Category: ambient music

New Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Trentemøller Teams Up with Disa on Fragile and Breathtakingly Gorgeous “A Different Light”

Copenhagen-based producer, multi-instrumentalist, producer and electronic music artist Anders Trentemøller, the creative mastermind behind the acclaimed electronic outfit Trentemøller has a long-held reputation for creating extraordinarily memorable melodies paired with dark soundscapes. While many artists follow a pattern of invention and reinvention, the acclaimed Danish artist’s career arc has tended to be a series of points along the same curve, playing the low game, with each release representing a new chapter in constantly evolving series. Throughout his career, Trentemøller’s work frequently explores contrasts, paradoxes, reminiscence and remembrance but while eschewing nostalgia.

Back in 2006, following a run of EPs, Trentemøller released his full-length debut, The Last Resort, an effort that eventually topped several end-of-year lists while exposing him and his work to a larger audience.

Since assembling his first full live band back in 2007, the acclaimed Danish artist has embarked on several world tours, playing over 500 shows and regularly selling out venues and clubs. Through his own label imprint, In My Room, Trentemøller released:

  • 2010’s Into The Great Wide Yonder, an effort that continued where its predecessor left off, further exploring previously minded textures of suspense, tension, release and noir with a tighter focus.

  • 2013’s Lost expanded upon the first two albums while firmly establishing the atmospheric and darkly Romantic qualities that he’s now been a part of his long-held reputation.

  • 2016’s Fixion showcased the Danish artist’s penchant for experimentation with the material meshing his various influences and inspiration while anchored in polyrhythm.

  • 2019’s Obverse was initially conceived as an instrumental album, not bound by the need to be performed live. And with that notion as a launching point, Trentemøller chased down every idea and explored every tangent. He eventually decided that half of the album’s songs could be better served with lyrics and vocals. So he recruited Lisbet Fritze, Jehnny Beth, Low‘s Mimi Parker, Blonde Redhead‘s Kazu Maikino, Warpaint’s Jenny Lee, Lina Tullgren and Slowdive’s Rachel Goswell.

  • 2021 saw the surprise release of “Golden Sun” and “No One Quite Like You,” a stripped down production that featured vocals from the equally acclaimed Tricky.

  • 2022’s Memoria thematically touched upon impermanence, from mortality to relationships, as well as light and dark, turbulence and serenity, piercing chill and comforting warmth with the material seemingly informed by life in the Nordics. The album was supported with a tour that featured a new live band lineup, which included Icelandic vocalist Disa, who later contributed to “Into the Silence,” as well as a cover of The Raveonettes “Cops On Our Tail.”

Trentemøller has also released several compilations including 2007’s The Trentemøller Chronicles, 2009’s Harbour Boat Trips, 2011’s Reworked/Remixed, 2011’s Late Night Tales, 2014’s Lost Reworks, 2018’s Harbour Boat Trips 02 and a live album, 2013’s Live in Copenhagen. The acclaimed artist has also remixed work by Depeche Mode, Tricky, Savages, The Drums, The Raveonettes, Pet Shop Boys, A Place To Bury Strangers, The Soft Moon, UNKLE and Franz Ferdinand, for which he earned a Grammy nomination.

The acclaimed Danish artist’s sixth album, Dreamweaver is slated for a September 13, 2024 release through his label In My Room. The 10-song album reportedly sees Trentemøller meshing elements of shoegaze, dark wave, motorik, noise rock and somber, introspective takes on electronic ream pop but in a decidedly immersive and psychedelic fashion that’s perfect for headphones — and for discovering new layers and interpretations upon repeated listens. The album also features Icelandic vocalist Disa, who contributes vocals throughout the entire affair.

The album’s first single, album opener “A Different Light” begins with an arpeggiated and melodic nylon string guitar figure that’s quickly joined by Disa’s yearning and meditative delivery weaving together until roughly the song’s halfway point when the melodic phrase is joined by swirling and painterly synth layers. Written as a sort of musical companion to a lunar eclipse, as the moon moves against the sky with the synth melody being akin to the eclipse’s penumbra, the song’s arrangement is anchored around many of the acclaimed Danish artist’s trademarks — rich dichotomies, musical shadow play, Nordic frigidity and warm analog waves — while also being an artistic leap forward. “A Different Light” may be among the most fragile and breathtakingly gorgeous songs Trentemøller has released while evoking a cosmic sense of awe, of being struck by your smallness in an infinitely vast universe.

