New Music – Page 258 – Queen City Sounds and Art

sub sequence Evokes a Sense of the Mystical, the Mythic and the Primordial on “seize release”

SubSequence1_Crop — sub sequence, photo courtesy the artist

There is a sense of deep ocean and a dreamlike state on “seize release” by sub sequence. The chimes and bell tones amid a steady beat and organ resonating in stereo as female vocals intone in something like a chant suggest a subterranean journey of some kind to a place deep in the earth or deep in the heart, to a cthonic shrine where fiery coals burn with an incense designed to cleanse the brain of personal darkness. Fans of the more mystical side of William Orbit’s 1993 Strange Cargo III, in particular “The Monkey King” will appreciate the way the track engulfs you in a sense of the otherworldly and mythical with an expert use of depth of sonic field where low end is strong but of soft impact and the percussion tribal and hypnotic in counterpoint to the synth swells that exert their own trance-inducing effect. Listen to “seize release” on Soundcloud and follow sub sequence at the links provided.

soundcloud.com/subsequenz
subsequence.bandcamp.com

Joel Ansett’s “Slow Down” is a Rejection of the Modern Rat Race

JoelAnsett_SlowDown_cover_crop — Joel Ansett, “Slow Down” cover (cropped)

Joel Ansett was inspired by a Dallas Willard quote in writing “Slow Down”: “you must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life.” In America where being a workaholic is praised and bravado about how hard one can work and always being on it’s easy to forget how that’s a pathological and unhealthy mindset that burns people out and causes early deaths through a variety of means. It also engenders a society where people don’t take time to assess and consider what it is they’re doing and why they’re doing it, what they say and why they’re saying it—in short, no time to be reflective when you’re always scrambling. The downtempo song with a robust low end, thick, textural atmospheres and Ansett’s vocals outlines how making ourselves performative creatures has warped our individual and collective psyches when we’d be better off with a more organic and human pace to life and creating and not expecting others to always be on and at our beck and call because of what? Money? Status? Ansett more than suggests our lives are worth more than a rat race to appease commerce and social pressure. Listen on Soundcloud and follow Ansett at the links below.

joelansett.com
soundcloud.com/joel-ansett
youtube.com/joelansett
twitter.com/joelansett
facebook.com/JoelAnsettMusic
instagram.com/joelansett

tummyache’s “In Between” Captures the State Between Bouts of Anxiety With Melancholic and Melodic Perfection

On “In Between,” Soren Bryce as tummyache really dives deep into what it feels like to be at the bottom end of your life and feeling helpless and lacking in the willpower to make it better and to help your friends. So you have to start with feeling better and hope that’s a rung on the ladder to better days. The swirl of guitar sparkling and humming to life is like the static and fog of emotions that are wrapped around you and they fade out for moments of clarity embodied by Bryce’s vivid vocals in which she confesses to being in a place of weakness and remorseful for having behaved badly and any acting out though unable to help herself at the time. The feeling of anxiety is so well articulated in the sense of being crushed and trapped by that feeling and not having control but yearning to transcend it because you have known a time in your life when it didn’t seem like your psyche was being smothered and wracked by an internal self-torturer. Bryce conveys perfectly how when suffering through those periods you have to snatch moments of feeling okay or comforted by small things because simply overcoming anxiety long term seems insurmountable and the work to get there overwhelming. It’s a song for soothing and exorcising those feelings with a wash of beautifully melancholic atmospheres and Bryce’s ability to demonstrate she’s been there and understands the crippling angst and emotional paralysis well.

