Ive got the "Tone Dialling" album, have heard "Song X" and a whole motley assortment of OC's motley music here and there.
I guess his music can be aurally confusing at first hear. It's an acquired taste. I think i get where he's drawing some of his compositional ideas, such as some tracks in "Tone Dialling" where he has two utterly different pieces of music juxtaposed on or running against each other, with his sax hovering above it. kinda like playin a 3/4 theme over a 5/4, but instead of conflicting meters, music, to solo over!
i have to hand it to him, OC has achieved a compositional technique which is dead certain to draw a response from all listeners, much faster than April Boy could upon first listen. The colors and emotions are totally OC's.
But, it is all an acquired taste. I don't think any of us here would listen to the harmolodic stuff to unwind on a lazy afternoon, to energize our flesh on a sludgy monday morning, or to perk us up and keep us wide awake during events of lethargy midday. But I guess that's OC's point in his music. It's not pop. Will never be. I don't think it has been designed for mundane pleasure. The harmelodic concept is as sophisticated as it borders on the confusing, and provides an almost alien terrain for access. I have magazines that have featured Vernon Reid (the modern proponent of harmelodic rock guitar) and James Blood Ulmer (perhaps the bastion of harmelodic guitar playing) and frankly, I have read hard (in and between the lines) to find the basics and basis of its concepts, BUT unforunately, Ulmer is secretive and won't share and Reid sounds like he's on glossolalia when describing the music! You've got shred and progressive guitar's "naked to the point of pornography" technique exposure on one side, then the harmelodic mystics who have harder noses, tighter lips and stiffer necks than what jazz snobs and blues legends have. It's either that deep in concept, or just plain vague and elusive, even to the practitioners.
I would consider harmelodiscm to lie in the extremes of improvisation and composition. If there was a differential for the measurement of improvisation and composition, classical composed music (which is only improvised upon during the creation process before being committted to the staves) residing on one end of the scale, harmolodicism would perhaps have its nest as classicals polar opposite. and all things lie according to their improvisational (and sane!?!) degrees within the mid region.
correct me if i'm wrong. enlighten me with all your might.
my balancing point: i think it was one of the marsalis brothers who stated that we do not go to the art to see what it can GIVE to US, but we go to it to see what WE can GET from it. as varied and diverse as how OC's music may mean to me, the next guy and the whole population, that's all personal and esoteric in nature. i cant really grasp it, perhaps its my ignorance, or the not-so-hospitable nature of the music.