“I wanted something human and timeless to carry the song and vocal melody,” says Trentemøller. “The acoustic guitar gave me the exact sense of fragility and presence that I thought the song deserves. At the same time, I wanted to play with both acoustic and electronic; to get the guitar to weave in and out of the synth role that is introduced in the middle of the track. I feel the interplay between these two worlds gave the song an extra dimension.”
 

“The song considers themes of longing, healing, and the need for personal transformation. It’s also about confusion and unresolved feelings that happen during any metamorphosis,” the Danish artist explains. “I try to reflect on the transient nature of dreams, loss, and love. At the same time I recognize, and even embrace that this is part of being a human.”

The accompanying visual beings with a drone-led visual for seafoam crashing against currents, fog sweeping across a forest with a full moon ahead, dye being injected into water and similar brooding yet psychedelic imagery.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Brussels’ We The Living Share Lush and Brooding “We Shall Return”

Brussels-based ambient, indie outfit We The Living features two highly accomplished artists in their own right:

  • Andorra-born and-based composer and singer/songwriter José Papí, best known for his work in hard rock outfit Yearn

  • British-born, Brussels-based ambient, electronic music legend David Morley

We The Living can trace its origins back to 2015: Papí and Morley discussed starting a project together, but the project started in earnest earlier this year, when teh duo went into the studio to write and record their full-length debut, Making The Living Great Again, an effort, which was released earlier this month, that the band describes as “an obstinately melodic trip into existential challenges and the unresolved issues of today’s world.”

Making The Living Great Again‘s latest single “We Shall Return” is anchored around a supple and propulsive bass line, twinkling keys, and a glistening, reverb-soaked guitar figure. The arrangement serves as a lush and dreamy bed for Papí’s yearning delivery. The result is a song that seemingly recalls Softspot‘s gorgeous, fever dream of an album, 2017’s Clearing — but with a sense of existential dread.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Khotin’s Blissed Out and Ambient Remix of Bodywash’s “Kind of Light”

Montréal-based JOVM mainstays Bodywash — Chris Steward and Rosie Long Dector — can trace their origins back to when the pair met while attending McGill University. But when they met, the pair didn’t immediately share a common musical language: Steward grew up in London listening to celestial dream pop while Dector grew up in Toronto listening to folk and Canadiana. But the music they began writing together saw the pair bridging their influences.

With the release of 2016’s self-titled EP and 2019’s full-length debut, Comforter, the Montréal-based duo firmly established their sound — slow-burning and dreamy material centered around ethereal vocals, intricate guitar lines and pulsating synths. 

The Canadian shoegazers’ sophomore album, last year’s I Held the Shape While I Could was inspired and informed by the COVID-19 pandemic and its subsequent lockdowns. The duo used the unexpected hiatus to write new material, which was darker, more experimental and more invigorating than its immediate predecessor. The new material also reflected on Steward’s and Long Doctor’s seperate and shared experiences of losing a sense of place, the way something once solid can slip between your fingers, and their attempts to build something new from the psychological and emotional fallout. 

In the lead up to the album’s release, I wrote about several singles, including the album’s first, “Kind of Light,” an expansive track that began with a slow-burning and elegiac intro and a skittering yet propulsive kick pattern that a slowly builds up and breaks out into a high-energy, boom-bap-like breakbeat paired with scorching guitar, and squealing and wobbling bass synths. Long Decter’s ethereal and achingly plaintive vocals are at the front and center, expressing heart-wrenching despair and yet hope. Throughout, the song suggests that while loss is natural and expected, there can be hope; that there are only a handful of things that in our lives that are truly permanent — and that for the most part, it can get better. 

“I wrote ‘Kind of Light’ in bed,” Long Decter says. ““It was the fall of 2018 and Chris and I were both going through experiences of learning not to trust what feels like home. He sent me a plugin for a new organ sound, suggesting it might provide inspiration. I sent him back chords, a kick pattern, and some vocals about trying to pull your legs back; trying to take your energy out of the wreckage and put it into yourself. The process of deciding what’s worth keeping, what can be reworked and what gets tossed in the fire. A process that is devastating and also weirdly invigorating, because you can see new possibilities opening up in front of you. And you can start to look for light somewhere else.”

