We test Liz and Dwight from Crash Symbols knowledge of their own label and maybe play a few tapes.
Kouns & Weaver – Children of Cimmeria (Unifactor) Mid Air! – Fucked Up Fish (100% Bootleg Cassette Tape Company) Acid Mothers Temple – split w/ ST 37 (Blue Circle/Sounds From The Pocket) Charles Barabé – split w/ Ratkiller (Crash Symbols) Luurel Varas – Riddles For A Machine (Crash Symbols) Pumpkin Witch – The Return of the Pumpkin Witch (Deathbomb Arc) Another Dark December – Anthropocene’s Apocalypse and Other Various Anxieties (Histamine Tapes) Alex Jacobsen – Apartment 2021 / Commutes 2022 (Tymbal Tapes) Wide Color – s/t (Oxtail Recordings) Mallwalker – Danger (Tetryon Tapes)
Not too long ago a bizarre (in a complimentary way) video emerged. One featuring a young woman, Ichiko Aoba, playing a festival in Europe backed by the post-Ants configuration of Black Country, New Road. The entire thing looked like a fever dream, or in the case of rym denizens, a wet dream. For on one hand, this whole thing is baffling; a real case of 21st century internet communities having their cake and eating it in the form of a dream collaboration that only a select few even saw in person. Yet on the other hand, that this entire thing exists is undeniably pretty and moving. So few opportunities for something as otherworldly like this to exist happen; even with the connections of internet and new generations of tastemakers. Truthfully though, one’s choice in flannel or one’s adherence to trolling new music lists may long term create such circumstances that end up leading to any kind of western recognition and touring capacity for artists ranging from Aoba to Parannoul.
The resounding performance of Aoba, whose focus on acoustic guitar and piano keys, acoustic fables and stories outside of regular time and place (landing closer to a folksy ghibli world), lends itself beyond her immediate intimacy. This folk can scale with immense finesse if the right backing (chamber) band happens to present itself–as BCNR proved rather distinctly. When she played Big Ears at the St. John’s Cathedral to a full audience, the back half of her set featured four women on violin and other stringed instruments providing that sublime chamber energy. Watching Aoba with her backing band, I felt back in Escondido, watching bunnies leap over the greenery that’s emerged from a hectic el niño. There is something absolutely otherworldly about her capacity for naturalism the silent rumination that powers her work and converts a listener one by one.
It’s also known that because Aoba self-releases most her music and has an immense online fan community, her albums become hot collector commodities. Only Ba Da Bing has seemed to take any note of issuing her material in the US, and yet Windswep Adan/Adan No Kaze remains only a double LP on its 3rd pressing, with no CD or tape edition. Cool! Such things often end with me creating blindspots instead of downloading. So, when I walked in to see her Big Ears performance, I was not anticipating that she’d have a merch booth with a limited 500 copy “Sketch” tour tape. One that currently remains unlisted on Discogs, without a torrent on Soulseek, and only about 3 folks on RYM that appear to know it exists and have listened. Make me the fourth I suppose. And also let me put my hat in the ring here to join the chorus of “Ichiko Aoba makes fantastic music that we should cherish” with a resounding grin.
Taken in first during a delirious jet-lagged capacity coming out of SAW II looping, “Sketch” has quickly become one of my favorite listens of 2023. This is owed not as much to the exclusivity of the tape itself, as much as the raw power and trust Aoba has in her lo-fi set-up resonating an astounding everydayness to her recordings. The tape is split into two side long recordings: A side’s “sea horse” (she uses images for the release) is piano improv that seems to hint at a recording of “Seabed Eden,” a one-off single precursor to her 2020 release, near the end. Meanwhile, Side B’s “garden snake” actually features recordings of “hello” & “asleep among endives” and then another round of increasingly ethereal and warped piano looping and water noises. On paper, this 20ish minutes really could be nothing. Merely a stopgap or small holdover for the heads. Yet, Aoba really understands her space and silence, and uses the tape more or less to reintroduce her capacity for recording and just see what comes from a day of work. It is simply, music to stare out at the yard to; music to do the dishes to; music that you take in all the details of a room at 11:11 to. What a heavenly surprise.
