The Stolen Bicycle

Album Review

Boud Deun is a quartet of violin, guitar, bass and drums that improvise exciting and dynamic instrumentals pregnant with the same high-energy charge that typifies early King Crimson. This tight, integrated unit deifies belief with a degree to which much of their extemporaneous jaunts sound premeditated. Consider, for instance, the sudden change from punk assault to violin and guitar recital in "Burnsville." Also, in "Burnsville," bassist Matt Eiland charges to the front for a spirited bass lead, one of the two few times that he does so. Three of the musicians will deftly swing behind guitarist Shawn Persinger or violinist Greg Hiser with barely a note's notice. The result is stunning and masterful. Influence of the Crimson ones is detectable throughout, as is the hyper-folk of Stravinsky ("Saints," especially the end), and traditional jazz in the guitar-led "Broken Spokes." Elsewhere that the lexicons of punk bombast, bluegrass, lightning licks (together in "Ten Pence/Bridges") and more are referenced. Boud Deun's fiery charges into one territory and then another leave no prisoners and ask no quarry in laying claim to fertile lands left fallow under the rule of orthodoxy. Boud Deun is Mahavishnu Orchestra on fire, the Dixie Dregs gone to town, a worthy new volume in the encyclopedia of progressive, limitless, surprising instrumental groups.