Foreign Mission
Track listing:
- Intro
- Bitter/Sweet
- Groove Mantra
- Brazil
- Amorphous
- Lizinko
Order Garett Buell’s Foreign Mission! Garett recently came across a stash of his records and is wanting to move them on out the door. The CDs will sell for $10 apiece and $2.50 shipping and handling. Hit the handy-dandy PayPal button down below to buy yours today! Supplies are limited.
Kirby Trapolino on Foreign Mission:
Caedmon’s Call percussionist Garett Buell and his troop of studio musicians have produced a five-star work of instrumental art, mixing styles such as Jazz, Samba, Electronica and even Celtic. Buell draws inspiration from Psalm 150, inviting listeners to praise God through an unfathomable array of masterfully arranged instruments.
Each song is a different experience all together. “Bitter/sweet” starts with a “bitter” in your face jazz jam, and fades into a “sweet” ambient-jazz odessey. “Amorphous” takes you to the streets of Brazil with its latin Samba backbone, while “Groove Mantra” draws from a tabla-n-drums backbeat and lazy piano meanderings while maintaining an Acid Jazz vibe—evidenced by electronic sampling and funk-esque bass guitar riffs. “Lizinco” lands somewhere on the outskirts of the trip-hop genre with its huge reverberating doumbeks, big and bassey udu drum loops and celtic wanderings. This is not just background music—this is rich and meticulous music that draws you in, makes you think about the gravity of life and the many wonders of the concept of music in general.
 —Kirby Trapolino
Aaron Tate on Foreign Mission:
In 1998, the ideas that would become Foreign Mission began forming in Buell’s mind. “This just kind of came out of nowhere,” says Buell. “I never thought I could do this, and then over the last year I’ve been inspired to start putting something together.”
At first, he feared that he didn’t have the financial or musical resources to pull it off. But Buell soon found support from independent label Grassroots Music, which has made Foreign Mission its inaugural project. He also gained confidence from fellow musicians, who were anxious to participate. “And as soon as I decided that I really wanted to do it,” says Buell. “God just opened the door.”
In the Summer of 1999, Buell began to make plans and gather musician friends to perform on the album. Rather than turning to fellow members of Caedmon’s Call, with whom he plays all the time, Buell recruited musicians with more experience in jazz and experimental music. “I knew for the type of project I wanted to do, I wanted it to be an odd instrumentation, not your normal rock band,” says Buell. “I have so many friends that I have gone through life with and played with and that have inspired me,” he says. Three of these musicians played on Foreign Mission, bringing their own unique talent and perspective.
Trip Wamsley (bass), Buell’s former roommate, added his funky, bending, driving bass lines to the songs, most notably, “Bitter/Sweet.” A full time musician, Wamsley has toured extensively with his unique solo bass performances, and has recorded several experimental records of his own. Robert Boston (piano), whom Buell met while in college, expertly contrasts the hard bass with minimalistic, yet stirring, jazz melodies. Boston, who plays in jazz and orchestral acts, also teaches music theory and composition at the University of Houston. Jett Butler (guitar), another friend from college, shines on “Amorphous,” with soaring and beautiful solo runs up the fretboard. Butler, an architect by profession, is a serious student of guitar, and, Buell says, “his love for guitar is so intense that he can do other things but still maintain his love for the instrument. And it shows.”
With these prolific instrumentalists, Foreign Mission is far more a group recording more than a mere drum album. The bass, piano, guitar, and Buell’s intense percussion, each have distinct voices, all the while working as a part of the greater whole. Although each instrument was recorded individually in the studio, the songs have a distinctly live feel to them, as each performer plays off of the others. Buell says, “I had ideas in the direction of the album, the big picture of where I wanted it to go, and so I directed them a little bit as they would play. But I told everybody to do what they wanted, because I wanted the whole thing to be very spontaneous. When an idea is fresh, then it’s the best.”
The result is an album that will, of course, be appreciated by musicians. But more important to Buell is that non-musicians enjoy it too. “I don’t want to write an album for drummers and musicians,” says Buell. “I would like musicians to enjoy it, but I want everyone to enjoy it—people who just like music, they can listen to it and find something valuable about it.”
The experience that Buell offers the average listener is illustrated by the sound-effects introduction to the record. We hear a person walking up a city sidewalk, past clubs full of music, then opening a door, a crowd cheering and the music kicking in. The exact city sidewalk, the club, even the name of the band does not matter. For in this age of the global urban culture, music transcends geography and projects like Foreign Mission give the listener the musical world in one recording.
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