Just ahead of the Montréal-based duo’s North American tour dates with Blushing and Airiel in June, they share a remix of “Kind of Light,” by Edmonton-based electronic artist Khotin. The Khotin remix turns the tense and cathartic original into a blissed out, ambient euphoria that’s perfect for contemplative chill out sessions. (By the way, the Blushing/Airiel/Bodywash tour includes a June 19, 2024 stop at Johnny Brenda‘s, one of my favorite rooms in Philly and a June 20, 2024 stop at Baby’s All Right. The tour dates, as always, are below.)

“Khotin’s Release Spirit was in heavy rotation while we were on the road last year, soundtracking everything from the craggy cliffs of the Pacific Northwest to the dreaded NJ Turnpike, so we were keen to have him remix ‘Kind of Light,’” says the band. “His version takes the tension and catharsis of the original song and injects it with blissed-out euphoria. It’s a track that’s destined for a sunrise slot in the chill-out room, channeling the West Coast rave psychedelia of Pilgrims of the Mind along with the more ambient influences that informed our last record.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

Throwback: Happy 62nd Birthday, Robin Guthrie!

JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Cocteau Twins’ Robin Guthrie’s 62nd birthday.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Beach Ready Shares Dreamy and Meditative “Gili”

Christopher Cordoba is a London-based instrumental solo artist, composer and session musician, whose career started in earnest as a member of Jack Adaptor, a band formed with The Family Cat’s Paul Frederick. As an instrumental solo artist, Cordoba has released a series of critically acclaimed, eclectic efforts that has seen him collaborating with a an equally eclectic array of artists and producers including Robert Wyatt David Watson, The Associates’ Billy Mackenzie, Phil Vinall, Propaganda’s Claudia Brucken, Robyn Hitchcock, Pascal Gabriel, PJ Harvey’s Terry Edwards, Audrey Riley, Alex Thomas, Charlie Winston and a list of others.

Cordoba released his sophomore Beach Ready Archipelago was released earlier this year through Snow in Water Records. The album’s material is darker in texture and more extreme than Cordoba’s self-titled Beach Ready debut while still being centered around Cordoba’s guitar work and penchant for atmospheric soundscapes. The album also sees Cordoba incorporating drone, glitch, Frippertronics, industrial, New Wave and New age to create a unique sound collage that imparts an urgent ambience. Fittingly, the album thematically focuses on destruction — an all too present theme in our seemingly pre-apocalyptic moment.

The album’s latest single, the meditative “Gili” is a shimmering and slow-burning dream built around glistening, reverb-soaked guitars, gently glitchy electronics paired with jazz-like percussion. It’s a dreamy bit of nostalgia, heartache and peaceful longing that seems like a bit of a respite in a mad, mad, mad, mad world.

Cordoba explains that “Gili” “is a shimmering and romantic call to keep the Archipelago (the Gili Islands in Indonesia) above water so that its beauty can be treasured for generations to come.”

The accompanying video is time-lapse footage shot in Lower Manhattan and edited by Jon Sadlier. Fittingly, the video evokes the unending passing of time and cycling of the seasons.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: NYC’s Content Blocks Share Lushly Textured and Eerie “IMDS”

Emerging New York-based electronic music outfit Content Blocks — Ian Campbell and Matthew Hord — features members, w ho have collaborated and participated together for years in various musical endeavors and events. Their near-decade of shared experiences crafting, programming and operating the electronic instrumentation in acclaimed industrial act Pop. 1280 has further informed their journey deeper into hardware experimentation — and their latest collaboration together shows the results of their experimentation into ambient abstractions, dance floor deconstructions, and fractured pop tropes into darker realms.

Campbell’s and Hord’s Content Blocks debut “IMDS” pairs off-kilter, repetitive and propulsive percussive patterns with glistening, reverb-soaked synths with reverb-drenched, ethereal yet disaffected vocals coming out like a feverish haze. While sonically seeming to channel Rival Consoles and Noble Rot, “IMDS” simultaneously manages to evoke the late night return home from the club with the music and the entire night reverberating in your head and soul — but the rest of the world may well be asleep.