As I sat with the release I’ve come to note that it reminds me of a staggering body of work. On one hand are Dan Melchoir or Ross Hammond, private press folk maestro’s that follow their thoughts to brilliant endpoints. The other hand includes Jessica Pratt and Wendy Eisenberg, who’s early recordings also treated the fidelity as a tool to presenting their own worlds and tales outside typical boundaries. Aoba is of her own accord as all these mavericks are, especially on the b-side. Her two originals recorded on this tape just feel like they could have been on On Your Own Love Again as a moment outside Pratt’s own lost wisdom. Still, as she moves beyond chord change improv towards loop manipulation that would not have been out of place on Pizza Night many moons prior. Her mic’ing that captures the patter of keys, the extra thump of pedal, and a voice that lowly croons knows exactly what the fuck its doing even if it wants to call itself a “sketch.” It evokes just how punchdrunk and out-of-body this kind of recording process, when treated as a sincere treat instead of a gimmick, can be.
What a resounding and deeply resonant sketch for spring, to say the least.
Find it at the next Ichiko Aoba show in Europe. Or on discogs in 5 months for exorbitant costs. Or on Bandcamp if and when it ever shows up.
E: Only months later have I realized the tape is on youtube. 50,000 views? Quite an audience!
a robin sings at night – brood parasite & murmuration
5.2.23 by Zach Mitchell
21st century connections are crazy. I recently posted on Facebook (a website I try to avoid outside of seeing what the 30 year old ex-goths in my life are complaining about these days) finally advertising my Tabs Out pieces and asked my 200 something strong friends list for a heads up on any tapes they might be releasing. The girl who headed up the photography department of my high school’s newspaper (where I was the award winning editor-in-chief) responded and linked me up with Ian Craig, who she met on a dating app. Both parties are happily married to other people now but still sorta kinda keep in touch through the magic of social media.
Craig was nice enough to mail me a literal handful of tapes, a true treat in the blogging world. Amidst the stack of lofi singer songwriter and campy horror themed garage rock (we love a diverse label!) one release stood out – a clear plastic case housing two tapes with the label “two guitars, semi-improvised” fixed to the back. Turns out that this is a reissue of the first two tapes from Craig’s project a robin sings at night and it’s just what it says on the tin – two tapes, brood parasite and murmuration, full of homespun, singularly voiced guitar duets.
What sets a robin sings at night apart is its approach to form over function. Both tapes feel like a punk rock take on American primitivism, featuring over 40 (by my estimation) short bursts of contemplative sketches. brood parasite is a sequel to murmuration but they were both created the same way: Craig would take one hour to create the initial tracks in the left channel and then give himself a half hour to come up with a response in the right. Craig varies his guitar playing through both tapes, taking on traditional finger picking, furious strumming, and what I imagine is the sound of him karate chopping his guitar. The conversational nature of the music, combined with the brevity, almost makes it feel like a madcap, instrumental reading of a diary. Every song captures a discrete emotion and an immediate reaction to it, warts and all. It’s hard not to feel charmed by this approach, even with its rapidly oscillating nature.
The range of ideas on these two albums is impressive for the creative parameters. Every nook and cranny of the concept is explored. Beautiful melodies are interrupted by noisy bursts. Lilting calls are met with joyous responses. As an artistic exercise, it’s impressive. As a listening experience, it’s invigorating. Craig’s guitar playing is easy to get lost in and the albums’ structure (including the lack of tracklist on the set itself) makes it hard to pick out any one moment as a standout, but that’s honestly to the set’s benefit. As long as you keep an open mind and are willing to let the 30 minutes of lightly improvised music wash over you, you’ll find something to love.
