Cole Pulice – Scry

11.2.22 by Matty McPherson

I am still most fascinated about Cole Pulice’s approach to an oatmeal breakfast. Whereas many of us look at the template and decree “Sweeten it! Throw down chocolate or brown sugar!” Cole instead considers how a savory mending of flavors (kale and garlic cloves) can open a new pathway from a rigidity set tradition. It’s the same base but a whole new class of thinking.

Pulice’s music has a variety of tags and eccentricities that as well, expand our ways of thinking. The kinds that lightfully tease and playfully stretch the ways in which one can approach their digitally processed saxophone recordings. We’ve seen their work in two labels and one consistent collaborator (Lynn Avery, aka Iceblink) that seems to be fostering these sounds with a curious open heart: Orange Milk and Moon Glyph. For the former label, the LCM Signal Quest tape of fall 2020 is perhaps the greatest introductory text into the world of “goo core”: noise being approached like bright, malleable plato instead of crushing, carbon-black steel. For the latter label, Pulice has been tied to “ambient jazz,” a moniker that moonlights more as a non-de-plume for people who need a shorthand to easily establish more free-form, textured recordings that just happen to be based around synthesizers and brass instrumentation.

That isn’t to say that the work Pulice has been doing over the past 2.5+ years, which has slowly teeterd out at the behest of delays or other discrepancies, does not intersect with a jazz context. Their CV on the Moon Glyph label–features on Lynn Avery’s 2020 Iceblink LP, their blissed out duo tape from February, and Pulice’s previous solo album, all albums that timespend and pitch shift reliable jazz contexts into personable, warped adventures. All of these releases have been quite exceptional in their ability to “zone”. Yet Pulice’s latest, Scry, is the first release where I feel as if the Oakland/Minneapolis artist has hit a tremendous stride in capturing the blissful quirks of digitally processed saxophone and (wind) synthesizer that imagines a true open world.

Scry’s near-three year development, articulated into the C28’s 8 cuts, willfully invokes 20th century electroacoustic mavericks. Hassell, Behrman, Oliveros, Budd, Brown, & Payne are all alluded to as points of interest. Pulice’s fascination with the mending of hardware and software found in these maverick’s projects inspired themself to create their own pedal board set-up where they are able to control the signal processing in-real time. Even still, Pulice’s approach is deeply playful and jubilant, not merely attuned to just perfoming a tribute as a stock classicist would. Within this approach Pulice parallels the nativity and utilitarian awe of those electroacoustic pioneers, capturing lightning in a bottle experiments and balladry that eclipses kankyō ongaku.

One humongous factor that simultaneously separates Pulice from the classics and advances their own electroacoustic vision is their devout adherence to a “gamer logic”, as it could be dubbed. The lad carries a knowledge base and dedication to the run of 90s Square SNES and PS1 RPGs. I would not be surprised if they have spent time in video game worlds just in awe of the pixels. The quips of Square’s detailed sound design are reflected in Cole’s own, sometimes within the brief sleights that occupy 4 tracks or as a feature of a main piece. The titles of side A opener HP / MP and side B opener Moon Gate Rune are not jargons but bristlings and twinkly baroque stage setters. Their brevity carries the speed and fluidity of scrolling through a video game menu screen, loading up and customizing all the options. Another brevitous cut, Driftglass warps one out of wherever they are to a hilltop of delicate spirally, minimal textures. Spool is as gaseous and droney as the tape functions at, still inquisitive and carrying all the hallmarks of traversing an open-air bazaar in a port district. These four shorter pieces are not interludes though, moreso earnestly cunning improvisations that gesture towards the thrill of being lost in role-playing.

