Isaac Knight lives in Las Vegas, Nevada, and makes eerily still music that sounds like the locked groove of a record played through an antique dub system. Under the name Boneless, he mixes deeply resonant effects and tightly looping audio for a uniquely minimalist approach. Earlier this year he played a show on KDVS’s invaluable radio show, Phoning It In, in which musicians literally play their music live on the air over the phone.
The result tamps down on Knight’s music, as if such a thing were imaginable. A taut “Little Drummer Boy” riff gets squashed into a pin-prick beat, and one segment sounds like an appropriated pop radio tune being played through a foot of concrete (MP3). The songs, such as they are, bleed from one to the next, but are listed in this sequence: “My Life (So Far),” “Way,” “Better,” “Breathless,” “On Me,” and “Young Thug.” Most minimal techno sounds downright flamboyant by comparison. Knight deserves praise for his restraint.
More on the recording at phoningitin.net. More on Knight/Boneless at myspace.com/byeboneless.