OST-Deflect (Emanate)
The apocalypse is coming, and lest yea not forget about it. Biblical
documents foresee the event as that of mass destruction and decimation when
war erupts amongst the ever-present forces of good and evil. Of course, to
assume that after the apocalypse absolutely nothing will be left seems
foolish. Ruined buildings and contemporary architecture will probably
remain in fragments, insects and highly adaptive animals will dominate
earth's landscape, and what the hell, let's assume there will probably be
some human survivors as well. Chris Douglas (OST, Rooke Vallard) sees
himself as one of these remaining "forgotten people," and he has made the
original soundtrack for his battered landscape with Deflect.
Much like the post apocalyptic world, the album is hard to grasp or believe
in. At times, it is so scattered and smeared in every direction that one
feels like he or she is developing a skittering paranoid schizophrenic
complex. However, let us not forget the traumatic events witnessed by these
survivors of the human race. If you saw your home planet decimated by
otherworldly angels and demons, would you not also become slightly insane?
What would music sound like to you afterwards? More interestingly, what
would the music you created sound like to others? Deflect poses and answers
these questions with its uncompromising onslaughts of digital feedback,
nonrepeating loops, randomly placed sounds, and the occasional three or four
notes joined to form an oddly uncharacteristic melody.
"Repus" opens the album with a cacaphonous brawl of chimes, asynchronous
beats, and distorted water drip sounds. This sort of alien combination
fills most of the hour-long album and takes a decent degree of effort to
finally enjoy. "Iring" contains what could be considered the first melodic
structure on the album, a mid-pitched, organ-sounding drone which fluctuates
between three frequencies. "Gorgia" brings in a digitized organ four
minutes into the song, adding a slightly eerie tone to the already
overburdening random beats and sonic garbage thrown seemingly everywhere.
"Lustig" wanders by starting with high-pitched beats which sound bathed in
acid. The track uses the simple enough 'build up' structure as it
incorporates layers of fog-like static, high-pitched tones, and finally a
mumbling crawl of bass to bring the concoction together. "Jagid" opens with
a sad organ wailing to its heart's content, eventually becoming distorted to
extreme lengths (nearly an inverse of what it originally sounded like),
before returning to its original harmony. "Planctus" incorporates
everything from synthesized fly noises as a melody to raindrop sounding
beats and sampled toy whistle sounds. It's enough to make the skin crawl
either through beauty or hideousness. "Belin" closes the album with echoing
metallic beats, discordant 'chirp' sounds, a barely audible background
melody, and a haze of digital grain slightly obscuring everything.
To be honest, I did not see myself as a survivor of the apocalypse as
envisioned by OST the first time I listened to the album. The sheer noise
and complexity (or perhaps chaos is a better word) often overwhelmed me at
times. I was expecting something in a similar vein to the
ambient/introspective based electronic music Emanate Records has founded
itself upon. Instead, I found myself pinned under heaps of random noise,
tones, and bass fluctuations. The release is definitely difficult listening
when compared to most other music available today. After the first two
listens, I relegated Deflect to the rack: that unholy device in my bedroom
where albums not worth their price are held. Yet, after picking it up
several months later, I cannot seem to stop wanting to listen to the album.
With each voyage through the tracks, I hear the chaos Deflect has to offer,
and I accept it. I hear new sounds or hidden patterns, and begin to realize
an intrinsic structure to the otherwise chaotic songs developed on Deflect.
Maybe I have become schizophrenic and my mind fragmented enough to
understand the music after the apocalypse, I am not sure. Yet, giving
Deflect a chance has given me confidence that if I should be one of the
survivors of armageddon, my shattered mind will at least be able to hear
music such as this.
aspen-sounds from passing cars (involve)
Everyday I drive twenty miles to and from my workplace, and everyday I see
the same billboards, landmarks, and man-made wonders. The only thing that
remains the same, yet at the same time different, are the cars which drive
alongside me. Everyday, while gazing at the various cars passing by the same
scenery out my windows, I think about what the life stories of the other
passengers in the cars are. I wonder what they think about and if their
lives are as monotonous as my own. Sometimes, I even consider what they are
listening to.
New Zealand's Bevan Smith obviously ponders the same things I do as his
fittingly titled Sounds from Passing Cars demonstrates. The fourteen track
album can be taken as a kind of experimental electronic concept album, with
the high idea being the answer to the question of what your fellow commuters
listen to. However, instead of collecting samples of AM/FM radio and
concocting a bizarre cut and paste experiment with modern radio, Smith
produces fourteen outstanding tracks of highly organic and emotional
electronic style music, which reflect more of the sounds of potential
attitudes of nearby drivers rather than what they are listening to.
Opening with "Sounds from Passing Cars" and "Sounds from Passing Cars
Rehashed," Smith blends the light, ambient atmospherics of the former with
gentle beats and simple tones for what seems like an epic venture into
percussive ambient music. "Ice Cream in Bath Water" uses a slightly
time-distorted melody with echoing, metallic beats (think two spoons struck
together on plate glass) for another moody, introspective piece. It reminds
me of the slight ennui-type feeling you have when you go out driving alone
at night to think about things and get away from the world at large.
"Doodling Banana Car" combines two acoustic guitar samples with foggy,
emotion-laden rhythms and scuttling basslines. "Running Riches" bases itself
around actual guitar chord procession and a compelling 4/5 beat pattern
mixed intermittently with a staggered 4/4 beat as well. Think of it as
driving music for looking at passing pretty girls that you can never have.
Two minutes into the song, discreetly placed tones enter, adding even more
depth to the mix. Eventually the guitars exit the song (much to my chagrin)
and the track decomposes into shifting harmonics, ending well, but not
nearly as pleasantly as it began. "Pedestrian not Aquarian" and "Frozen Soy
Milk Experiment" use a few lonely keyboard notes over a staccato rhythms,
shifting bass, and a digital glockenspiel for unique and enjoyable sound.
"Now with Bassline" combines a dark, emotional melody with echoing chimes
and the last remnants of the glockenspiel heard earlier.
With Sounds from Passing Cars, Bevan Smith furthers the maturity
demonstrated on 1999's Are You That Retail Snob? through a diverse and
experimental palette of songs which work well together as a whole. At
several times while writing this review I've often simply stopped to listen
to the beauty that has been recorded. Most of the pieces on the album are
moody and introspective, fittingly so for the album which supposedly
comprises the sounds and thoughts of tired, anxious, angry, or bored drivers
alongside the road with you each time you commute to wherever it is you go.
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