There are still, mesmerizing songs and goodness! These compositions are akin to a fall vacation in any futuristically fictive way or fact-laden nostalgic past. Astral Cowpoke is defined by its steady drum machine track as Pulice’s saxophone squiggles around into unwieldy sound tornadoes–all the while, small flickers of gurgling bass or chipper “secret collect!” noises reflect the most brilliant serendipitous moments of finding yourself in a strange place. City in a City rivals Patrick Shiroishi at his most revelrous. Stripping back the digital processing, Pulice lets a simple piano loop and bassline be the framework as their saxophone strikes up a watercolor still life of domestic bliss: quiet kitchen cooking, frivolous boyish activities, and a sapphire blue sky are all images one could deduce from the Fuubutsushi-adjacent recording. Glitterdark subtracts the saxophone (or purposely warps one looping sound out of it) in lieu of pushing forth a synthesizer at its most revenant. It can recall grandiose cathedrals as much as time scanning Forerunner databases.

That brings us to the closing title track. At once its Pulice’s most meat n’ potatoes composition, the one that could distinctly have fit on a previous of their Moon Glyph endeavors. It moves hypnotically, teasing out small tantalizing quips within the sound design while allowing the quiet, personal warmth of their saxophone to foreground the track in a bliss state. About halfway, a lulling, softly wonky loop creates a percussive beat that every element seems to respond and move to, if not outright…yearn for. It’s rare that an amalgamation of sound, stripped back and analyzed part by part, reveals each sound fitting like puzzle pieces. They do not just quite ache to be pieced together, but to amount to a paean for seeing a future. And Scry really do be crystalline gazing into a future.

Pro-dubbed cassette, imprint, sticker, full color artwork available from the Moon Glyph Bandcamp

Muave – IMAGINARY

10.18.22 by Matty McPherson

It’s nearing another big number (400 to be precise), and Already Dead remains a most dedicated (domestic) label when it comes to a consistent barrage of new sounds; from whatever is happening anywhere at any time, really. It’s a bonafide minor league where the beauty of its variety keeps my eyes opened. Anything can catch me. Case in point: the label opened 2022 with an immediate leftfield and most welcome zoner that captured a real slice of a moment. Muave’s Imaginary. Returning alum, Nandele Maguni, finds himself in a trio with Chris Born and João Roxo during a live performance at the Gala Gala Festival in Maputo, just a little more than a year ago.

Maguni’s been developing beats for an era; earliest I’ve seen of his uploaded them to Bandcamp dating back to 2013. He’s worked in and around the coastal capitol of Moçambique, Maputo, and its scene of electronic music, with a speciality pushed towards tactical refinements of trap. He’s denoted trap as a “warrior sound” The pulse of the Africa. Interviews with Maguni reflect a person who has a dedicated ear and pulse to the modern sounds of Maputo–traffic and coal carts, industrialization and street culture. It’s a dedicated, craft for Maguni that he brings a swiftly resilient and consistent process to. In one interview, he claimed that once a beat is done, after a few tweaks he moves on. This can make for bonafide bangers, but his under praised Plafonddeinst tape for Already Dead back in 2020 revealed his capacity for ambience and transitory affairs. The Muave trio actively twerk with that vision, adding in an extra laptop and a whiff of ambient keys that present delirious, multifaceted soundscapes.

Perhaps this is because the trio are able to squeeze a lot of finesse and push them into time-bending loops out of their four main pieces on the tape. Each one is a sort of quadrant this sound can tackle, all built around trap’s mechanics, but now pitched shifted and warped into ambient big bass chill out, acid techno gone wonky, street-level dub of a most industrial accord, and longform club DJ bangers. Opening fourteen minute cut, S701 Noise, brings around late 80s synth bass (enough to recall Massive Attack’s Five Man Army), glitched out space electronics, and just a pulsing trap line that’s swinging and grounding all of those elements. The cut’s pulse is sinister and riveting even as it harkens to a chill out room. Born and Roxo slowly tease out soundscapes and let them, confidently evolve into a pervasive dub fog. Ambient trap can be a detailed listen.

