Tag: Martin Bisi

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.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Throughout this site’s eight-plus year history, I’ve written quite a bit about the New York-based act Dead Waves. The band has gone through a series of lineup changes and in that same period — but one thing has been consistent, the band’s primary songwriting and founding duo, brothers Teddy and Nick Panopoulos. Interestingly, the band’s sixth, full-length album, the Martin Bisi-produced God of the Wild finds the duo making a decided change in sonic direction and songwriting approach, moving away from the power chord-based garage rock/grunge rock of their early releases — including, the Steve Albini-produced “Oracles of the Grave”/”Promise” 7″ — towards a more experimental, minimalist  and free-flowing approach with the material focusing on bare-boned arrangements of guitar, synths, vocals without any percussion; in fact, God of the Wild‘s dark yet hauntingly lush and minimalist first single “Astrapi” is centered around towering layers of looping and droning guitar chords, burst of feedback and howled vocals.

While still retaining an element of the heaviness that first captured the attention of this site and the rest of the blogosphere, the new material finds the New York-based duo’s sound seemingly drawing from Directions to See a Ghost-era Black Angels, Sonic Youth and Swans — but with a patient, painterly vibe, as each layer is carefully and deliberated placed atop another. As the band’s Teddy Panopolous explained to CVLT Nation, “For this album we really wanted to go clean slate. Not listening to anything while creating, just delving into our feelings and blanking everything out. Feelings of loneliness, happiness, sadness. How this concept of time, in what we perceive as reality, goes by so quick. Loved ones passing away, ourselves getting older. Just trying to enjoy the now, the feeling of just being and trying to enjoy, but all the while with that certain lingering sadness.”