Aerial M The Peel Sessions

David Pajo’s creative life as M seemed as prone to mutation as the music he’d composed, his work embracing the harmonic delicateness and emotive clarity that he had a hand in developing during his time with Slint, sensibilities that were later carried into the many iterations of this single-letter solo persona. One of these iterations was Aerial M, and it was during a rare occasion in the late 90s that the project existed as a full band when Pajo, guitarist Tim Furnish, bassist Cassie Marrett Berman, and drummer Tony Bailey were in the midst of a European tour and invited to record a session for BBC’s The John Peel Show on Radio One.

The band recorded three tracks on February 4th, 1998 with producer Mike Robinson and engineer Nick Fountain. The music was later broadcast almost a full month later on March 3rd. Aerial M’s recorded life up to that point had been handled mainly by Pajo himself, so the quartet’s performance for this session kept the thematic elements of the songs intact while opening them up with improvisation. As consequence, these sessions provide the only recorded existence of this version of Aerial M and these songs as performed by a four-piece.

Aerial M’s The Peel Sessions was recently issued by Drag City. In an interview for the Talkhouse Podcast, Pajo, Berman, and Furnish—Bailey unfortunately passed away in 2009—reconnected to discuss the album. Pajo had apparently found a rough cut of the Aerial M sessions on YouTube and had intended to master the material for a proper release. Pajo then disclosed that an Aerial M tour had been planned for 2020, but that these plans unfortunately had to be pushed aside thanks to the ensuing pandemic. His efforts were instead put toward securing licensing of the Peel session recordings from the BBC, which thankfully paid off. 

My first observation following my initial spin of the album was that it was a pity that this version of Aerial M existed for such a short time. It’s remarkable the level of synergy these recordings capture from only three tracks, the palpability of vernacular exchange between Aerial M’s four members who had by that point been extensively road-tested through touring. It sounds natural, every component attuned.

Second, is the inescapability of time and place that this album exudes. As one who normally scoffs at nostalgia, or admittedly assigns contempt for people who refuse to look ahead while time marches on, there’s an air to this recording that resonates deeply enough that I subconsciously found myself in a state of complete reminiscence throughout its runtime. When you hear people comment about things from the past that “couldn’t happen now,” specific circumstances all based on the aforementioned and unavoidable “time and place,” I admit to feeling that way almost as soon as the first picked notes of Skrag’s Theme reached my ears, each one ringing lightly with an analog embrace. Even during the track’s midway tumble into free form commotion and elevated distortion, a feeling of vibrancy permeates the track’s otherwise somber disposition.

Driving this feeling home is the beautiful Vivea, which surfaced as a lead single prior to the album’s release. Opening with a few strummed stanzas, a quiet drum pattern emerges and the song’s melodic theme takes shape, a gorgeous break eventually giving the arrangement room to quietly breathe. This track has been on repeat for weeks, a middle-child highlight sandwiched between Aerial M’s lengthier, more meditative instrumental. Vivea is the album’s subliminal lift. The final entry is the 12-minute Safeless, whose wandering opening act transitions into a coarser stride, the rhythm section’s backdrop locked in as guitar phrases are amplified, varying intensity and tone. This track sounds like a cleansing, almost cathartic as the mode is pushed to the end, steady and determined.

Up to now, the last album Pajo released as Aerial M was a four-song electronic remix album called Post Global Music in 1999, his most prolific solo project being Papa M, which was revived in 2016. Having taken part in a number of collaborations and enjoyed membership in an impressive array of bands—Tortoise, Royal Trux, Zwan, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, and Stereolab to name a few—he’s currently a member of Gang Of Four. As testimony to Pajo’s impact and prevalence as an underground music hero, Aerial M’s The Peel Sessions cover, a faithful homage to the band list that would adorn a Peel Sessions release, was refashioned to show the name of every band and artist with whom he’s worked, toured, or recorded. From that standpoint, Aerial M’s The Peel Sessions comes across as more of a tribute than a repackaging of lost songs, a lasting record of a fleeting moment in Pajo’s history that we’re thankful to finally hear.