Curved Light – Mineral Wash/Indigo Rinse
6.18.15 by Mike Haley

I’ve spent the last couple of days playing this debut C48 by Curved Light on repeat. It’s made up of a dozen and a half tracks with lengths ranging from under a minute to just under six, but most populate the area of twoish minutes and exhibit fantastic concentration . Curved Light doesn’t meander down paths waiting to discover focus, but instead chooses one dynamic goal and pursues it like a motherfucker on each cut. A quick trip to the potty or taking a telemarketer call about diabetes and you can miss out on entire chapters of the “Mineral Wash/Indigo Rinse” story, but that can also make each listening session a fresh experience.

“Mineral Wash/Indigo Rinse” was self-released by Peter Tran, who also does the project HD Sunrise. Something I learned from an email while writing this up. You wont find marathon drones or protracted synth wanking here. Tran makes his intentions crystal clear as he offers up 160 seconds of lustrous, stained-glass licks, then moves on to a serving of flustered sound swirls or a minimal lucid injection. It’s not as if Curved Light runs out of steam or blows his load early on any of these terse jaunts. And I wouldn’t dare refer to this material as “bite sized”, because it just doesn’t feel that way. Nah, Tran has got the juice for sure. He pre-plans, dives in, and extracts the goods like a cosmic Navy SEAL.  In other words, it’s No Pussyfooting with no pussyfooting. Ya dig?

The artwork and overall look of this cassette is equally simple and wonderful. The clear shell with white imprinting and reversible Jcard SEAL the deal. Get it in your deck before the 100 copies go bye-bye.