Gothic Theatre

Macha

Macha survived the turn-of-the-century indie rock wars and lived to tell the tale. Always one of a kind, the band, which was formed in Athens, GA in 1996, carved out a significant place for themselves in the pantheon with two extraordinary releases, 1998’s Macha and 1999’s See It Another Way. Critics and fans praised Macha early on for their astute use of non-Western music styles and techniques, and for incorporating unusual string, reed, percussion, and electronic instruments into their sexy but enlightened rock’n’roll swagger. Alternative Press called See It Another Way a “flash of avant-exotic brilliance.”

Macha appeared on the scene with their distinctive sonic identity fully formed: an exciting blend of influences ranging from kraut-rock, 70’s-rock, post-punk and trance-music, to the street musicians of Indonesia encountered by founding members Josh McKay and Kai Riedl during their travels there. Forget Tomorrow is more soulful and funk-tinged than previous efforts. The band continues to effectively explore unexpected sonorities and atypical timbres, their music resonating remarkably well in the post-post-punk, post-punk-funk early 21st century.

Anticipation for the new album is high. Macha’s debut hit the top five in the college radio charts and See It Another Way spent three weeks at number one. Work on the new album began during the summer of 2003, when percussionist Mischo McKay (the third founding member of the band) worked out the rhythm tracks with his brother Josh, who then wrote and laid down all of the instrumental and vocal parts. The brothers McKay used this methodology very successfully on their highly praised collaboration with now-defunct Texas band Bedhead (Macha Loved Bedhead, 2000). Ten of Forget Tomorrow’s thirteen selections were produced by Josh and created in this way. Despite the decidedly experimental approach, the music grooves, stomps, and soars as much as any rock you’ll hear this year.

Kai Riedl produced three songs with Tim Hankins (a longtime friend and former bandmate of the McKays) that explore additional textures and Eastern influences. These selections, along with the rest of the album, distill Macha’s rich palette of sounds into a layered, harmonically dense rock music that sounds like no other. For the first time, one is tempted to label Josh and Mischo ‘Soul Brothers.’ More than ever on Forget Tomorrow, Riedl and the McKays look deeper within to find emotionally stirring beats and melodies. It is their most stylistically diverse album to date. From the New Order synths and Studio 54 beats of the title track to the blissed-out dreamscape of “Now Disappearing”, and from the classically minimalist Philip Glass meets The Seven Samurai of “Paper Tiger” to the dubbed-out trance pop of “Smash and Grab”.

Not content to bang a gamelan gong at a problem a vibraphone or zither could fix, Macha characteristically employ instruments including hammered dulcimer, keyboards, and double-reed instruments to assimilate the sounds, motifs, and textures of non-Western music into their danceable, wide-screen rock’n’roll. The music, while still using abstract and unconventional structures, is uncannily expressive. Forget Tomorrow revisits moods familiar from the record released by Josh McKay’s Seaworthy project, “The Ride”, in late 2001, and sonics inspired by his spent time on the road with the New Year (featuring the Kadane brothers from Bedhead).

This sophisticated album gives the listener the effect of tuning through a fourth dimension short wave radio band that encompasses many nations and historical time periods. Macha manipulate rhythm, melody, harmony, dynamics, atmosphere and found sounds like no other band in the world.

Forget Tomorrow represents the next step for Macha, more emotionally wide-ranging, and arguably darker than previous efforts, but it is undeniably upbeat in the end and rooted in appealingly funky retro-modern, cosmopolitan rock.

Macha’s avant-garde approach to rock music takes their incorporation of other cultures’ traditions way beyond mere exotica. Josh, Mischo and Kai have created a totally new and unparalleled integration of pop, experimental music, and so called “ethnic music”. Greater by several orders of magnitude than the sum of its parts, the highly original synthesis that Macha present on Forget Tomorrow place the band is a class by itself. The album is their most significant achievement to date, and it sets a new standard for this kind of audio artistry. It is a new century for Macha but their vision, as always, is artfully assembled for maximum aural and glandular pleasure.

(08.03.04)

Unless the blood has completely drained from the cheeks of every free-thinking music fan in the world, MACHA is going to ring bells and blow minds.

Formed in Athens, GA, MACHA (which is Turkish for “The spade card”) has no viable contemporary parallel—it’s like a DIY garage Gamelon orchestra. A list of easily audible influences include My Bloody Valentine, Martin Denny, Girls Against Boys, Legendary Pink Dots, the Holiest of the Holy—Can, a touch of the Fall, bright flashes from the Bad Seeds/Neubauten nexus, and MDMA-friendly, participatory vibe that recalls San Diego’s guerrilla noise collective Crash Worship. However, its important to understand that, rather than simply combining these elements into a hybrid for hyphen-happy music critics (biography writers included) to use as crutch, MACHA owns it all. MACHA (Which is Yiddish for “The Big Cheese”) was realized at the end of 1996 when multi-instrumentalist and MACHA mastermind Joshua McKay (vocals, hammered dulcimer, vibraphone, giutar, bass, various double reed horns, gongs, the Fun Machine, Baldwin Organ, The Kitchen Sink…) learned that his brother Mischo (drums) was moving to Athens. The two had been previously playing in bands together but had not lived in the same town since the demise of Emperor Moth, a band they had in Gainesville, FL three years ago. Once in Athens the brothers were joined by friend and housemate Kai Riedl (same instruments as Joshua) and the three began forming loud, trance inducing, out of control, semi-improvisational and thoroughly ass-rocking shows. MACHA (which means fun in Hindi) was recently joined by childhood friend Wes Martin, who has become a full fledged band member and shares the multi-instrumentalist duties as well as pitching in with vocals. Instead of the murky chaos one might expect from such a conglomeration of skills, influences and instruments, the grace of MACHA’s native talent glows steadily on the group’s self titled debut album on Jetset Records. MACHA (which is what Mark E. Smith asks for when he needs a light) introduces itself with an instrumental cut aptly named “When They First Saw the Floating World”. The smooth and groovy “Cat Wants to be Dog” follows, then leads to the hypnotic, revelatory gong banger “The Buddha Nature”. “Double Life” satisfies the music freaks need for groove and opiate simultaneously. Moving on through the melodic lament of “Capitol Cities”, the album never lets the listener down until the sombalistic album closer “Samma-Samma” ends and the he/she realizes that the trip is over.

Throughout, MACHA maintains fierce sexy power and exoticism that may have something to do with Joshua’s affinity for Indonesian arts, music and culture. (witness the bonus CD of Joshua and Kai’s recordings of Indonesian musicians included in this package) But whatever it is, MACHA is here, and believe me, you are ready.

- Carter Armstrong