanek Incident – Vol. 3 whilst underpinning Kranky’s legacy as the ultimate reference point for experimental music. (Wiltzie and Robert Donne also teamed up in 2000 as Aix Em Klemm releasing the eponymous debut.)

Meanwhile, the ’00s saw Stars of the Lid unveil a naked intimacy perhaps previously unheard. The duo crystalised their sound with hymnal-like passages that conveyed a unique emotional intensity, and it’s no surprise Wiltzie continued down this path via his A Winged Victory for the Sullen project.

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Whichever way you feel, there’s no doubt both periods are bound together by a common theme. Stars of the Lid intersected the ominous with hope, making their compositions drip with the kind of stark reality many others in this space have chosen to ignore.

By and large, experimental music is about escapism. An artist teleporting you into their sound world and bearing full responsibility. Not Stars of the Lid. They were there with you to ease the burden, not completely shoulder it, and this approach enhanced their reality.

Through song titles, McBride also showcased his wicked sense of humour, creating a juxtaposition between the silly and serious – a facet almost unheard of in a scene that is widely regarded as pretentious and high-brow. While there are many examples, the best for me is Dopamine Clouds over Craven Cottage in reference to the Fulham F.C. American striker and Captain of the same name).

While McBride also released two solo albums via Kranky, When the Detail Lost Its Freedom (2005) and The Effective Disconnect (2010), it was his work alongside Kenneth James Gibson as Bell Gardens that revealed another dimension to his work. The band’s beautiful gospel country hybrid saw two beautiful releases, 2012’s Fully Sundown Assembly and 2014’s Slow Dawns for Lost Conclusions – both of which dripped with McBride’s subtle sonic inflections. (The latter release was originally earmarked to feature in our Lost Albums series in the coming months.)

Bell Gardens reaffirmed McBride’s greatest skill. He was the master of slow motion. Alongside Wiltzie, not only did Stars of the Lid move at their own pace, but unhurried their audience along the way. And in a modern world that moves so fast for absurd reasons, you can’t help but feel that Brian McBride was a part of something completely ahead of its time. Stars of the Lid were the creators of a remedy that stymied the senselessness of a fast-paced modern age.

Even though he’s left us, Brian McBride made music to alleviate the trouble of certain realities. That’s what makes his art so pure. Everyone’s life changes over time, and whether it be for bad or worse, the compositions he sculptured as a part of Stars of the Lid have an uncanny way of shaping around a specific time and place. That’s what music with no currency can achieve, and that’s why McBride’s music will always be with us.