Splicetoday

Music
Dec 29, 2016, 10:02AM

The Longest Glide

52 Weeks of Elizabeth Veldon, Week 52: “red light fades to pink/the consistency of chalk” (10/27/12).

Screen shot 2016 12 29 at 10.01.10 am.png?ixlib=rails 2.1

Every discography is a subjective journey from wherever an artist or group of artists began to wherever it is that the present moment deposits them, and us. Perspectives sharpen, dither, or both; no one is the same and everyone longs to return to different places. Almost in defiance of this idea, it feels appropriate to conclude my 52-week long survey of Elizabeth Veldon’s ever-expanding catalogue—a survey, frankly, that barely scratches the surface—with a song whose particular journey scans as the very antithesis of a journey, a song that suggests the very, very slow sliding of a level or twisting of a knob, a song that might be said to represent a piece of chalk gliding across and then off of a blackboard.

“red light fades to pink/the consistency of chalk” commences in a manner that’s stark, loud, and unambiguous: a long, sustained tone. That high, neon tone is gradually joined and then wholly usurped by a lower-register doppelganger. On paper, “red light fades” isn’t especially exciting or enthralling; it’s briefly maddening, and then it’s merely there, and after about six minutes it’s pretty much a done deal. Someone somewhere will inevitably assert that anyone with a keyboard could’ve written and recorded this minimalist sunset ear movie, or some version of it. But we didn’t; she did. She composed a swath of music that sounds like a late Mark Rothko painting looks, saw it through, then committed it to tape. “red light fades” will never be a hit pop single, but it’s powerful in a more instinctual sense, the way a rising garage door is powerful, the way the lines binding colors are powerful. The song concludes as if it, and by extension its audience, has been rudely interrupted.

Discussion

Register or Login to leave a comment