[Review] Harold Budd: The Serpent (In Quicksilver) (1981)
Harold Budd visits the same haunted chambers in half the time.
Kronomyth 3.0: Snake aural.
At twenty minutes, Harold Budd’s third album is technically an EP rather than an LP. Given the brevity of the songs (half of them clock in at two minutes), The Serpent (in Quicksilver) feels like Music for a Very Short Film (i.e., Brian Eno’s Music for Films, only shorter). I find Budd’s music soothing and, truth be told, this Serpent passes too quickly to soothe my savage breast. Fortunately for you, several labels have reissued this over the years with Abandoned Cities (another album originally released on Budd’s Cantil label), so you can always pick that up and settle in for sixty minutes of somnambulance. The Serpent (In Quicksilver) isn’t a different journey for Budd, merely a shorter one. You’ll encounter those warm tonal shifts first heard on The Pavilion of Dreams (The Serpent, Widows Charm), sonorous notes that reflect The Plateaux of Mirror (Children on the Hill, Rub with Ashes) and a duet with Chas Smith on pedal steel guitar (Afar) that proves more effective than Apollo’s ill-advised foray into the same space. Wanderer, the only track to feature a synthesizer, might have stepped directly from Music for Films. It’s interesting to hear Harold Budd provide his own musical treatments to his acoustic piano playing, even if they’re not quite as exotic as Eno’s approach. The thoughtfulness of his arrangements seem to slow time to a crawl, which makes this a richer experience than you might expect from a 20-minute record. That said, I wouldn’t spend $50 to buy this on vinyl when you can get Abandoned Cities with it on CD for about half the price. Now that’s money well serpent! (Man, this site just gets classier by the day.)
Original elpee version
A1. Afar (Harold Budd/Chas Smith)
A2. Wanderer
A3. Rub with Ashes
B1. Children on the Hill
B2. Widows Charm
B3. The Serpent (in Quicksilver)
All compositions by Harold Budd unless noted.
The Players
Harold Budd (acoustic piano, Fender Rhodes electric piano, Prophet, Bosendorfer, Hammond organ, sounds, treatments) with Chas Smith (pedal steel guitar on A1), Eugene Bowen (bass on B3). Recorded and mixed by Gene.
The Pictures
Design and layout by Paula Bethsebe. Front cover photo by Terrence.
The Plastic
Released on elpee in 1981 in the US (Cantil, Cantil 181).
- Re-issued on elpee in 1983 in Belgium (Crepuscule, TWI 083).
- Re-packaged w. Abandoned Cities on 2-for-2 compact disc and cassette in 1989 in the US (Opal/Warner Bros., 4-/26025/-2).
- Re-packaged w. Abandoned Cities on 2-for-1 compact disc in 1992 in the UK (All Saints, ASCD08) and Japan (All Saints, POCP-1312).
- Re-issued on elpee in 2013 (All Saints, WAST039LP).