Conceived as an audiovisual experience, “IMDS” is accompanied with a video created by the duo’s longtime collaborator Scott Kieran (ESP TV) that starts off focusing on an accelerating centrifuge interspersed with frames featuring cell death and electronic feedback and 3D imagery that orbit around a lone figure dancing or using a complicated elliptical-looking device. It’s fittingly eerie and trippy.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Montañera Teams up with Bejuco’s Cankita and Las Cantadores de Yerba Buena on Dreamy and Meditative “Santa Mar”

María Mónica Gutiérrez is a Bogotá-born, London-based singer/songwriter, musician, who during the course of her decade-plus long music career has established herself as one of the most unique and intense voices in the contemporary Colombian scene — as a member of bands like Suricato and Ságan and as the creative mastermind behind the acclaimed solo recording project Montañera.

As a member of Suricato and Ságan, Gutiérrez has toured across Europe, the US and Latin America, and has played at The Smithsonian Museum, The Kennedy Center, SXSW, Lollapalooza and Festival Estéreo Picnic, and MaMA Festival among a list of others, as well as a live session aired on KEXP.

Gutiérrez’s third Montañera album, the Rizomagic-produced A Flor de Piel is slated for a November 17, 2023 release through Western Vinyl. Thematically, the album is reportedly a meditative journey of self-discovery across oceans, time and the traditional confines of genre. Gutiérrez began the album as a way to explore her identity after a difficult move to London for school left her feeling untethered and alone in a strange new place. Understandably, the 5,000 mile journey across the other side of world and across a seemingly endlessly ocean imparted her with a new understanding of herself as a human and as an artist.

The album also reportedly sees the Colombian-born, British-based artist examining the immigrant — and migrant — experience through a rich soundscape inspired by and drawing from disparate sources, including traditional Colombian and Senegalese music, contemporary ambient and experimental production and whalesong from the depths of the Atlantic Ocean. Pairing skillfully restrained synths and electronic textures, A Flor de Piel sees Gutiérrez re-contextualizing traditional sounds and sentiments into something fresh, urgent and vital. And for the Bogota-born, London-based artist, it’s a fitting representation of her personal struggles, while echoing universal truths, as she summons the strength and wisdom of past generations. As she describes it, “The album has accompanied me through inner journeys of finding myself in a new territory — of redefining myself, of remembering who I am — in a strange place.” 

A Flor de Piel’s latest single “Santa Mar” is the only album on the track that features percussion, as well as Cankita, Bejuco’s marimba player and Tumaco, Colombia-based traditional vocal group Los Cantaadoras de Yerba Buena. Built around Cankita’s twinkling and percussive marimba, atmospheric synths and electronics serving as an ethereal and dreamy bed for Gutiérrez’s yearning vocal paired with the expressive harmonies of Las Cantadores de Yerba Buena. The result is a song that evokes a deep, mediative sense of peace and mindfulness — and at a time when we all could use it.

“It’s a song that talks about peace in Colombia, specifically with the afro pacific women,” the Bogotá-born, London-based artist explains. “The lyrics were inspired by them after investigating their musical practice for my master’s studies. Understanding their personal and collective healing processes within the peace-building process of the country. I want to portray the importance of womanhood for peace-building in their territory and the song talks about the forces of the sea to cure and the sea as a female saint, of how these women have the power of the sea in themselves. The marimbas are played by the amazing Cankita from Bejuco, who is very close with the Cantadoras de Yerba Buena, he calls them his “aunts”, his masters. It’s a true honour having the voices of these elder women in the album, they have such a strong life story and nevertheless, so much vitality, strength, and drive in life, a true inspiration for me.”

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Brazil’s Belagio Shares Vibey “Caldo È Pra Tomar”

Marcelo Altenfelder is Brazilian singer/songwriter musician and producer, who has played with Four Tet and dabbled with post-rock before starting his own band Holger back in 2006. And sine then Holger has become one of his homeland’s most influential indie rock bands.

After spending close to two decades with Holger, Altenfelder began recording a series of sparse, instrumental tracks that saw him blurring the boundaries of post-rock, dub, electronic music and ambient. The result is the acclaimed Brazilian artist’s solo recording project, Belagio.

2023 has been a busy year for the acclaimed Brazilian artist: He has released two albums Nuvem 9 and the recently released, Entradas Para Sair. Entradas Para Sair is a sonic departure from its immediate predecessor, with the album being a blend of ambient and post-rock with Altenfelder playing and recording all the instrumental parts himself, employing the use of analog instruments for an organic aesthetic.

