Loop pooL

Elliott Sharp: Loop pooL.

I've returned to listening to vintage Elliott Sharp as I drink in the abrasive sound that has infected me for so long. Loop pooL is another early Sharp release that I've had to locate via eBay and it was well worth the effort of tracking this 1988 treasure.

Loop pooL is a great sampling of Sharp's personal sonic vocabulary with plenty of guitar work, drum machine programming and processed sound. There's even a couple of tracks of guitar accompanied by a pitch-to-MIDI converter patched into a simple piano patch that works in spite of its transparency. There's something satisfying about the aggressive, noise-heavy textures and rhythmic intensity of "PKD" (presumably a reference to the science fiction writer Philip K. Dick) or "Two Faces Stare." This is Sharp's sonic world and it's rendered convincingly here. From this point his sound matures while retaining much of the forceful, creative drive found here.