It can also just be a fun as hell one; Nalombo is a steady 7 minute absolute pout of amped up boppin’ bliss. The video linked below of Maguni is absolutely wonderful; a euphoria and ecstatic charisma hangs over his face of what shenanigans the trio just cracked themselves into. The whole thing looks considerably “hype,” recalling his rooftop sampling and display of FRESH beats in you can find online. 09 00 24 builds from the ground up, with nature samples and wind instruments setting a stage for those lime green tasty synths from before with a slick low end of trap rhythm that hit with a punching bag knockout. It’s sounds like a flowing trance state for the trio. Enough to knock psychedelic void energy on knockout “final boss” of a closer. Motorcycles, static electricity, whistles, alarms; all tied together by dub texture. The immediacy of the tantalizingly metallic trap percussive sounds come out on the laptop, but the tape listen over speakers continued in that ambient-esque lineage. Truly a blessed release.

VERY Limited Cassette & VHS, as well as a Bundle of the two are available at the Already Dead Bandcamp & Already Dead Tapes Webstore

Ian MacPhee – Everything

10.7.22 by Matty McPherson

Ventura art space show with a five band bill can put you in contact with a lot of chaps. Had a moment to catch up with my two favorite Cal Arts oriented Flenser-core acts: Sprain (LP2 one day in another dimension) and Drowse (who is currently working on a doctorate there in performing arts; rock on sir). Both continuing to evolve as humans and refine their own documentations of 2020s era decrepit mindsets and botched pathways to human transcendence; alright that’s just a fancy way for me to say “I think their doom-laden sounds hit the q-zone for what DIY can provide at the moment.” Anyways, one of the chaps on the bill was Ian MacPhee. He’s done an ample job keeping one ear tethered to the world of Moon Glyph, Aural Canyon, HausMo, Orange Milk, and other ambience in Simi Valley, a special kind of suburban dystopia.

Everything is MacPhee’s C20ish demo release (2 tracks on Bandcamp, with a third bonus on the tape), likely the first sounds he’s decided to amply share with the world. “Line 6 DL4, Yamaha Portasound, the sounds outside my house [in Simi Valley, CA].” that’s the template he’s serving on. It likely deserves a home in your collection if you have a heart for “freeway ambience” and “subterranean overpass rave.” Seriously, that’s the best way I can describe the longforms and the surprisingly detailed short rave single that interludes between them. The title track lands somewhere between whatever maverick energy Jefre Cantu-Ledesma found himself nestled with on the radiant longform work of Tracing Back the Radiance. Seriously, just imagine a gargantuan six lane interstate carrying you out of the SFV by moonlight. MacPhee might as well have, taking a mix of chill out room ambience (from small electronic squiggles to field recordings) and pouring it into a soft yet powerfully radiating guitar drone. It’s the whole framework of the Side A longform, those chords played out like a series of deep breaths, longing to glide off towards somewhere far away.

Meanwhile, “LEAVING” opens side 2 as a rather enigmatic ethereal near-rave soundscape. Guitar reverb mended by murky drum machines that sound like they were captured from one flooded basement over; all the while the edges of the sound frizzle and fry. It’s a memory of an energy flash more than a snapshot of a rave outright, a fantastic proof of concept for where MacPhee could well end up on his next release. Shame it can only sustain itself for three-ish minutes, as that frizzle sudden deteriorates the ferric until it just swallows itself whole, but then again that’s what makes it such a potent track. Spring pt. 2 appears to close at the tape; it’s the most straightfoward ambient cut as well as a bit of a ghostly sound hunt. MacPhee teases small glimmers of feedback while a strange, squiggly aberration tip toes across the frequencies. It ebbs and flows, using small impasses of noise as if to suggest a tension. Although its quick fade out perhaps leaves the track as is, more a suggestion of what’s to come than a full blown assault.

