Clogs' chief composer, Padma Newsome (viola/violin), was born in the red center of Australia. He is the son of a writer and an ecologist. In the early 80s he trained and performed as a concert violist in Sydney, retiring to spend six years on an ashram in the remote region of New South Wales. He began composing in the 90s at the University of Adelaide, and then was awarded a Fulbright scholarship to study at the world renowned Yale School of Music.
Clogs are his group, but not really. This is a democracy, the work of four musicians, all classically trained: Bryce Dessner (guitar), Rachael Elliott(bassoon), Thomas Kozumplik (percussion). You could use words like "ensemble" or "quartet" and keep a straight face when discussing Clogs, but that doesn't really get at it. Clogs' music has been described as "at once familiar and alien, comical and disquieting, soothing and overwrought, the Clogs' music walks a fine line between radiance and darkness that is rarely achieved outside Hindu culture--and even more rarely in a nightclub setting."(SF Weekly)
As a group they have performed throughout the United States and Canada in some of the most respected venues for improvised music including: Tonic and the Knitting Factory in New York, Casa del Popolo in Montreal, the Empty Bottle in Chicago, and Café du Nord in San Fransisco. They have shared the stage and toured with some of contemporary music's most interesting peformers including Evan Ziporyn (Bang on a Can All-stars), Erik Friedlander (Masada String Trio), and Sony recording artist, Mia Doi Todd. Clogs' music has been aired extensively on college and non-commercial radio, with live performances on New York's WFMU, Chicago's WNUR, San Francisco's KALW, Los Angeles based internet station Dublab.com, and Montreal's CISM and CIBL.
Their music blends the sounds of contemporary classical music, elements of folk music from various cultures, and the raw energy of rock music. Their structures use episodic forms, variations, a micro-minimalism and are often spatial and open-ended. Clogs write their own compositions, allow them to evolve in rehearsal, and improvise in the live setting. Their music led one critic to proclaim, "few new CDs in any genre will do as much to challenge the way you listen to music." (Philadelphia City Paper)
Clogs are more influenced by the quiescence and brevity of Erik Satie and the raw primitivist energy of Béla Bartók and Igor Stravinsky than they are by the music of any of their contemporaries, but The New Yorker writes that, "fans of Sigur Ros, the Rachel's, and other post-rock ensembles who know how to listen in respectful silence to a live performance will have no trouble appreciating the softly evocative compositions."
THE NEW YORKER (New York, NY)
The Clogs, a local quartet led by Padma Newsome, a classically trained violinist and former Fulbright scholar, inaugurates the first of three Wednesday-night sessions this month in the intimate Old Office space. The music handily eludes classification, but fans of Sigur Ros, the Rachel's, and other post-rock ensembles who know how to listen in respectful silence to a live performance will have no trouble appreciating the softly evocative compositions.
VOIR HOUR (Montreal, Quebec, CANADA)
The buzz is swelling around this Aussie-American quartet that captures the basics of conservative avant-instro. ...classically slanted, borrowing, at high points, from that well-bred mix of orchestral mood music, world-hippie beat and post-rock.
VILLAGE VOICE (New York, NY)
This pensive Aussie-American quartet, which begins a three-Wednesday residency here tonight, has been described as an acoustic (guitar/bassoon/violin/percussion) take on post-rock. I hear them more in the smart and pretty romantic-minimalist-improv tradition that began somewhere around Erik Satie and extends through the Penguin Cafe Orchestra to the Tin Hat Trio.-Richard Gehr
SF WEEKLY (San Francisco, CA)
While his [Padma Newsome's] works for bassoon, saxophone, guitar, percussion, and his own instruments bear the casual, loose-limbed shamble of Western improvisation, they are largely grounded in the classic folk musics of India and the Jewish Diaspora. At once familiar and alien, comical and disquieting, soothing and overwrought, the Clogs' music walks a fine line between radiance and darkness that is rarely achieved outside Hindu culture-and even more rarely in a nightclub setting.