Clocking in at a little over two minutes,. Entradas Para Sair‘s latest single “Caldo È Pra Tomar” is breezy composition built around looped handclaps, wobbling and glistening synth arpeggios and brief bursts of supple bass line before quickly evaporating into the ether. Sonically, “Caldo È Pra Tomar” brings L’Eclair and JOVM mainstays Mildlife, with the vibey composition possessing a similar lounge and club friendly groove.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Tomorrow’s Child Shares Melancholic “Spectres of Summer”

High Wycombe, UK-born, Cornwall, UK-based multi-instrumentalist and electronic music producer Tomorrow’s Child creates music that draws from a broad spectrum of influences, surroundings and experiences — in particular, the ugly concrete buildings and garages old his hometown, the sense of failed potential and lost futures it all evoked, and the dystopian themes of a number of ’80s films and TV shows.

Now, if you’ve been frequenting this site over the past few months, you might recall that the rising British producer and JOVM mainstay’s full-length debut, Beach Ghosts thematically touches upon his father’s death back in 2015 and his relocation to Cornwall, where he went to study popular music.

Gradually evolving from a singer/songwriter and guitarist to an electronic music producer, he found a much-needed outlet to express his grief and to process the major life changes he had just gone through.

So far I’ve written about two album singles:

  • “Great Western Railway,” a cinematic and brooding track informed by his father, who was a stream-train enthusiast: His father grew up with the Great Western Railway trains passing his classroom windows. Sonically, “Great Western Railway” brought John Carpenter soundtracks and Trans Europe Express-era Kraftwerk to mind: Thumping, industrial clang and clatter paired with train whistle-like synth lines help to evoke a train roaring down the tracks to an unknown destination. 
  • “Ruination,” a haunting and ambient composition that brings Brian Eno and Autobahn-era Kraftwerk to mind as its centered around atmospheric synths and skittering beats before closing out in a slow fadeout. According to the British multi-instrumentalist and producer the composition reflects “the journey of Cornish mines from once thriving places of industry to ghostly monuments to the past haunting the landscape.”

Beach Ghosts‘ third and latest single “Spectres of Summer” is a brooding track meant to evoke the summer nights with a hint of autumn chill centered around layers of glistening synths, tweeter and woofer rattling thump and industrial clang, clatter and acidic scorch. While the song is a a melancholic ode to the end of summer, it’s possess a subtle — but still noticeable — hint of hope and uplift.

The British artist explains that the track references the vibe of trip hop artists like Goldie, Massive Attack, and Moby, as well as genres like Future Garage and Witch House.

The accompanying video features footage and stills shot at sunset in Gwithian, Cornwall UK, Redruth, Cornwall, UK and Chania, Crete, Greece and Sougia, Crete, Greece. The video evokes the inbound chilliness of autumn and the increasing darkness of long winter nights in a way that’s hauntingly beautiful.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Tomorrow’s Child is a High Wycombe, UK-born, Cornwall, UK-based multi-instrumentalist and electronic music producer, whose work draws from a broad spectrum of music, surroundings and experiences — in particular, the ugly concrete buildings and garages of his hometown, the sense of failed potential and lost futures it all evoked, and the dystopian themes of a number of 1980s films and TV shows. 

His full-length debut, Beach Ghosts thematically touches upon the death of his father in 2015 and his relocation to Cornwall. Going on to study popular music, Tomorrow’s Child evolved from a singer/songwriter and guitarist to electronic music, which provided a much-needed outlet for him to express his grief and to process the major life changes he just went through. 

Last month, I wrote about the album’s first single, the cinematic and brooding “Great Western Railway.” Informed by his father, who was a stream-train enthusiast, who grew up with the Great Western Railway trains passing his classroom windows, “Great Western Railway” simultaneously brought John Carpenter soundtracks and Trans Europe Express-era Kraftwerk to mind: Thumping, industrial clang and clatter paired with train whistle-like synth lines help to evoke a train roaring down the tracks to an unknown destination.