Limited run of hand dubbed cassettes, design by Jeremy Colegrove, available at the Ian MacPhee Bandcamp page

Invertebrates – Demo

10.3.22 by Matty McPherson

If my brother is sending me a punk tape and I really haven’t a proper clue of what Im to do with it, I let it sizzle. I’d dub this an act of tender love and affection, but the truth is I should of had six minutes sooner! if you have six minutes, you should just do the right thing and take every tape as a study break from real work–enough to study those differences between the shades of hardcore punk; this is real scholarly activity that puts you on the level of Zorn! Such was the case with my excursion listening to Invertebrates, a Richmond, VA based punk quartet that my brother happened to make posters for and somehow knew to save me a tape. Thanks brother, I dearly appreciated this.

Anyways, with limited promotion, Raleigh, NC-based label Sorry State Records and Invertebrates seemed to quickly and quietly sell out of two runs of tapes for this demo. Exactly what was the fuss? Well Chubb, Merm, Jerry, and Minx–some of which are members of Public Aid and “NC punk legends WRIGGLE”–hashed out a bonafide burst of hardcore, pristine ’82 vintage energy; any SST tape hound who thinks “Spot-handshake deal” production is the pinnacle of guitar music will find joy in these 4 cuts. They screen printed the tapes, with slight deviations between the covers. It’s a power move that genuinely indicates “this ain’t no crapshoot, but a quality product that is one of a kind and yours to cherish.”

Over the course of nearly six minutes, the quartet hit the ground with mad-capper energy, power chords, and an unwieldy good time. It’s not so much that this does extend quite well to the pits of Gonerfest or the pages of Maximum Rock n’ Roll, but that these little energy burst is primed and directed with finesse. Clearly, these 4 tracks are explosive, but its a precise “carpet-bomb” type of explosion they burst out. Even while all the cuts are kept to the red (with vocals delivered over a collect call line from hell), there’s a significant push-and-pull melody that keeps a zany, unkempt swagger; the kind that ebbs and flows enough to tell that even if the guitar is slashing and going “AWOOGA,” its the drums who run the tempo and dictate the direction. Such is in particular on Shit Pit’s devious breakdown and shotgun rush blast beats that practically kick the tempo up high enough to force the guitar solo to speed up.

Demo sold out at all sources, although it remains name your price, with all proceeds going to the Richmond Reproductive Freedom Project. Chip in, won’t you?

Yes Selma – Dulce en Rune

9.21.22 by Matty McPherson

Chad Beattie’s Yes Selma project is self-described as “the musical vehicle of expression.” Recorded near the start of the year, the multi-instrumentalist creates his own, jubilant one-man orchestras. It’s a joyous ruckus that layers and loops these swap meet sorts of worlds; beautiful treasures hidden amongst the junkers. It’s music that feels as out of time as Dead Can Dance or the folk traditions Power/Rollins and other collaborators nestle into.

An opening field recording is practically a red herring, masking what is a wicked round of hammered dulcimer or glockenspiel driven music. It has that feeling that can summon fall festivities–like Heron’s increasingly radiant instrumentation (and synthesizer usage), or go deep into reminiscents of gothic cathedrals and graveyards, like on Crow. There, the clank of a ritualistic percussive and salon piano eat the world whole. One Red Bird twinkles whilst an alto sax solo from what sounds of an underground cave throws in a rustic quality to the recently designated ambient jazz buzz. But even this song’s spirit is not wallpaper, but horse! Side A closes with Dix Creek Blues, featuring a lovely, fluid performance from the only other musician on this tape, one Creek.

Side A’s amalgamation of ideas does give way to the utter beauty and simplicity of Side B. Snow is Falling is Asheville is simply that, a delicate dance of the hammered dulcimer and twinkling glockenspiel that fulfills a pastoral fantasy. A motorik, droned impulse channels through the piece that puts it in line as a spiritual cousin to Bulbis’ masterful paeans to lockdown. However, Beattie truly comes into their own with Blue Ridge. Here, the hammered dulcimer’s tuning gives it an imagined regionality to its sound as a few key keys of a piano are repeated as if to invoke a stately presence. It rattles with a regenerative spirit, the energy of a blessed fall harvest being celebrated with dance and bountiful feast. Needless to say, I hadn’t anticipated such an otherworldly yet plainspoken affair to find its way into my walkman. But as it goes.