The Maximalist Approach to Minimal Techno on Israel Kimchi’s “Live DJ FilmSet #1” Gives it Riveting Diversity and Depth

IsraelKimchi1_crop — Israel Kimchi, photo courtesy the artist

Israel Kimchi meticulously crafts a short set on the video for “Live DJ FilmSet #1.” Bringing in echoing tones, pulsing electronic bass, a driving cadre of percussion (electronic and acoustic—much of which he performs live) brought to bear creatively throughout and a progressive house compositional sensibility that centers the sounds and keeps a focus even as seemingly endless layers of sound are brought in without crowding the sonic field as Kimchi expertly adds and removes layers with a seamless precision. He brings in elements of the exotic in the percussion and samples and his builds dropping off into space are masterful rather than predictable. This track may be “Minimal Techno House” but Kimchi’s approach is maximalist in the sound palette and judiciously employed throughout the song’s more than sixteen minutes in a way that holds your attention with enough both variety and consistency. The pace is consistent but the use of dynamics in conjunction with bringing in sounds and themes gives the song a wonderfully colorful quality beginning to end. Including in the last third of the song where there’s a great use of samples of “Psycho Killer” by Talking Heads. Watch the video on YouTube and follow Israel Kimchi at the links provided.

israelkimchi.com
soundcloud.com/israelkimchi
youtube.com/IsraelkimchiOfficial
facebook.com/IsraelKimchiOfficial
instagram.com/israelkimchi

Richard Swingle Brings Fire Down on Local Greed and Corruption on the Passionate “Gravy Train”

RichardSwingle1_crop — Richard Swingle, photo courtesy the artist

Richard Swingle’s “Gravy Train” single from his new EP Older Bones starts off sounding like a typical Americana blues track with the shuffling percussion and borderline bluegrass if not for the slide guitar putting some atmospheric touches at the edges. As the song progresses the vocals become more intense and the guitar work and rhythm unfurl in bursts of emotion. The raw quality of the song at that point is reminiscent of Sixteen Horsepower and the way that band held the fire in check until it was time to let it out. Thematically the song is a pointed critique of greed and the assumption of dignity and respect one has when moneyed even when that wealth is at the expense of those that helped create it. Swingle punctures that bubble with some choice rhetoric delivered with passion. Listen to the song on Soundcloud and follow Swingle at the links below.

open.spotify.com/artist/3Qy8eg9VXUgZ9x8T58ZbvD
richardswingle.bandcamp.com

Drug Hunt Blow the Lid Off the Foundations of Modern Conformity With “The Tower”

DrugHunt1_crop — Drug Hunt, photo courtesy the artists

“The Tower” by Drug Hunt fools you a little with the warping grind of the opening stretch of music and when the vocals come in like they might in a Kyuss or Sleep song it evolves during the course of its nearly six and a half minutes into raga-inflected art rock passages circa the weirder ends of Emerson, Lake & Palmer, fiery yet fluid runs and majestic, crushing, dark blues. The title of the song is interesting given the lyrics outline a situation happening in the world today when the vested authority structure is crumbling in America and beyond and many people cling to what they know rather than embrace change and thinking for themselves outside their usual cultural and political affiliations. Of course in America this has been helped along by a figure whose policies boost and support the power of his own oligarchic class and the establishment generally but whose cognitive ability is so lacking he is destroying the foundations at the same time. The Tower in the Tarot is a card signifying both the destruction of the established power structures and authority, turning the existing order upside-down, it represents revolution and instant enlightenment and illumination in the eruption of the top of the tower. The card correlates to the astrological sign Sagittarius and thus a Bill Hicks connection that would suit the psychedelic sound here as well. The song itself escalates to that moment and brings the symbolic flame out to a satisfying denouement. Listen to “The Tower” on Soundcloud and follow Drug Hunt and their experimental and conceptual psychedelia at the links below.

facebook.com/drughuntband
instagram.com/drughuntband

Possimiste Bridges the Quantum Gap to Sing a Love Ode to Her Alternate Self on “Unseeable”

