Just as mainstream rap production is dominated by the likes of Timbaland, Kanye West, and Dr. Dre, the underground is ruled by RJD2, Madlib, and Prefuse 73. The last is the glitch-hop moniker of Atlanta native Scott Herren, director of the Eastern Developments label and creative force behind the world-folk project Savath & Savalas, who played at the Black Cat last Wednesday. From that show, though, few would guess Herren’s impact on the world of hip-hop.
2003 saw the release of two Prefuse 73 records, the brilliant instrumental break-up album One Word Extinguisher and Extinguished: Outtakes, a collection of short beats, samples and ideas developed while working on Extinguisher. Both of these records built on the sound Herren let loose on his now-classic Prefuse 73 debut, Vocal Studies + Uprock Narratives, a boundary-stretching feat that incorporated progressive elements of techno, glitch and hip-hop.
Herren has now taken a step away from the hip-hop and techno elements of his music and resurrected the Savath & Savalas project, which he last worked with in 2000, for Folk Songs for Trains, Trees and Honey. In embracing Spain, the land he says he “considers home,” he and Puyuelo Muns released Apropa’t, Savath & Savalas’ quiet album of Spanish nuevo-folk music.
Herren’s move from Atlanta to Gracias, a small city north of Barcelona in Northeastern Spain, has attracted much attention. Speculation as to Herren’s motivation has focused on the Spanish father he never met and the end of the relationship that was the subject of One Word Extinguisher.
Herren moved two and a half years ago, though he says he had been contemplating the move for some time. Herren explains, “I had to save money, and before that there were other things that were stopping me, but I finally got up the time and the money together and the motivation together to just pick up all my stuff and put it in boxes and go.”
For Herren, Apropa’t allowed further fulfillment of his creativity. “I like to play instruments, so Savath & Savalas is a way for me to express myself in that way, and with Prefuse it’s more b-boy type stuff. It’s two different methods and two different forms of expression.” He is quick to point out the differences between Prefuse 73 and Savath & Savalas. “The two projects, they aren’t actually linked at all. If someone’s listening for Prefuse in Savath & Savalas they’re not going to find it. It’s not meant to be that way; it’s not an offshoot of Prefuse. It’s a very separate idea in itself.”
Apropa’t is unique for Herren, especially in that he has almost exclusively been a solo artist. The new album is much more of a group effort, which the live show reflects. As Herren said, “I just sat down and wrote the songs. Me and my friend Eva [Puyuelo Muns] collaborated and came up with different ideas and just did it.”
In many ways the album is really Puyuelo Muns’; she sings lead on all of the songs and it’s her quiet, ethereal vocals that draw in listeners. On tour, the group is using a seven-member line-up, and though Herren is prominent in promoting the band, his role on stage seems limited. Even the physical set-up of the stage leaves him hunched over his three keyboards behind a row of back-up singers.
Although avid hip-hop fans are used to hearing Herren delivering some of the strangest, hardest beats, the scene at the Black Cat was worlds away. This was a significantly intimate show, even for the Black Cat mainstage. The two-guitar, dual vocalist set-up centered on an excellent drummer and was able to recreate Apropa’t songs with a startling degree of accuracy, allowing Puyuelo Muns to display her impressive vocal range.
Herren gave showgoers the heads up on a new Savath & Savalas EP slated for release this summer, as well as a Prefuse 73 set to drop at the beginning of 2005. Until then, Savath & Savalas are touring the U.S. this month, culminating with Herren playing two slots at the Coachella Music Festival, one as Prefuse 73 and one with Puyuelo Muns as Savath & Savalas.