Dulce en Rune is available in the ever-useful cassette format. Layout by David Van designs. Chrome tape is forever. Limited Edition

John O’Neill – Cine/Hollywood Tow

9.19.22 by Matty McPherson

Earlier this year the Tabs Out East Coast CEO went ahead and premiered a novel invention for noise practitioners. A simple paper sheet, designating set time lengths and genre variation, that should help the scene with schedule organization and variations. At the local noise coffee shop where I frequent, all the trendy noiseniks have been hailing the invention as a boon, the thing that will start an earnest dialogue about what the perfect set length is. We all want this. Admit it, you do too.

I suppose though that there will always be artists that can subvert the need for such paper sheets by sheer talent. The ones who internally understand that when their piece is done, well it is done and no sheet will designate otherwise. John O’Neill is one such fella with a finger on the pulse there. The LA-based artist has remained uncollected for quite a while, that is until Hot Releases finally made a cold call and copitulated to a perfect “no fat or lean” C28 back in January. Cine / Hollywood Tow is 3 whip-smart variations on a theme: “meditative yet solitarily vibing” more or less. Exactly how it is to be achieved comes through the three live performances that make it clear there is no singular manner to the endeavor.

Side A is completely dominated by “Backyard at Zoey & Craig’s 5/27/21”, which finds O’Neill quickly digging into towards stateless, “open-zone” ambient. There’s nary an undercurrent of brooding anger or simmering rage gestating within the just-shy of 15 minutes performance. Ponderous, brisk synth fog, mousy electronic squeals, and small haptics drone into a Pacific Northwest night walk; low to the ground, deep in the soil–chilled and billed. Even a crow that makes a brilliant stage debut; enough that made me turn my back to check if the garage was open. As the piece draws up, a strange sudden quivering pulse comes through, as it to foreshadow the b-side.

Two tracks here on side-b are wisely cut new adventures down in LA. The UCLA-recorded experiment, 69.000.1 startles at first with the change up in palette. O’Neill still finds comfort in abrasive droning textures and sine wave low frequency oscillation. At piercing volumes, it takes me back to anti-gravity rides at the county fair as much as those dreaded “room of mirrors.” Soon though, we’re inside a wild chainsaw demolition derby in Los Angeles with Station to Station (AM Band). Bouts of generator noise, radio hellscape noise, and evil robot blacksmith” field recording noise all intermingle into a playful final boss form. Yet as time moves, a pulsing drum beat moves to the forefront as the noise drone decays. It’s a fusion that provides the industrial strength backbone and excitement. His noise bashes become more smart bomb-oriented. They honk and wail, even sputtering like a Squidward robot trying to fire off lasers or an arcade machine that wants to offer free change. It never bores over its 11 minute run-time; perfect length from what all the noiseniks are saying at the coffee shop.

It was only released 8 days into this year; sadly sold out for a long time but perhaps not a long time?

Moon Bros – Le Jaz Mystique

9.9.22 by Matty McPherson

It’s LATE summer. The time where the cupeth overflows with crisp golden lagers and the sounds of garden splendor. Sounds quaint but it’s also my own personal hell. Have you ever had a day where you just got feck all happening so you commit the cardinal sin of a wake n’ bake instead of doing Real Tasks? Good times! Usually when this happens I at least try to make a day of it. Fancy movie from the silent era of the silver screen? That with any instrumental tape as a personal soundtrack untangles the weed haze into a personalized cinematic experience. A soundtracked bus ride is also equally as compelling an experience and I’m less likely to grow weary. 