Beach Ghosts‘ latest single “Ruination” is an haunting and ambient composition that brings Brian Eno and Autobahn-era Kraftwerk to mind as its centered around atmospheric synths and skittering beats before closing out in a slow fadeout. According to the British multi-instrumentalist and producer the composition reflects “the journey of Cornish mines from once thriving places of industry to ghostly monuments to the past haunting the landscape.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Immersion Team Up with Laetitia Sadier on an Atmospheric Yet Uplifting New Single

Malka Spiegel and Colin Newman are a husband and wife team and the creative masterminds behind Immersion. Although they’re individually known for their acclaimed and influential work with Minimal Compact and Wire respectively, their work in Immersion provides an outlet for their ongoing fascination for crafting enthralling, unique musical soundscapes through five albums and three EPs released between 1995 and 2018.

er, run by Speigel and Newman, alongside writer, broadcaster and DJ Graham Duff and promoter Andy Rossiter. The night features a range of influential and cutting edge acts but the unique aspect of it all is that each show ends with a one-off collaboration between Immersion and that night’s headliner: with one notable exception, the songs have been written and recorded in the studio a few days before the show.

we had these recordings” Malika Spigel adds. The recordings have been since further developed with Speigel and Newman heading up production duties. The end result may arguably be the duo’s most unique yet beautiful albm to date. “I think the really interesting thing is how different everybody is,” says Spigel. “Both as people and creatively.”

Nanocluster Vol. 1 sees Immersion collaborating with some of the most acclaimed left field artists of our day — Tarwater, Laetitia Sadier, Ulrich Schnauss and Scanner. The album’s latest single “Riding the Wave” sees Spigel and Newman collaborating with Laetitia Sadier. Initially making a name for herself as a member of Stereolab, Sadier has since become an acclaimed solo artist, who has created a number of applauded solo works. Centered around atmospheric synths, a sinuous bass line and shimmering and spidery guitar lines, “Riding the Wave,” features a plaintive lead vocal from Newman on the song’s verses and a sunny vocal delivery from Spiegal and Sadier on the song’s uplifting chorus, which finds them singing “Things have a way of working out.” Considering how uneasy everything in the world is at this moment, the slow-burning and atmospheric song may unexpectedly be the anthem — and mantra — we need right now.

The accompanying video for “Riding the Wave” features some gorgeously shot footage shot in what appears to be the English seaside and countryside — and while beautiful, the visual is imbued with the bittersweet reality that all things pass.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Old Man of the Woods Releases a Gorgeous and Meditative Visual for “Dissolve”

Miranda Elliott is a Richmond, VA-based singer/songwriter, producer and creative mastermind behind the lo-fi, ambient pop project Old Man of the Woods. Elliott describes her creative process as the alchemy of shit into sustenance, deriving the project’s name after a dark, scruffy mushroom that survives by — well, turning shit into sustenance. Interestingly, Elliott’s Old Man of the Woods debut, last year’s Dissolve EP according to Various Small Flames’ Jon Doyle “blurs the line between the personal and the natural world, conjuring a vivid and sometimes eerie soundscape as damp and rich as the woodland floor.”

Elliot’s forthcoming Old Man of the Woods’ full-length debut is slated for release later this year. In the meantime, the Richmond-based artist has managed to be rather busy; her Dissolve Remixed EP marks the first time she has collaborated with others: Richmond-based artists monad and OK HUNNEYS, as well as Totally Real Records labelmates SUPERORDER contribute remixes of Dissolve EP material.

Along with that she has collaborated with Roman Betanzos and Gabriel Güieros, visual effect artists based in Vancouver and Montreal on the video for Dissolve EP’s title track “Dissolve.” As for the song, “Dissolve” is a slow-burning and meditative track centered around Elliott’s plaintive vocals and atmospheric synths that — to me, at least — seems to evoke mist gently rising in the forest.

The recently released video can trace its origins back to when Betanzos and Güieros reached out to Elliot through Bandcamp, detailing how “Dissolve” to them sounded like the coastline of British Columbia. Interestingly, the video follows a humanoid wisp of mist through a lush and damp forest landscape, much like the ones seen in the Pacific Northwest. For Elliot, it reminded her of a surreal hike in Berlin, where she had actually forgotten that she wasn’t in Virginia and took note that “all woods feel like home.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: London Duo Tullamarine Releases a Haunting and meditative Visual for “Then Billy Said”/”What Billy Said Next”

London-based electronic duo, Tullamarine — British-born writer/producer Adam Young and Kiwi-born, London-based writer/producer Joss Arrmitage — features two accomplished artists, who have been friends for over 20 years, but who have long created separately — until 2015 when the duo formed their latest, collaborative project through the fog of late-night conversations and half-formed ideas.

