Super Visas (SCQ's Year-End Questionnaire Part I)

James Hicken (also of Wallscenery Demos) is one of those overly prolific, under-the-radar artists who release so many songwriting incarnations of himself, you gradually begin to love the entire repertoire. Speaking of his Super Visas moniker, Hicken discusses how READ (I Found Out) organically came together as spare parts from many recordings yet to be announced. Yes, 2011 is looking predictably busy for James Hicken…

SCQ: Every list-lover's favourite question: what are your top albums of 2010? Feel free to include any older yet worthy records you discovered this year.

JH: le noise. this album sounds so alive... the production is great, and the record sounds so fresh. it's one of those albums that provides me with relief. I haven't been listening to a whole lot of newer albums lately. I've mostly been digging through older albums...

SCQ: What were you listening to a lot of while recording your excellent Super Visas' debut READ (I Found Out)?

JH: I was going back through albums and artists that have had a lasting effect on me and my ideas about music. some of my staples are guided by voices, lee scratch perry, neil young, art blakey, king tubby, real estate, thrush hermit, galaxie500, gangstarr... I'm a little all over the place, but these artists were in heavy rotation.

SCQ: Be cocky for once in your life: what was the finest thing you did all year? That moment where you actually thought "shit, I nailed that..."?

JH: I would have to say this ablum (READ)... I didn't plan on doing it. I was working on the 3rd wallscenery demos album, and realized I had a bunch of recordings that made more sense to me as something stand alone. It gave me an escape from thinking too much while making an album. I recorded a lot of it with an internal mic on a computer and just had fun doing things the way your not supposed to...

SCQ: Effect and Cause: Having exiled myself to some patchwork pastures in New Hampshire this Summer, I became lost while listening to gauzy tracks like 'Anonymous Props' and 'Keep On Doin' It'. Okay, your turn: confess a true tale that inspired one of the songs from READ (I Found Out).

JH: Hands down duly noted projections. hugh oliver. I recorded an album for hugh and rosie, and hugh recited his poem projections as the album closer. I had a demo that I recorded at home and for some reason it made me think of projections. I put the two together, tweaked a few things and it made sense to me. Working with hugh, rosie and marco on that album was amazing. we recorded Hugh reciting projections at marco difelice's studio in the lobby- which is massive and has great natural reverb. the recording sessions were fun, and it felt invigorating being a part of the record.. Hugh is a great creative spirit.

SCQ: If all the reasonable and implausible ideas in your head came to fruition in 2011, what would they be?

JH: label support. my albums are all self financed, recorded, manufactured and promoted. I'm not even playing shows now. It would be a relief to have some portions of what goes into releasing an album removed from my plate so I can focus on important stuff. My main priority is to continue writing and releasing material frequently. 2011 will hold another super visas album- I've started ear marking some recordings. I should start playing some shows as well.

READ (I Found Out) - Super Visas

READ (I Found Out)

Super Visas
Independent.

SCQ Rating: 79%

No matter who you are, a newbie to independent music or an open-minded veteran, first impressions of James Hicken should elicit a fair share of scrutiny. I know my initial reaction after hearing his band Wallscenery Demos’ second effort Check This! was one of grand uncertainty, as each track that drew me in would be countered by something I instinctively held at arm’s length. Don’t let it hinder your listening though and don’t back away; you may never enjoy every song Hicken has ever written but in time his restless ambitions become familiar charms that weave through his work like elusive armour. Sticking with it also permits the great perk of catching Hicken at his focused best, which he is on Super Visas’ debut READ (I Found Out). It’s a treat you somewhat have to earn.

If the raison d’etre behind Super Visas was to draw out a balance between Hicken’s musical interests, READ (I Found Out) achieves it handily. These seven songs still contain an accommodating degree of variety, ranging from bustling indie-rock to a surprisingly effective spoken-word composition, but they’re produced in a similar, gauzy finish and sequenced to fit cozily next to one another. You can tell Hicken has roped in his immeasurable basin of ideas (as opposed to dispersing them at random) by the distant choral that grows more haunted – yet increasingly beautiful – over the prickly rhythm-guitar on ‘Anonymous Props’. That opener’s mix of warm, bleeding keys and lo-fi percussion returns on ‘Duly Noted Projections’ and the title track, the latter with Hicken’s voice rustling like a rasp of autumn leaves. When the album steers into nostalgic pools of cascading acoustics, as on ‘The Hum That Keeps Us Cool’, Hicken proves that loosening the reigns and fleshing out his songwriting ideas can result in mesmerizing, spacious tracks that give the parent album added layers of emotion.

The less-structured jams embraced near the album’s end, like ‘Get It Right’, forfeits verse/chorus predictability but not at the expense of tight focus and, after its preceding tracks, its heady grooves feel almost celebratory. Justifiably so. Super Visas lives up to the hinted genius scattered over Hicken’s other aliases and weeds out the filler for a debut that should only get more suitable as autumn comes calling.