Anyways, I was just thinking the other day about the Tim Stine Trio’s Fresh Demons–man what a jazz tape! I could use something like that, those tumbly guitars and all the bells and whistles. Well fortunately, in between nabbing headshots for his (unconfirmed) role in the U2 biopic, Ryley Walker’s Husky Pants Records is once again stumping for tapes. Moon Bros’ Le Jazz Mystique is the latest release for the label, bringing recent Colorado immigrant, Fred Schneider and his solo 12 string guitar project back to Chicago. The need for this was unknown.

Unlike previous releases that have utilized pedals as pathways to psychedelia, Schneider goes for no-frills guitar maverick majesty. The move to a staunchly realist aesthetic pushes the tape towards a new mode of psychedelia. One practically capturing the feeling of an Italian post-war nitrate classic. However, even with the opener Jitterbug I, you can sense that there’s a great sense of romanticism and a lackadaisical nature to the space. The ebbs and flows of these pieces have tightly wound rhythms in their structure. It renders brief pivots or sly chord shifts into a mental image like a title card! Meanwhile, the following long winding setpieces function as unmoving, grainy one-takes (track titles themselves suggest the take number more than anything) of the mental action. It’s not a dance in the rubble, but a celebration of gracious planes and ample outdoor vistas. 

The simple pleasure of the tape leads to a miraculous one-two closer. The rootin-tootin Honeysuckle Rose III strums with the finesse of oil on canvas, quickly changing from a deep shade of pained, bitter blue into a rustic countryside medley of orange and reds. Don’t Be That Way II meanwhile imagines a soundtrack for a square dance reuniting a familial celebration. It’s airy, evanescent playing keeping an eye-winking energy afoot. Worthy of a glass of the juiciest Syrah and finest silent sunday feature, Le Jaz Mystique tumbles and weaves with a one-track minded exuberance. A dream in heaven for a hound such as myself. 

Edition of 100 tapes dubbed in real time to hi bias cassettes. “it sounds perfect. in hand, ships immediately” from Husky Pants Records

Irarrázabal / Baldwin – Grips

9.7.22 by Matty McPherson

At 1:34 on my dream day, I walk into the local world class wine & beer market. I make a mad dash for the 50% off table. It’s flush! Just with all my enemies, unfortunately: hazy ipas 4 months past their shelf life and coalescing into a flight risk; saisons that have less personality than the Michelin man; “grape ales” with brett added to turn any party into a “pour one out and cry session;” a cassette from Tripticks Tapes entitled Grips. Wait, how’d that tape get there? Why the feck is Amanda Irarrázabal’s and Nat Baldwin’s double bass improvisation, recorded in August of 2021 and released as a C27, doing on the beer table? This tape just HAS to be straight edge, it just doesn’t have that energy in it!

Naturally, I take it to the register with my “class A enemy” beers. I use my rewards membership, because I like earning points just in case I wanna splurge for an $8 triple IPA that will fail me (they never cease to!). The man sees me purchasing these all. “Buddy,” he graciously tells me with the power of 1000 bodybuliders, “this tape changed my life. It taught me how to drink these beers.” I’m incredulous. I don’t understand how this gentleman and scholar could learn to drink and contemplate the most brazen of beer from the most elliptical and sardonic of double-double bass recordings. I stare into his lone monocle-drenched eye. “Tell me gentleman scholar, how so?”

The gentleman scholar at the counter proceeds to express, in the most beautiful of diction and concise of syntax, his knowledge. Knowledge of how Baldwin and Irarrázabal, whomst had never met in the flesh before meeting on that cramped stage, would spend 27 minutes with unkempt, yet unwavering grins (under their masks) on their faces and a casual wardrobe. Knowledge of how their exploits, over the composition hereby known as Grips, was as spiffy and fleet as a pilsner, but with the droning, recondite pleasures of brett yeast. “You see, when Baldwin and Irarrázabal joust, the clash is akin to synesthesia; it’s a novel flavor you sorta taste and have to hoard for yourself. Their joust is unnerved in its quips and stretches, even as it steadies and stills itself, it can’t help but jolt or twitch. All the while, they still find ways to bring in percussive elements of the bass akin to a coinstar pump n’ dump or boozy triple; drone worthy of the low level listening experience tang of a sour; why even the acoustics are that of a rustic palette akin to the farmhouse ale!” It all sounded too good to be true as I was tapping my credit card and dropping an extra dollar for lotto.

