Stereophonic – A Honey of an Anklet

Playwright David Adjmi takes another plunge into less-visited subcultures, in this case top-tier pop-rock music production in the 1970s with the double album-sized, polished Stereophonic. Music recording in this decade was in a transition period from the era when all musicians played together at the same time, in the same room, looking at and listening to each other. The five-member unnamed band (we may as well call them Bleetwood Mac) of Adjmi’s work do play through a song or two as an ensemble in the first half, but as relationships unravel like a bad macrame plant hanger, all of the subsequent taping sessions entail only one or a few band members, listening to playback and staring straight ahead.

Although the band and chief engineer Grover do have access to a gigantic mixing board the size of a corporate boardroom conference table, sound capture and mixing at the time was analog and linear, in the parlance. Nevertheless, Grover and drummer Simon (Chris Stack) consume an inordinate amount of energy pursuing a glitchy resonance in Simon’s drum kit, something inaudible to us and perhaps chimerical. As Grover learns the ropes of fake-it-till-you-make-it, in the latter stages of the play he overpowers Simon to play to a click track (again, a relatively novel technology) because Simon’s beat is wavering. Or so Grover says.

It was a silver age, with so much money and time available, chasing infinitesimal improvements in quality.

Adjmi’s approach to dialogue, matched by the direction of Daniel Aukin, follows a similar arc: early expository scenes are full of jumbled, overlapping, super fast passages (particularly from Sarah Pidgeon’s Diana), while at the end, characters’ decisions are underscored by searing pauses. With all involved looking dead downstage.

It’s not for nothing that perfectionist Peter (Tom Pecinka), as done up with aviator shades and drooping mustache, is a ringer for Walter Becker.