Possimiste_Unseen1_crop — Possimiste, image courtesy the artist

“Unseeable” by Possimiste strikes one as a beautiful synthesis of The Space Lady and Kate Bush. It’s pop music but one from some alien civilization that isn’t inundated with bad examples of how it should sound. The glockenspiel, twinkling synth swirls and Possimiste’s unique vocals straight out of the realm of Lord Dunsany’s The King of Elfland’s Daughter. In its lyrics it’s like an ode to a twin from another quantum reality connected by a kind of magic mirror or psychological technology that bridges the cosmic chasm. Somehow Possimiste combines tones wistful and bittersweet in equal measure making for an enchanting listen that promises more strangeness ahead for this Estonian songwriter. Listen on Soundcloud and follow Possimiste at the links below.

possimiste.com
soundcloud.com/possimiste
instagram.com/possimiste

The Video for Ros Gilman’s “Fresh Air” is a Dynamic Graphical Representation of the Meeting of Mathematics and Imagination

RosGilman1_crop — Ros Gilman, photo courtesy the artist

Ros Gilman’s song “Fresh Air” unfolds and expands like the images in the music video. Simple piano melody joined by sampled vocals and layers of percussion. Later joined by horns and all represented mathematically by a dynamic EQ meter on screen throughout the song whether in mirrored top and bottom, down the middle, in various arcs like geographical features in the musical world presented. Playful bell tones are reminiscent of The Art of Noise though the track is well within the realm of a deep house aesthetic informed by a free jazz sensibility and a flowing free association employment of sounds to suit each moment while remaining thematically coherent. Fans of Future Sound of London and IDM of that ilk will find much to like here as organic sounds are mixed in so well with the electronic composition and sound design. Watch the video and follow Ros Gilman at the links below.

rosgilman.com
open.spotify.com/artist/4encGefmC48XGvJod2eBr2
youtube.com/rosgilman
twitter.com/rosgilman
facebook.com/rosgilman
instagram.com/rosgilman

Broughton’s Aching “R.I.P. Joyce” is the Heartbreaking Tribute to Struggling With the Passing of a Loved One

Broughton2_crop — Broughton, photo courtesy the artist

Somber echoing piano, minor chord progression synth drones and a sampling of rain serve as the evocative backdrop of Broughton’s “R.I.P. Joyce.” It’s about the artist’s struggle with the passing of his grandmother due to cancer. The ache in his voice as he spits bars like graffiti poetry on the walls of his psyche and tries to make sense of the loss of a woman in his life who was such an important figure and presence who shaped who he is, who supported him and helped him to see things in his life more clearly. Presumably she encouraged his creative endeavors and his development as a human being yet never got to see him perform his own music in front of an audience. Broughton consoles himself, to the extent possible, with the hope that his Nan looking down on him from the afterlife with a sense of pride. It’s a powerful composition that at close to four minutes feels like more like half that because Broughton conveys so well that moment of sorrow that may never go away but also always means your poignant appreciation for your loved one lost never goes away as well. Listen on Spotify and follow Broughton at the links below.

soundcloud.com/nqh-x-dbds
open.spotify.com/artist/1ZgfHlEOqu1zHd3PoK14aa
youtube.com/channel/UCFJKu3mvFZ3Pz1XeRXK2u0w
twitter.com/BroughtonNQH
instagram.com/broughtonnqh

Legendary Acid House DJ or Not, Klaus Blatter’s “(I Find Myself Surrounded By) The Lunatics of Acid House” Sounds Like a New Classic of the Genre

The mystique, perhaps manufactured, behind Klaus Blatter is only enhanced by the unusual and dryly humorous and surreal single video for “(I Find Myself Surrounded By) The Lunatics of Acid House.” The story goes that Blatter is an influential figure in the world of Acid House (which started in Chicago, of course, and developed further in the UK) but whose name doesn’t appear in histories of or articles on the genre. That he’s allegedly from Dortmund, Germany may go some way to explain his not being included in the official record. But whatever his exact origins or place in the family tree of Acid House, Blatter’s track is both an eccentric celebration of and documentation of the spirit of an era that changed the course of electronic music forever as well as a fine example of the art form. Blatter reportedly performed at the most recent Glastonbury Festival so there may be something to his story so follow Blatter on his Twitter page as his story further unfolds.

Tweets by BlatterKlaus