Many things have changed in the world of Rachel's since their last album,
Full On Night, in 2000. There have been weddings, trips abroad, new jobs,
new bands and projects (Seluah, Matt Pond PA, The Louisville String Quartet)
and the arrival of new canine friends Miles and Tilly Bean. The band
is still happily based in Louisville, Kentucky, and the house that was
30% painted in 2000 is now 60% painted. The month of April 2002 was particularly
memorable for Rachel's: they got to play with Fugazi and Shipping
News in Louisville, and then travel to England for the All
Tomorrow's Parties festival.
systems/layers is their sixth release on Quarterstick Records. Rachel's also self-produced a collection of oddities in 2002, called Significant Others. Rachel's has been recording music together since 1991, and playing live shows since 1995. Collaboration is an essential element to everything Rachel's has done, and over the years they have worked with many other musicians, photographers, filmmakers, choreographers, writers and visual artists. With systems/layers, the collaboration comes from the SITI Company, an innovative, ensemble-based theater company from New York City. Music and sound are an important part of the SITI Company's process, and they had been using Rachel's albums in their rehearsals and actor training courses.
Numerous recording sessions make up systems/layers - a lot of work at home, field recordings, and several large ensemble sessions with members of the Louisville Orchestra in the beautiful concert halls at Indiana University Southeast and the University of Louisville (where they recorded the Music for Egon Schiele album). They also had the chance to work with a musician they admire very much, Shannon Wright, on the song "Last Things Last". In keeping with the search for interesting sounds, Rachel's asked friends and fans to submit recordings of sounds meaning to their lives and environments, CDs, mini-discs, tapes and voice mail messages arrived from all over the world.
A final aspect of the collaborative process of systems/layers was working with photographer and filmmaker Harvey Wang. Feeling that it was important to represent actual humans in a record about cities and urban life, Rachel's asked Harvey to take photographs of the SITI Co. in rehearsal. He also travelled to Louisville to photograph the band. These photographs, in addition to photographs by Rachel's, make up the artwork for the record, which was designed by band member Jason Noble.