What time do the readers of Tabs Out wake up at? I’ve never asked that and I take the whole asynchronous thing with a whiff of serendipity. I imagine most people who read this get up sometime around 6-9 AM local time. 5:50 AM is just out of that range and too bloody early, but I used to pull myself up then, or at 5:07 AM and walk in darkness to the job site to either deliver pastries or brew a giant vat of coffee. I do miss the colors of those spring skies by the lagoon. Unfortunately, the color of dark twitter DMs at 5:30 AM don’t hit the same. Most days now, I wake up sometime shortly after 7 and if the house is empty, I fill the walls with sounds.
This morning is one of those fortunate mornings, currently being soundtracked by Mute Duo. Do you remember Mute Duo? They were a band that definitely existed pre-pandemic on a fledgling American Dreams. Skyler Rowe on Drums/Percussion/Vibraphone & Sam Wagster handling the Pedal Steel amongst a drum machine, using their tools and the warmth of a studio space as canvas to impart naturalistic, rugged Americana. The kind that shimmers rays of sunlights and shakes the bristles of its tree needles with it. Well, Mute Duo have had a rather busy reemergence this April. There are new compositions for American Dreams, as well as this most curious 34 minute pre-Pandemic (2/29/20) live realization at the Empty Bottle; Chelsea Bridge, Matthew Lux, and Andrew Scotty Young join as auxiliary members that turn the Mute Duo into a Mute Quartet encroaching on a particular jammy sunday I’ve come to admire over the past few years. A thanks to the Sea and Cake as well alludes to a greater lineage that Mute Duo themselves are chained to: intersectional Chicago jamming
5amSky is grounded in a pulsing motorik, the kind of a steel engine on a flat plane where anything can happen. Mute Duo, even with these added members, are steadfast to that particular kind of jam. One that parallels Jake Acosta’s Rehearsal Park or one of the many Unifactor pocket worlds, but with a greater sense of anthemia guiding it. It only takes about half of the rather acute side A to lock into its devious jam as Rowe provides a steady beat for Wagster to draw out all the curls of the clouds and deepest of blues that a pedal steel’s chords can provide. It’s fluffy music, complete with a footwork to its beat that begs for revelrous dance; I sure hope those patrons pre-pandemic did so. Although I must admit the outro’s sudden distorted twang and electronic honkery is more…an electrified rodeo than the piece’s first ten minutes.
Side B meanwhile brings in the whole auxiliary band one piece at a time, slow burn. The nearly 22 minute affair has a whiff of a heist being pulled off, the kind of heist that you always imagine Tortoise would’ve soundtracked in ’99 but were never afforded. It’s opening minutes focus intently on a minimal rattly drum beat, augmented by bass effect and actual bass dancing off it, while a cymbal skips over it unhurriedly. It soon moves to focus on the drones of the bass n’ pedal steel while introducing the vibraphone that doodles about and compliments the drum beat. Chelsea Bridge’s strings meanwhile create these dustbowl arpeggios (that soar) that help complete the piece and move it to its sleek final form for the majority of the run time. Suddenly, the mute duo have concocted a loungey chill out dance track; one rather based in Americana. A dustbowl disco (well, for the mind) if you could imagine that. One that actively integrates wind chimes and electronics (and even noise splotches!) like a DJ finessing live samples into the mix. The B side’s groove is a particular kind of revelry and dance character that has not been effectively considered in recent American tape releases. The kind with such a viscosity to its character! Even as it turns into a deep fried lazer guided melody burst in the final third and drones out Charalambides style.
There’s been traces of a cosmic Americana in the curation that Unifcator and the newfound Astal Editions. Although, I’ve struggled to use or consider the term to describe the loose happenings in these (mostly) midwestern folk music that has its ear turned to krautrock-indebted jamming. There is an incredible canon of work that the last three years of Moon Glyph, Unifcator, Astral Editions, and a few other scattered releases have been dialoguing with one another. Yet, even as these folks have shared bills or acknowledged one another, the capacity for outright trance has been inconclusive, or at least are grounds that are only starting to be really acknowledged. Pulice’s work with Powers/Rolin feels like a groundbreaking here, as does the Power/Rolin certified curation of Mute Duo’s 5amSky. For a recording that’s 3 years old and uncirculated until now, it feels of the moment; a perfectly encompassment of electronic intermingling in jamming that stays grounded to its roots and isn’t afraid to shake its ass. Consider it amongst the year’s best.
