Black Bile: Variations

Black Bile: Variations is an entirely reconstructed work of music, born from the work Umberto composed for Black Bile. Umberto’s variations on the reflective Black Bile are in turn refractive, borrowing elements from across the album and reconfiguring them into entirely new arrangements. The process for creating Black Bile involved construction, destruction, and reconstruction. The process for variations took a macro-scale approach, taking composer Matt Hill’s method to its pinnacle. “My process for writing Black Bile left all the tracks open to be edited and merged together,” notes Hill. “They all worked together because of the music theory I was using and the parameters I set for myself when I was starting the proper record itself.”

In contrast to the LP, the tracks that compose the variations were assembled more quickly and instinctually. Hill elaborates on the process:

“I was giving Black Bile a lot of breathing space after I composed and recorded it. I wanted to sit with it more before it came out, so I knew I was still happy with how it came together. I decided to do the opposite approach with Variations. I think this process was a lot more like soundtrack work for film, because I put myself on a much tighter deadline. Normally that can be kind of challenging because there’s last minute adjustments that you have to live with forever, but I found these variations more exciting and interesting, like a way to push these musical fragments to their limit.”

An excellent companion to Black Bile, Variations’ revelation comes by illuminating the complex process of composing minimal emotive music made up of delicate details and tonal shifts. Together, Black Bile and Black Bile: Variations showcase Umberto’s considerable compositional acumen.