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It’s no coincidence that the debut ANA/ album, Caverns, shares a kindred mood with the works of epic orchestral 9-piece KATA.
A side-project of KATA guitarist Demetrius Antuna, ANA/’s future albums will actually be designed to play at the same time as their counterpart KATA discs.
“Someone was asking me about the origin of the name ‘KATA’ and mentioned that KATA was a direction in the 4th dimension,” writes Antuna via email.
“In our dimension there is right/left, forward/back, up/down, and in the 4th dimension there is ANA/KATA, which are relative to time and space. This wasn't the original concept behind the name for KATA, but I really liked how this tied in with the whole theme of the band spiritually and universally. So I thought, wouldn't it be cool to start an offshoot project called ANA/? My plan was (and still is) to write an album that can be played in tandem with the KATA albums. So, in other words, ANA/ will also have an album called The Rising, and you’ll be able to play both albums simultaneously.”
Shortly after the idea surfaced, Antuna was asked if KATA could do a show.
The schedules of the band’s extensive line-up didn’t allow it, so Antuna decided to play alone.
“I came up with some material and played by the name ANA/. Since then, ANA/ has become a project that allows me to be a part of events/shows without the restrictions of other band members’ schedules. Although I tend to have people play with me (Rebecca Antuna, Alia Jyawook, Ross Zafar, Lance LaFave, and Chris Graber have all played), I have also done shows completely solo. I played this year’s June Gloom solo, and I improvised what later became track 6, ‘Caverns I & II.’”
Caverns invokes a sense of apocalypse from the get go with opening track "Sovereign Reign."
A hissing breeze, a distant tintinnabulation, ambient swells, and an echoed guitar line that repeats like a doomsday mantra draw immediate comparisons to Swans – a notion that is validated by track 4 with a cover of “Not Here/Not Now” by front swan Michael Gira’s project Angels of Light.
"Sovereign Reign" continues with a brutally overdriven and trudging riff that builds to screams in a potent industrial/doom outburst, giving the eardrums goosebumps before closing with the eerie counsel: “fly to the moon, your world has found you.”
“There is a repeating theme throughout Caverns, and its kind of a politically driven theme,” Antuna writes.
“It's this idea of trying to find a way out of being a part of the global political system. Somehow returning to sovereignty. And when you really think about this idea, there is no escape, and that's where the title Caverns comes in. It's like searching for a place to hide, but realizing it doesn't exist. You know, you can move to a remote island, and completely free yourself from social political restraints, BUT, you can not escape things like Fukishima, the BP oil spill, global warming, etc.. This shit will have effects on your life no matter where you try to hide - unless of course you can find your way off the planet Earth.”
The impending New World anxiety carries on through the closing and title track, when Antuna seems to find some resolve – a last second ticket off the planet – in slow, rolling OMs that build over the course of nine minutes and then give way to a tremellowed, dreamy refrain of space cowboy’s nostalgia.
A great weight is lifted. Everything appears small and distant. Bliss.
Then dissonance returns in a swirling review of Caverns’ crushing paranoia which, when all is almost lost, is silenced.
The album fades out with Antuna’s (or is it Siddhartha’s?) all-pervading OM.
“I have never really done a ‘solo’ venture until this,” Antuna writes, “and it is terrifying at the same time as it is very exciting to be merging all these different influences, musically and artistically, into one piece of work.”
Fly to the moon tonight at the Casbah, where ANA/ celebrates the release of Caverns with The Album Leaf.
It’s no coincidence that the debut ANA/ album, Caverns, shares a kindred mood with the works of epic orchestral 9-piece KATA.
A side-project of KATA guitarist Demetrius Antuna, ANA/’s future albums will actually be designed to play at the same time as their counterpart KATA discs.
“Someone was asking me about the origin of the name ‘KATA’ and mentioned that KATA was a direction in the 4th dimension,” writes Antuna via email.
“In our dimension there is right/left, forward/back, up/down, and in the 4th dimension there is ANA/KATA, which are relative to time and space. This wasn't the original concept behind the name for KATA, but I really liked how this tied in with the whole theme of the band spiritually and universally. So I thought, wouldn't it be cool to start an offshoot project called ANA/? My plan was (and still is) to write an album that can be played in tandem with the KATA albums. So, in other words, ANA/ will also have an album called The Rising, and you’ll be able to play both albums simultaneously.”
Shortly after the idea surfaced, Antuna was asked if KATA could do a show.
The schedules of the band’s extensive line-up didn’t allow it, so Antuna decided to play alone.
“I came up with some material and played by the name ANA/. Since then, ANA/ has become a project that allows me to be a part of events/shows without the restrictions of other band members’ schedules. Although I tend to have people play with me (Rebecca Antuna, Alia Jyawook, Ross Zafar, Lance LaFave, and Chris Graber have all played), I have also done shows completely solo. I played this year’s June Gloom solo, and I improvised what later became track 6, ‘Caverns I & II.’”
Caverns invokes a sense of apocalypse from the get go with opening track "Sovereign Reign."
A hissing breeze, a distant tintinnabulation, ambient swells, and an echoed guitar line that repeats like a doomsday mantra draw immediate comparisons to Swans – a notion that is validated by track 4 with a cover of “Not Here/Not Now” by front swan Michael Gira’s project Angels of Light.
"Sovereign Reign" continues with a brutally overdriven and trudging riff that builds to screams in a potent industrial/doom outburst, giving the eardrums goosebumps before closing with the eerie counsel: “fly to the moon, your world has found you.”
“There is a repeating theme throughout Caverns, and its kind of a politically driven theme,” Antuna writes.
“It's this idea of trying to find a way out of being a part of the global political system. Somehow returning to sovereignty. And when you really think about this idea, there is no escape, and that's where the title Caverns comes in. It's like searching for a place to hide, but realizing it doesn't exist. You know, you can move to a remote island, and completely free yourself from social political restraints, BUT, you can not escape things like Fukishima, the BP oil spill, global warming, etc.. This shit will have effects on your life no matter where you try to hide - unless of course you can find your way off the planet Earth.”
The impending New World anxiety carries on through the closing and title track, when Antuna seems to find some resolve – a last second ticket off the planet – in slow, rolling OMs that build over the course of nine minutes and then give way to a tremellowed, dreamy refrain of space cowboy’s nostalgia.
A great weight is lifted. Everything appears small and distant. Bliss.
Then dissonance returns in a swirling review of Caverns’ crushing paranoia which, when all is almost lost, is silenced.
The album fades out with Antuna’s (or is it Siddhartha’s?) all-pervading OM.
“I have never really done a ‘solo’ venture until this,” Antuna writes, “and it is terrifying at the same time as it is very exciting to be merging all these different influences, musically and artistically, into one piece of work.”
Fly to the moon tonight at the Casbah, where ANA/ celebrates the release of Caverns with The Album Leaf.