Edition of 200 Available at the Astral Editions Bandcamp Page
With the intensely unsettling rush of guitar and drum histrionics from Cleveland’s most-pummeling-of-all-time psycho-death-math band (yeah I said it) fresh in my ears, I could barely begin to identify the Homo sapiens traits within myself that I once took for granted. That’s no small feat – I had been feeling the most person-like I’ve felt in a long time before I popped in “Prove Youre Human,” a cornucopia of DNA-altering bombardment at the molecular level, enacted through devious sonic manipulation by Clan of the Cave Bear’s John Delzoppo and Brendan Sedlak. But sure enough, and truly, by the time the tape locked on the finally empty reel of “Prove Youre Human,” I was questioning my own response to the imperative in the tape’s title, a response that transitioned all the way to “I don’t think I am anymore, actually.”
I was pretty disappointed in myself.
That’s what you get, I guess, when you’re bombarded with metallics steeped in radioactive goo, dried and corroded for maximum abrasion. And abrade the Cave Bear fellows do, as each second of “Prove Youre Human” hits with a force that seems utterly physical. It’s no wonder then that my body responded – nay, reacted – to the assault by breaking down at a molecular level, skin, bone, tissue, and organs ceasing to exist in easily defined states and seeping into one another until I attained a form somewhat resembling a cross between the Toxic Avenger and the Blob by the end of the tape. So the joke here, dear friends, is the challenge itself – once Clan of the Cave Bear finishes with you and demands proof of your ongoing humanity, there’s very little – if any – of it left to present on your own behalf. I sure failed the test quite miserably – damn you, you crazy slash-and-burn noise rock! I’ll never not say no to you.
Oh, and guess what? This is a lost album from 2012, released just now by Mistake by the Lake Records, so these chuckleheads have been planning our humiliation for years. Cassette edition of 100.
It had to happen at some point. We couldn’t stave off the inevitable forever, no matter how much – or how little – we tried. And it truly was “how little,” because no one was holding back the Electric Nature but the Electric Nature themselves. And they weren’t even holding themselves back – they were essentially just out there, waiting to carve out some time for themselves to hop in a room together with some recording equipment and lay down some sweet, sweet tracks. Which they eventually did. So – good news, in the end, there’s a new Electric Nature tape (and – gasp! – LP edition on Feeding Tube) for us to gobble and barely chew before swallowing and digesting and disseminating throughout our bloodstream and body in a euphoric rush. Because that’s the effect “Old World Die Must” has on the human person – it goes in fast and intense and results in a massive rush.
You’ve seen it happen, because you’ve seen it in person – the Electric Nature just ripped through a tour for this sucker, so it’s road-tested. Battle-tested, even. Michael Pierce, Michael Potter, and Thom Strickland are the grizzled vets returning from duty, their crushing freak-jazz/earth-scorching noisebient a PTSD-inducing cacophony … or mind-freeing antidote to primitive and insular thinking everywhere. Jeff Tobias (yes, the Sunwatchers/of Montreal/Circulatory System among others guy) plays sax on “Enter Chapel Perilous.” John Kiran Fernandes (yes, the Olivia Tremor Control/Circulatory System among others guy) plays clarinet and violin on “Old World Die Must.” Each side is a wildly different vibe, but there’s a gravity-defying, atmosphere-piercing rocket ready to rip the face right off the sky for fifteen to twenty minutes or so, uniting the two sides in a clear attempt to freak out every square in sight. And there are a million of them, so it’s imperative we get this piping through every loudspeaker in every city before anybody realizes what’s going on.