“Gentleman Scholar, this sounds too good to be true!” I bemoaned. “Like, these two Irarrázabal and Baldwin chaps and all these darn noises they’r-” “Highly technical sounds!” the Gentleman Scholar corrected me. “Right, these highly technical sounds, how can they be in service to improving the flavor of a Brett ale?” I gandered. Perhaps I seemed to near-sighted as the clerk responded. “It’s in the vividness. The way these instruments, believed to be so blunt and ‘black and white’ in their approach, can achieve a thriller level funk and uncanny esoteric dividends for the bass! It’s about the process and the excitement of a new amalgamation; when it brightens up the synapses of your mind that’s just the cherry on top” I pondered the fluorescent yellow cassette, peering into its soul, imagining the sounds I’d soon come to hear.

The clerk was no scoundrel. As the dream day turned into a dream night with the beers, Baldwin and Irarrázabal sashayed and moseyed through a variety of acrobatic sleights. With only 27 minutes, their plucky style of jazz stays precocious. Their movements are steady leaps of faith, an implicit trust carrying the weightlessness of the effort along. It made me a better listener as much as a beer aesthetic ponderer. I suppose that happens sometimes to the best of us.

Dania – Voz

8.19.22 by Matty McPherson

Today, Geographic North is celebrating an important catalog number milestone by welcoming Dania Shihab into the exclusive club of discrete zone weavers. Yes, the masses will proclaim that GN is being “pro-mogul” with yet another label runner (M. Sage, Brian Foote, Felicia Atkinson, even Jefre-Cantu Ledesma) joining for an esteemed cut. Rather though, I implore that we should cherish each release and newcomer as another crevice into their evolving tapestry; the sense of place and memory in GN releases has become a recurring label focus. Their latest, Dania’s Voz is an ode to that spirit. Over its 23 minutes Shihab unspools a nimble execution of ambient loops, vocal exploration, and “process trusting” modular synthesis, whose brevity marks inspired moments of radiance and hermitage.

Dania, aka the titular wife of Shawn Reynaldo’s superb MY WIFE HAS BETTER TASTE THAN I DO sub-section of the essential First Floor newsletter, has been a Dublab DJ, COVID frontline doctor, and also a label mogul. Her work in Barcelona with Paralaxe Editions could be described as minimalist, unhurried, and homespun. The choice to work with Geographic North is a moment of “game recognizing game” considering how Paralaxe Editions employs their own high-end aesthetic design and analog machine imprinting into their tapes. The label’s own releases though only offer a partial framework into Dania’s own interests in environmental music. Previous editions of her Dublab program had further honed in on these realms, while her (tumultuous) work perhaps envisioned such tones as treatments for various ailments.

Last year’s tapes in GN’s Sketches for Winter series had their own aquatic-tinged auras, while Dania’s Voz often tiptoes the “quite ancient but also rather futuristic” dichotomy with finesse. Its 23 minutes have the world building of a humongous RPG, as winged instrumentals convey snowpack melting in forests, desert sunrises on sand dunes, and incandescent realms of worship. Yes, there’s a dream pop tag in the bandcamp descriptor, although “ambient music but for gamers who do this shit alone” is more apt. It is a tape that presents Dania’s measured talent as a solo sound architect; these are personal spaces that reveal their own personal solitudes. These are lonely or pained kinds mind you. Just solaces encountered in one’s travels.