Inspired by Brian Eno’s Oblique Strategies, the duo’s initial idea behind the project was to creatively push each other through experimentation and remote collaboration, with the hopes of bettering their respective music. Sharing two, four or even eight-bar snippets, and never working physically together in the same studio, the duo saw ideas gradually form and organize themselves into symbiotic designs of experimental production. Interestingly, they had no prearranged agenda, no pre-determined style; they went where each track took them in an intuitive fashion.

The duo’s intuitive process shouldn’t be surprising: Young, who’s an expert int twisting and shaping audio found and Armitage, whose style is defined by a deep and abiding love of synths quickly found a natural fit that came together through a shared production and writing approach. Initially. tracks were guided by Young or Armitage, but rarely both. But by the time the released And So We Followed Her Blindly Into The Sun EP there was a marked shift in their creative process, with the duo collaborating much more while revealing influences from the likes of Nils Frahm, A Winged Victory for the Sullen, Reich’s Music for 18 Musicians and a lot of nights at The Barbican.

With the October 20120 release of the three-song Stratosphere EP, Young and Armitage firmly established their sound, one that’s an assertive, melancholic soundscape. Continuing where Stratosphere EP left off, the emerging British electronic duo’s 17 track album Frequency, allows listeners to further experience their complex and unique soundscape, which evokes memories of clubbing, to more expansive and meditative material, interspersed with beat work that brings 90s alternative hip-hop and IDM. Interestingly, Frequency’s latest single “Then Billy Said”/”What Billy Said” is an expansive track with a meditative piano-led introduction before quickly transforming into a trance-inducing section featuring skittering beats, shimmering synth arpeggios that slowly builds up tempo — but while being an exercise in tense restraint without release. Adding to the eerily cinematic feel of the song, get composition focuses on Billy, a bewildered fictional character, created by the duo’s Joss Armitage, who had conflicted relationships with women since his mother died when he was a young boy.

Directed by WIlliam Glass, the recently released video for “Then Billy Said”/”What Billy Said” is an achingly nostalgic dream that stars Lilly Ashley as a sort of distorted and romanticized image of someone’s late mother. Throughout the video, Ashley’s mother-like figure holds a fish balloon, which the duo and the video’s director explains is meant to embody both the child and childhood. Of course, at some point, the woman eventually decides to let her balloon go. So the video alludes to the innocent and playful mother, and to death — with the tacit understanding that death is a part of it all.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: JeGong Releases a Slow-Burning and Meditative Visual for Atmospheric “Sowing dragons Teeth”

JeGong is a new krautrock-inspired, experimental act featuring MONO (Japan)’s and Watter’s Dahm Majuri Cipolla (drums) and Sum of R.’s Reto Mäder (synths). Slated for an October 16, 2020 release through Pelagic Records, the duo’s 14 song full-length album I reportedly finds the band using krautrock to push themselves, and their songwriting approach into new territories — with the album’s material featuring elements of ambient, experimental rock, krautrock, post rock and electronica. The end result is an album centered around ambient soundscapes and repetition that sounds like the soundtracks to Blade Runner and Metropolis.

The album was written and recorded remotely with Mäder recording instrumental parts at Hinterzimmer in Bern, Switzerland and Cipolla recording drums at BC Studio with Martin Bisi, where it was partially mixed. Additional mixing took place in Finland with Jaakko Vitalähde.

“Sowing Dragons Teeth,” I’s latest single is a minimalist, slow-burning and atmospheric track centered around repeating shimmering synth lines, taut yet propulsive drumming, gurgling and hissing feedback and subtle blasts of guitar. The track sounds as though it should be part of John Carpenter-like movie soundtrack — but while featuring subtly morphing throughout the entire song, “We wanted to have a song that is constantly changing in form and density. A song structure like a maelstrom or a growing plant focusing on our two main instruments, analog synthesizers and drums, the members of JeGong explain in press notes. “The theme of the song goes well with the film scene in Blade Runner 2049, in which a meager little flower in a field of ashes becomes a sign of hope.”

The recently released video for “Sowing Dragons Teeth” is the second part of a trilogy focused don a dystopian world that collapses and is eventually recreated by another species with a monolith as a memorial for the previous world.