Loebs is BACK! They didn’t even have a moment to swea–or chomp down a Gatorade for the electrolytes! Coming only half a year after their stellar Orange Milk debut, this new Hyperlink Anamorphosis tape is both new-time shifting R&D as much as a genuine jumping refinement of Loebs’ palette. The liner notes make it clear: about 11 slices of music akin to “second-hand Second Life glitching” or “any % speedrun challenges” across 22 minutes of 2022 live performances from house shows and wherever Loebs was being given full reign of control.
If you don’t know those liner notes, then you may mistake the crispness of these DAW cuts for new Loebs compositions. And the fella’s been seriously figuring out that psychedelic bliss tempo range. Culling from a bag of electronic developments less based in precise rhythms or synchronous drum tempos, Loebs style is ever-present vibe shifts between haptic sounds and what constructivist affect layering instrumentation can reveal. Future funk smackdown here, gabber rail grinding there, a little broken orchestra from just outside the normal, oh and one of those footwork synths that you might as well glide down; this is all just there in the opener Trolley Portal. Every element comes together at the finale, before fizzling out with finesse, enough so that you can seriously lose track of where you are on the tape. This is a benefit to the approach in my opinion, allowing for Loebs to maintain immense hustle and their galaxy brain bag of ideas.
The little fella HUSTLES in compositions like “The Back of the Router” (which its jumpy “HEY!”s) and “Hypertext Reponder”’s major-keg BIG SOUND under sizzlzing drum n’ bass. There’s a progression towards synthpunk sugar rush rushing into the red on (the brilliant fucking titled) “$5-10 Suggested Donation (notaflof),” a cut that fries the bass and turns the synths into subway trains that seem to be just around the corner.
That being said, it’s those pieces near the end that are of immense note. The B-Side itself is a little more airy, with only arpeggios of bleeps keeping a stable reference across the field recording fuckery of “The Word for World.” Even as gamer gabber grab bags light the way, it’s the “Oblique Zing” and “Scenic Overlook” where Andy stretches their noise muscles a tad. You see it a bit during the A-side, when small dispatches of airy synthetic silence pull you out from the mania, but these two together really hit at the haptic overload. Both sound as if Andy just decided to pivot HARD into ZXS Spectrum computer building, but forgot to install the RAM and took a field recorder to whatever alien noises plopped out of there! It suggests a new versatility to Loebs’ bag of tricks.
As much as the versatility of the noise on this tape is such a draw, Hyperlink Anamorphosis’ brevity gives it a walloping punch that also revels in listening repeatedly while on the move. I spent the end of March back in Knoxville for Big Ears, at an airbnb walking distance from Downtown. This became a walking tape on Thursday morning. With cheap headphones in my ears, I quickly realized that there’s incredible potential for Loebs’ sound to bounce off urban zones. The sirens of a real ambulance almost felt within the piece, as did the chipper birds at a crossing, and even the low drone of a car revving or generator a building away. Hyperlink Anamorphosis DOES sounds like 2023 in all its almost-cybernetic glory; a fact that Skye Butchard also brilliantly noted in a piece for the Quietus this month. And I should know! I saw Kate NV performing her own hyperrealist compositions that Loebs equally stands toe to toe with. Could you imagine that?! The russo pop princess and Loebs in a DJ battle of wits? Oh goodness what a dream! I’ll go ahead and get the house show guest list all set up, you can DM me for the address, just $5-10 notaflof.
Pair with a local honey ale and bbq chicken sammich served on a hot dog bun; fries applicable! Edition of 200 available from Jolt Recordings!
Learning about someone posthumously is a messy, beautiful process. It’s happened to me twice over the past year: once when my friend Nick (of the wonderful band Spiral Rash) died and a second time when Sarah “Underhill” Danger passed away. I didn’t know Sarah like I knew Nick, but what little time I spent with her was spent with someone who treated me like I was her best friend even after just meeting in passing a once at Gonerfest. When she died, I regretted not knowing to get her better. I saw the tributes from people in Milwaukee and the people who knocked back beers every year in the Memphis heat with her and felt a strange twinge of guilt along with the expected sadness. That’s obviously selfish on some level, but that’s what’s hard about having a new friend in your life pass away – you end up mourning the person and the friendship that never was at the same time.