I Lied’s introduction to the tape is basal; an affair centered around misted vocal loops that harmonize and further each other as the piece swells to a plateau. The echoes all serving as a reminder that this is of her own accord. When Alpeh picks up though, there are now drones taking a key focus in the palette, beginning a steady stretch to reverent lengths. Dania’s sound palette brings in flutes and keys as her vaporous vocal mantras flow, itself creating a piece of music falling between post-Windham Hill and Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. Fire Dash’s hypnotic deep breathing loops invoked Cemetery of Splendor’s otherworldly, eerie colored circulatory systems. As a trio of tracks stand, it actively is pushing one of our their own assumptions of general time, even as they only barely crack 10 minutes and all differ in the approach taken.

At the center of the tape stands Whale Song, a close ancillary to an ambient pop epic. Dania hums small harmonic whirlwinds, her synths percolate between tones, and inklings of field recording ambience procure a grandiose scale, even within its own isolation. The swirls of An Individual stand as just that, one individual modulating their voice into the symphony that plays within a forerunner elevator, eliciting a sublime reaction. The Other Thing Is offers the greatest, if not still a subtle, shift in Dania’s sound world. Piano keys are emphasized as life recordings of plaza life strut around the edges; a relaxed, if not dissociated moment amongst a crowd that suddenly–well it just suddenly dissipates as these moment are known to. Finally, that leaves us at our denouement, Anomaly. It’s a considerate bookend to I Lied, doubling down on the same voice looping and ambient synth textures. Although, its noticeable springier and less misty; not as lonesome as it stood twenty minutes prior.

Within Voz‘s 23 minutes, there’s a genuine sense that Dania could have tinkered with the length of any of these pieces however she sought to. Still, by preserving a brevity within these recordings, the whole affect over 23 minutes is spellbinding; you could have told me it was double and I’d have believed you. It’s a testament to the simplicity of this guarded sonic approach, that these 7 tracks all fit like perfect puzzle pieces, imparting uncanny affects of emotional resonance.

Edition of 200 Tapes available at the Geographic North Bandcamp Page

Prom – EP

8.18.22 by Matty McPherson

Is there a sludge energy (sludgenergy?) in the air? Back in April at the Wednesday gig, the local bar had two alternate local bands. The house cup went with flying colors to Prom’s simple “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it; also don’t overdub it too” approach to sludge and fuzz. Timeless atmospherics that can translate to a lo-fi excursion. Their C16 isn’t focused on epic though. 4 tracks of equal riff-driven proportion, two to each side.

It’s a tenacious spot for the quartet. A 7″ would not quite have spotlit the quartet’s lockstep basement jamming. Side A’s Mars & Fauna are not exactly a two part epic, but their intrinsic flow into each other helps set a sense of expectations. Mars’ lurches while Fauna rains down a crashing kick drum and cymbal refrain. Passion and technique meeting through the hiss and leaving a restless sense as the tape jumps over.

Max’s feedback laden riff, driven by a boomed out drum beat–in monitor mix mode. It gives an uncanny sense the sound is machine driven, as sludge guitars ponder a desolate waste. Then the two enter a LOUD blast and fury–eclipsing the mix into crisp territories. Ruiner is the biggest noise rocker–the sole track to feature vocals of an individual hashing and lashing out gurgling grievances and blood shot frustration. A prevalent sense of dread washes the first half, until it pivots into classic doom metal crests and waves. In the final minute, there’s another pivot into SST-style hardcore, as if it really can rise about the narrator’s woes; of course a return into Prom’s fuzzsludge just is too good too pass up for that final chorus and outro.

The band stuck around and sold tapes from their merch table for $5 a piece. They only pressed 50 and their sparse Bandcamp suggests it is currently sold out. San Diego music of this caliber is few and far between. It’s akin to panhandlings for diamonds in the rough without a map, so I’d be mighty fascinated if they make another pressing for online buyers.