Foxy Digitalis
Sections
Feverish streams jostle for position in the obtuse angles of Emily Kuhn’s beguiling “Ghosts of Us.” Melodic silhouettes from Kuhn’s harmon muted trumpet ghost through the pointillist rhythms, filling empty space while weaving through the wake of Erik Skov’s guitar. “I wrote Ghosts of Us when I sat down at the piano after coming home […]
It’s time to get crunched. Fugue State angles toward the ground floor with stochastic rhythms and jagged guitar textures. Throughout “Facts,” an underlying gust of broken glass arrays is overrun by distorted chord progressions and ramshackle reverie. “Just give me the facts, I said!” Shane Bruno demands, a blistering urgency growing as the growling basslines […]
Julie Reich’s (Body Breaks, CHANDRA, etc.) solo guise, Bile Sister, blitzes our memories and energetically bounces us into an angular sonic blender. Basslines dance across the floor, shoulders shaking all the way until we’re stuck in a hypnagogic nightmare. “Generation Steam” is about the oppressive absurdity capitalism subjects us to, turned into a circular sonic […]
Nora Stanley’s opening, wistful saxophone run clears the smoke lingering in the sonic foothills of “Hawk Hill.” Chord progressions stretch slowly inward, pulling away from the margins and bringing this thoughtful piece into focus. Situated safely in the hollows, the ephemeral melodies flicker above Benny Bock’s foundational keyboard playing as the emotive trailings buoy the […]
Tension is an immovable force on Nicol Eltzroth Rosendorf’s “Cohen.” Relentless, searching aural fields collide with swelling emotions, building dramatic crescendos and poignant, reflective peaks. Time is a disintegrating circle on “Cohen,” reality breaking through each crack in the piece’s sonic fabric. Cryptic imagery in the video, directed by Rosendorf himself, heightens the unsettling realizations […]
Openings appear beneath the sonic expanses of “tiny flames,” the opening piece on missing scenes new album, sturgeon moon/beaver moon. As the final part of a triptych that began with cold moon/worm moon, resolutions are buried in faint, bubbling rhythms and searing drones. Dawn breaks, holding dissonance at bay as distant oscillations creep through mirrored corridors. It […]
From the opening moments of SANAM’s “Ayouha Al-Taiin Fi Al-Mawt,” vocalist Sandy Chamoun spits fire. She recites Paul Chaoul’s poem of the same name with a frenetic energy that infects the entire track. “The track is a description of a hallucinatory state of clarity, from a stream-of-consciousness text by poet Paul Chaoul who raves endlessly […]
Ecstasy and heartbreak are woven into the mesmerizing sonic journey of “Astande To Boose Gahe Man Ast.” It draws in listeners with its energy and technique, almost lulling us into a trance, as the expressive melodies and Amiri’s stunning vocals channel so much emotion into an unforgettable performance. Amiri is one of many Afghan artists […]
Dichotomies are everything on Diego Caicedo’s Ascendit In Inferno. The Colombian guitarist (currently based in Barcelona) keeps listeners alert as he nimbly moves from one mode to another. In the opening corridors, acoustic guitar plucks wind circuitous pathways through jagged scenery, evoking moving figures and craggy peaks. A perilous shadow looms across Ascendit In Inferno, shrouding sparks […]