Thankfully, Biff (the great bootleg head of Das Boot Tapes) over at Tetryon Tapes released Danger, a tape combining the Mallwalker (Sarah’s band) album that never saw an official release with an incendiary set he recorded live in Buffalo. Another funny connection here – the Mallwalker album was recorded by Eric and Stacy over at Sex Tape Records, who, at one point, tried to court my band Big Clown by telling us that they had the record ready to release. They sent us the album and I never listened to it.
This was the story of my experience with Sarah until summer 2022, when Big Clown made the trek up to Milwaukee to play a show at the fabulous Circle A with the equally fabulous Florida Brothers Band. Sarah was a Gonerfest regular but we never really had an actual conversation. I didn’t see Mallwalker when they played a 4 AM aftershow or when they played the festival proper; I walked in during MOTO’s set two bands after and was told I missed a great set from some band with a wild singer. I filed away the information for later. I saw Sarah, all dyed hair and provocative punk clothes, and knew she had to be cool. I didn’t feel cool enough to talk to her, so I didn’t. She obviously thought my band was cool enough to pump her fist and yell along to our songs at a sparsely attended show (and again at a very chaotic 1:30 AM Gonerfest afterparty that was better attended (we played better in Milwaukee though), so this was totally a me thing. Hindsight is always 20/20.
I wish I had listened to this album while Sarah was still alive. I want to tell her that “Parent Trap” felt relatable in ways that punk songs usually don’t. I want to tell her that laughing about turning into your parents is more worthwhile than hating it. I want to tell her that the sexcapade outlined in the first verse of “Phase” is fucking gnarly and made me wish I could’ve/would’ve raised a Gonerbrau to it at the Hi Tone. I want to tell her that it sounds like this is what she was born to do. Some people just make sense as punk singers. It’s not about the costume (which she rocked, clearly) or the lyrics (which hit the modern punk sweet spot of being funny, gross, and passionate). It’s the venom. It’s the confidence. It’s the charisma. She sings exactly the same as she talked and that’s the kind of energy I crave in my music. So what actually was Mallwalker? Who was Sarah? What did I learn from this tape?
Mallwalker was a good band that absolutely earned their opening slot at Gonerfest.
Mallwalker was the kind of band I don’t think I would’ve appreciated in 2019 if I saw them at Gonerfest. This, again, is a me problem. I have become much more appreciative of energetic performances and opportunities to live in songs than I was in 2019. Ironically enough, that MOTO performance changed a lot for me.
Mallwalker had an absolutely killer bass tone that more punk bands should rip off.
Sarah could front any band and it would be worth listening to.
Mallwalker was clearly special among a heap of other scuzzy four chord floor tom pound punk bands.in my life. It’s impossible for me to separate this band from the context of the tape, its creation, and where I’m at, but I also just don’t want to. This is all I’ve got left of someone who was warm to me and could’ve been someone I got to know better in years to come. It’s worth holding onto that for as long as I can.
Tapes of the fabulous available at the Teyron Tape Bandcamp Page
Alright before I talk shop here about this tape, I need to give a massive tip of my hat to the PR email. I haven’t received a PR email more inventive this year than the one Z. Emerson of Doom Trip Records enthusiastically threw my way after asking “hey is it okay if I send you this PR email that’s really just a big Notes app message?” Finally! Someone meeting me where in 2023 where I resonate most: a giant litany of font colors and links with information that is more in line with feeling like a Web 1.0 page that just blatantly tells me what I need to know and the links worth sharing if I so desire to go further. Wow! PR-heads…take notes. This is how you grab my attention.
