Written by Michael Broerman
To call Gabriel Marin Various Situations Vol. 1 the latest solo project from Consider the Source guitarist Gabriel Marin would be a bit of a misnomer, since it’s actually comprised of three of the latest solo projects from the Consider the Source guitarist.
Various Situations Vol. 1 consists of 10 songs from three different bands: Gabriel Marin’s Social Assassins, End of Echoes and Storm of Existence. Each group brings its own particular style to an album that runs in many different directions, but ultimately circles back to the same theme: Marin’s immense instrumental talent.
“Honestly it came from not knowing which sound I would like to explore first,” Marin said in an email. “I had a few other band ideas too, but I thought three would be a good amount to start with. Also I thought it would be a fun listen to be able to have such a wide range of bands on one album.”
The first project on the album is Gabriel Marin’s Social Assassins which, of the three groups, most closely aligns with the style Consider the Source fans are familiar with. It is another progressive, instrumental trio that centers around Marin’s trademark fretless shredding. Social Assassins also features drummer Gregory “Torch” Sgrulloni who holds down layered but steady rhythms as Marin navigates all over his fretless Vigier double neck, outfitted with prototype VO-96 pickups. The first track on the album, “Firehose of Falsehood,” throws listeners straight in and douses them with heavy wailing right from the beginning and ends in a wild wash of crashing cymbals and ripping from Marin.
Most especially with the Assassins, the question must be raised as to why Marin would break off at all from CTS, which has been a mainstay of the progressive instrumental scene for nearly 15 years.
“CTS has been so busy for so long there’s never been time to try anything else,” Marin said. “But we are at the level now where we can kind of have a bit of time. Also in CTS we can cover so much ground musically that its a very, very fulfilling situation; but there are some ideas we each have that wouldn’t necessarily fulfill the CTS thing, so these projects came from that.”
The place of the next project, End of Echoes, is notable because of its proximity to the headiness of “Firehose” and the entire Social Assassins sound. “Get What You Give” opens with a bit of poppy guitar synth from Marin but quickly separates itself on the album by introducing vocalist Kira Crissinger. The resulting track is about the closest to popular music that Marin is willing to get, but he should be willing to inch even closer. “Get What You Give” is danceable with a catchy hook, while still containing some heavily downplayed guitar compositions behind the vocals, a fine mixture attributable to producer for the duo Daniel Lynas (A$AP Rocky). Still, to call it the furthest departure from Marin’s typical CTS sound would be presumptuous without hearing the third group.
To say which is a further deviation from Consider the Source, pop-synth vocals or traditional Persian Sufi music, is a tough question, but one that Various Situations demands answer to. In his third project, Storm of Existence, Marin expands his instrumental repertoire to include the two-string dutar and the bowed kamancha, instruments synonymous with traditional Persian sound in addition to his fretless electric. Accompanying this overdubbing of several stringed instruments is percussionist Dan Kurfirst in addition to traditional Persian singers performing in their native tongue. People in this scene aren’t usually the kind to shy away from experimentation, but for those who are a bit perplexed by the vocals, there remains the familiar pounding instrumentation building behind the vocals that is reminiscent of the synth guitar leaning behind the vocals of End of Echoes. In a way, the piercing Persian vocals that are unintelligible to English listeners serve as a temporary substitute for Gabe’s shredding, a trademark that inevitably returns by the end of the track. “Ali Blood” begins like a Social Assassins song, but when the vocals commence along with the Storm of Existence as a whole, the song is instantly set apart from the rest of the album.
“I’ve been playing Turkish and Persian Sufi music in a traditional context for a long time,” Marin said, “And some of the Persian songs have such a natural weight to them I always thought that they would sound good heavy. I took a guess and recorded the songs in a traditional way and then orchestrated them into the arrangements that they are at now and luckily in the end it seemed to work.”
Picking a favorite track, or even group, on the album is a difficult endeavor simply because of how diverse the album is. Truthfully, I’d be perfectly content with an album that consisted solely of Marin’s stringed prowess. This is something more challenging. It is something more inspiring; to see Marin explore new instruments, sounds and regions of influence rather than stay with the tried-and-true formula of progressive jamming that Consider the Source has followed for the past 15 years. It’s also apparent that Marin had fun with this one. One of the songs by Social Assassins, “of course that’s a Curb Your Enthusiasm reference,” is titled “Does it Taste Like Magenta in Here?”, a subtle reference to the Netflix series Bojack Horseman.
The sheer inventiveness and get-your-money’s-worth of one album with three different bands all led by the same guy is enough alone to separate Gabriel Marin Various Situations Vol. 1 from any recent solo projects by contemporary shredders. This album isn’t one that survives on a gimmick alone, as Marin is able to back up this bold experiment with the chops he has spent years honing on the road with Consider the Source. If Marin decides to take even one of these side projects out on the road, there is no telling how much further this journey can go. I just hope we don’t need to wait another 15 years for another volume. According to Marin, we won’t have to.
“I am in the studio tracking drums with Torch and [producer and engineer] Amrish Mahabir recording drums for the full length Assassins album,” Marin said. “After the next CtS tour I will record a full length [album] with Storm of Existence as well as some more End of Echoes and start Various Situations Vol. 2. As far as live goes, nothing in the works yet, but eventually 100 percent some live stuff will happen.”
You can listen to Various Situations Vol. 1 here!
Gabriel Marin Explores Various Situations in Solo Record
