First of all, I invite you to google “twig blights” and feast your eyes upon artist renderings of these creepy photosynthesizers. Allegedly created from a stake run through the heart of a vampire, these D&D monsters are bloodthirsty shrubs who can uproot themselves and use their branches as claws to ensnare unsuspecting victims. Levi (aka Passenger Pigeon)’s improvisation keenly encapsulates the joyful scratchiness and viciousness of these branch-beasts with a driving, energetic, distorted loop from his baritone electric guitar. We hear the overdriven fret sounds and harmonics layered into the looped and doubled bassline, and halfway through the track we are treated to a distorted sliding solo.
I like to imagine myself hidden safely in the underbrush, watching a pack of these things passing by me on their way to wreak havoc, accompanied by this soundtrack. If one of the aims of improvised live looping is to transport the listener to a different world, and show them that world in detail . . . this track accomplishes that aim immediately.