It's Quiet, by Zea et Xavier Charles

It's Quiet

by Zea et Xavier Charles

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Streaming + Download

Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.

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Cassette + Digital Album
transparent case, 3 page artwork, red cassette

Includes unlimited streaming of It's Quiet via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.

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Purchasable with gift card

€10 EUR or more

1.	Boarne 03:07	buy track
2.	Wer werom komme 04:31	buy track
3.	It's quiet 03:51	buy track
4.	The queen's feet 04:01	buy track
5.	De doar 03:17	buy track
6.	What should we do with our bodies 04:40	buy track
7.	You're dead 04:09	buy track
8.	Moarn gean ik dea 04:26	buy track
9.	Sethed seketelad 04:17	buy track

about

"Cassette tape It’s Quiet (MAKKUM RECORDS MR34) is a nifteroo from Zea, i.e. the singing guitarist Arnold de Boer, lead singer and player in The Ex (Holland’s spiky post-punk greats) and who has also made experimental records recorded in the Frisian tongue...joined by French clarinettist Xavier Charles, a fellow we normally hear in the context of very refined and severe minimal improvisation records, yet here he is...doing what I’m not quite sure, but it’s like he’s been called upon to fill in for all the other instruments in a 1980s post-punk band such as Magazine when everyone else is sick or has gone home from the studio. While de Boer spits out and barks out disaffected lyrics and strums basic rhythm guitar – a kind of inverted, cynical, Bob Dylan for the 15-dollar coffee generation – Charles plays bass riffs, percussive sounds, and even little flourishes of lead guitar, all done using his clarinet. Even supplies abstract noise if the occasion demands it. Think how useful such a man would have been on the Pet Sounds sessions. Matter of fact I’d like to hear this duo remake that entire album on their own terms, replacing the introverted vulnerable lyrics with something of their own invention, hopefully more wiry and realistic about the practical difficulties of living. Apparently these two made a seven-inch single in 2012 (released on Makkum) and just decided to get this one together after doing a recent tour in March 2022. Glad they did. They made it very quickly too, much the best way, perhaps all single takes one would like to think. Content includes new songs and old songs by de Boer, plus one of them is an Ethiopian song with new lyrics, and there’s also this odd cover version of ‘You’re Dead’ by Norma Tanega, the 1960s singer- songwriter from California. So now I need a copy of Walkin’ My Cat Named Dog on New Voice or a reissue on Stateside. Meanwhile you listeners need a copy of this tape. (10/10/2022)
- The Sound Projector