Anyways, Doom Trip’s first 2023 tape of the year comes from Heejin Jang. That’s her there central on one of the most evocative and stylish j-cards I’ve seen in a second; a pristine portrait that glistens with a talismanic quality. She trained as a painter but catching a noise performance in 2012 completely shifted what artistic endeavors she was interested in taking up: painting drawn out of noise, more or less. She makes a clear distinction that what she is doing is not rooted in “art” or “music,” but more just general experience. Her work, at least early renditions, were the result of live Max/MSP manipulation (and have been releasing on tape as far back as 2016). And in the past few years has been building in intensity and its capacity for noise textures without being sunk by the sludge, weight, or expectations. The stray dublab session here, an ESS presentation there, and collaborative soundscape work at the start of the decade have been crucial in trying to create a tactile sensory overload. A genuine desire to lose one’s self in the noise.
Me and the Glassbirds caught my ear because quite simply, Jang seemed to have a grip on concise soundscapes that could be abrasively abstract, but also deeply inviting and inquisitive little puzzle boxes of their own accord. That is to say: Me and the Glassbirds is the first real industrial release Doom Trip has curated in their existence as a label. Not a hyper-EBM inversion you’d think the label would shoot for, but an actual legitimate private press noise release that wouldn’t be out of place on Hot Releases or No Rent. Although neither label exactly curates a focus towards the psychedelia that this mode of crafting provides, the bountiful grip on the present experience that with which one can lose themself in. This is perhaps why it makes sense as a Doom Trip release, foreshadowing the uniquely hypnotic and almost-dance characteristics of Jang’s work.
Listening as a full listen as intended and what becomes apparent is Jang’s restlessness. Her palette is one of sensory depraved loops and reverb washed recordings brushed and chiseled down to gaseous states; two matches made in heaven that also could run around like a monotonous carousel if they so desired. They don’t though. Throughout the release Jang seems to be trying to temporally unstick her loops by any means necessary. Mostly that accounts to viciously ascended forms of jamcom’ing. The layering of sounds and beats give the tape a translucent sleekness often missing in industrial of this size. You can barely picture eggs cracking, timers ticking, messages being sent through power lines, and of course the stray cryptid bird noise. But all the while Jang never keeps her foot in one spot long enough to pinpoint and denote a full lineage. Still, her field recordings, drones, or deconstructed club sleights that come through beckon for a novel way of approaching the familiar. An ever present vibe shifts in real time on the release that seems to keep a listener moving.
All of which is confirmed within the central component of this entire release on Our Brief Eternity. It’s a 13:22 track that begs to catch your ear, if only because it is such an upstanding composition of production sleights and asynchronous melodies constructing a universe of its own accord. Part industrial light machine gun pitter-patter routinized and pitch-shifted, another part deconstructed club with tumultuously swinging breakbeats, as much as one giant amalgamation of reverberated bird ambience absolutely off its rocker. A lot of side A teases these pieces, but they do come together into an actual legitimate soundsystem that I’d bury myself under if given the opportunity. Partially because it seems to carry with it its own textbook of influences indecipherable enough into an amalgamation that parallels Twin Infinitives moments of batshit savant electronic wisdom (Royal Trux’s own strung out savant wisdom is one of the closet ancillaries to these sounds). Our Brief Eternity is immensely less strung out than said Trux album, but I detect a similar mania in the razor sharp execution.
If not that mania, a similar deeply ingrained tenacity to chart a sonic roadmap. Me and the Glassbirds does not tell you the name of this place, it merely suggests that alloys and rare earth metals exist here as birds seem to elicit a metallic call. It’s a dimension that always seems to be just between the harmonics of our music systems and the blurs our eyes end up dashing out; a place that really can only be summoned by fucking with Max/MSP and noise as if to tune in to and find a resonate frequency. With that it’s enough to seriously consider that Jang’s unclassifiable style of sound is indeed tapping into various aberrations and specters just outside this world. That is to say, Me and the Glassbirds is one of the strongest listens of the year full stop, and quite frankly the best tape Doom Trip has put out this decade to date. Here’s to hoping for a second edition.
Sold out at the Doom Trip Records Bandcamp! Pester Z to make more tapes because it needs it damnit!