MONTREAL MIRROR (Montreal, Quebec, CANADA)
Although their bio calls them 'post-rock instrumental,' the NYC-based foursome is closer to a classical ensemble than anything else. Smooth and thin-sounding strings weep in and out of hollow guitar pops and deep, minimal bassoon-based soundscapes- rich, concise, repetitive and slightly experimental. These guys refresh classical music with their subtle touch, their accessible grooves, and a tiny klezmer edge. The dominant feeling that emerges from this record is neutrality. No joy, no absolute sadness, simply Zen nihilism. Probably a phenomenal live experience for those with sensitive ears and quiet tongues. 9 out of 10 rating-Boss Sambosa
PHILADELPHIA CITY PAPER (Philadelphia, PA)
Critic Pick: Clogs, a loosely configured foursome of classically-trained musicians, compose music in pretty much the same manner everyone who plays instrumental, neo-classical post rock-from Tortoise to Rachel's to Japancakes-says they do. They compose songs, which then evolve through repetition and experimentation. Which isn't to say Clogs aren't better at it... The improvisation-touched compositions on their upcoming Thom's Night Out (Brassland) can move, as on "Mysteries of Life," from expic string swells to rhythmic, rock-inflected passages or combine classic structures with ethnic folk devices as on "Four Blue Poles." The tracks are thematic, for sure, but actually feel touched by caprice, unafraid to take a stylistic turn, right or wrong (but mostly spot-on).-Brian Howard
WILLAMETTE WEEK (Portland, OR)
Atypical as all get out, this could shape up to be a quietly mesmerizing night. Clogs is a shrewd viola/bassoon/guitar/drum ensemble, blending everything from avant-garde classical and melancholic gypsy laments to keening ambient drifts--and if that makes you imagine 3 Leg Torso with a bonus degree in Thrill Jockey-style post-rock, it should.
PHILADELPHIA CITY PAPER (Philadelphia, PA)
The biggest drawback to Thom's Night Out is that it won't fit logically anywhere in your music collection. A case could be made for including it with your world-music stuff or with your classical discs or even with the rock CDs-somewhere between Camper Van Beethoven and Costello, Elvis. The four-piece ensemble uses Western classical instruments to play pop-structured songs that can sound like klezmer music, traditional Indian melodies or even medieval monody. Padma Newsome plays the violin and viola and also composed most of the tunes. Thomas Kozumplik plays all manner of percussion, including steel drums, and Bryce Dessner plays classical guitar while Rachael Elliott fills out the ensemble on bassoon. Sound like an odd combination? It is, but the honed chops and unique harmonic sensibility somehow hold it all together. Fans of rock's slo-mo movement will feel right at home, and so will their parents. It is overall refreshing in its originality and bravado; few new CDs in any genre will do as much to challenge the way you listen to music.-Andrew Ervin
BLUE DOG PRESS (Buffalo, NY)
Clogs...grab form by the cojones and manipulate it to fit their own personal vision of aesthetics, meaning they're real weird, real creative, real esoteric, real good.
CINCINNATI CITY BEAT (Cincinnati, OH)
The Clogs, who recently releases Thom's Night Out on the new artist-operated Brassland label out of New York, are a great Neo-Classical quartet whose crafty arrangements and dynamic style brings to mind a mix of Kronos Quartet, Rachel's and Tortoise.
PRIVYMAGAZINE.COM (Internet)
A fan though hardly a connoisseur of classical music, I was pleased to discover that besides being purveyors of serious and exquisite musicianship, the Clogs are also quite aurally accessible to your average indie/modern rock fan. Particularly for those of us going ga-ga over the latest prog-rock experimental eclecticism as heard in the last two Radiohead LPs and Sigur Ros, this band emerges as a prototype of the pure sound forms onto which these "saviors" of rock have built using computers, fusion, distortion, and vocal stylings... It is an epic of sound, so much so that I find it difficult to imagine someone listening to it and not mentally conjuring some adventure through the woods of medireview Britain or some such elaborate plotline. I figure music must be pretty bloody if you find yourself creating stories as you listen. -Megan O'Karma, rating: 4.5/5
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