Windsor for the Derby
Dan Matz continues to release music under the name Windsor For The Derby after several line up changes along the way. Several albums have come out since the YGR release below, way back in 1999 – well worth checking out. Difference and Repetition is one of their best, and I hope you’ll give it a listen.
– Michael Gira/Young God Records 2008
Windsor for the Derby stake out their own highly personal and original terrain of organic guitar soundtrack music. Augmented with sensuous analog keys and delicate vocals, the guitars are uneffected and interwoven in complex patterns that shift ineffably over time. The resulting atmosphere is intimate and unpretentious - handmade extended county-folk ballads laced with a gentle sadness, as if Brian Eno had a hand in remixing Harry Smith's anthology of American folk music.
Windsor for the Derby was formed in 1994 in Austin, Texas. Daniel Matz and Jason McNeeley are the core members of an ever shifting collaboration that has included (and may sometimes include) John Weiss (Rodan), Adam Wiltzie (Stars of the Lid), Wayne Magruder (Bowery Electric, Calla) and a variety of other contributors.
Their fist two CD's, Calm Hades Float and Minnie Greutzfeld, were released on Trance Syndicate Records. Windsor For the Derby opened for Swans on its final US tour, and M. Gira was so taken with their sound and performances that he immediately offered to release them on YGR.
Difference and Repetition is the most refined and focused Windsor recording to date. YGR is extremely proud to offer these intimately crafted dreamsongs as the first in its coming series of new releases offering a poignant and non-cynical musical experience, rare in its warmth and understatement.
A few contemporaneous reviews:
6/20/2001 | allmusic.com | Thom Jurek
Windsor for the Derby | Difference and Repetition | Review
AMG Expert Review
On their debut recording for Young God, and third overall, Windsor For The Derby refine their delicate, intricate guitar landscape even further. Based in Austin, the core of Daniel Matz and Jason McNeeley with guests that include Adam Wiltzie from Stars of the Lid, Christian Goyer and Erik O'Brien. Keyboards, from floating electric pianos and tightly woven yet spaciously measured guitar patterns dictate the flow from which Windsor For the Derby's music emanates. On the nearly 13-minute "Shoes McCoat," the band tangle two guitars in an edgeless knotty, slowly unwinding labyrinth that grow longer in length and intricacy over the track's duration. Certain notes get stretched to resonate a tad longer before they move, or a sudden shift up the neck on one note like a slide whistle will occur, but otherwise, the patterns build and unfold, adding layer upon layer of mysterious intent that results in gorgeous music. Everything is so subtle here—even the vocals are so slurred and unreachable as to be just another instrument in the mix. The analogue keyboards in "Nico," a pipe organ (resembling a harmonium) and a piano resonate in the shadows of the bass and guitars as an off-meter rhythm accents each phrase, and another, and another until the phrase becomes the pulse of the tune itself. But perhaps nothing here is more strikingly beautiful than "Lost In Cycles," a vocal track where the lyrics are indecipherable, whispered hoarsely into a lilting guitar line and a sustained keyboard line that gives way to feedback on both sides of the channel to create a dense yet melodic wail of harmonic distortion. Windsor For The Derby is perhaps not the best known band making records from Austin, Texas, or even on the Young God label, but no matter how hard they are to find, their records—especially this one—are worth seeking out.
8/1/2000 | MOJO MAGAZINE | Andrew Cardeen
Windsor for the Derby | Difference and Repetition - Review
There's no reason to overlook the third lp from texas post-rockers windsor for the derby. "difference and repetition" is their first for ex-swans leader michael gira's young god label and continues on the gentle trajectory of their earlier work with a soothing mix of repeated phrases, hushed whispers, and organic ambience. think eno, tortoise, and late '60's pink floyd."
