A Produce
★★★★
The Clearing
INDEPENDENT PROJECT. CD
Vital underground electronica from 1980s LA.
Matt Crockett
First issued in 1988, the debut solo LP by synth-music explorer A Produce (real name Barry Craig) came after nearly a decade of experiment and local initiative: in the post-punk band Afterimage, then as the driving force behind two landmark anthologies of trance and noise, L.A. Mantra I and II. On The Clearing (“an album of conceptional musical space,” according to the old mail-order flyer reproduced here), A Produce casts the enriched-Eno spell of Another Green World through a California anxiety of stark, modal guitar and dire, repeated keyboard hooks.