Cyclic Defrost Magazine

Afxjim – Blackout Music (Feral Media)
La Lakers – Silk Lettuce Whitney Houston (Dungeon Taxis)
Brackles – LHC (Planet Mu/Inertia)

Posted: 07 Oct 2009 03:26 PM PDT

Feral Media are up to number eight of ten releases in their POWWOW series of new music. This latest album is the work of Sydney's Travis Baird, who splits his time between his band The Woods Themselves various work for the likes of El Mopa and Sounds Like Sunset.

Blackout Music sees him taking a solo jaunt into electro-acoustic post rock territory with a firm focus on melody and some delightful instrumentation. The CD has a fantastic sound to it, all warm tones, fingers on strings and a depth where you can make out a tambourine away in the distance with sampled voices appearing right in front of you.

‘Love For Juan’ weaves some tumbling Tortoise drums over more delicate percussion that sounds like children's toys, gamelan and the like. The mix brings reverb and delay to the fore as synths swirl and dive through the rest of the music. It is impressive stuff, especially in the context of the blinded hype that was applied to the latest Decoder Ring album. Blackout Music is a much more rewarding listen.

The key to this album is the diversity. There is no slavish cloning of Mogwai or Tortoise. ‘Edgbaston’ is a creeping indie track, surprisingly straight down the line after the previous songs which are more in the mold of bands like Ukiyo-e.

Diversity alone won't make a record work however: it’s the way Blackout Music is woven together which is critical, and that’s where the production skills of Baird and Tony Dupe come to the fore. They don't allow indulgence to seep in – most songs are under four minutes. Nor do they rely on studio effects to cloud and soak the melodies. Bells chime and guitars creak with crystalline clarity and samples are used economically to highlight a passage rather than forming the idea the music is built around.

The ghost of Spiritualized hovers over the gospel tinged ‘Round Midnight’, giving it a human edge. In fact that 'personal touch' is ever present on Blackout Music, while ‘Success’ is like Arcade Fire dabbling in club music and getting it gloriously wrong.

There is something here for everyone then – touches of indie, lashes of post rock, experimental dabblings in electronica and some freak folk organic haziness to bring it all back down to earth. By combining these thing together so successfully this has to be one of the most engaging local releases for 2009.

Chris Familton

Afxjim – Blackout Music (Feral Media) is a post from: Cyclic Defrost Magazine.

La Lakers – Silk Lettuce Whitney Houston (Dungeon Taxis)

Posted: 07 Oct 2009 03:24 PM PDT

There isn't a lot to be found about La Lakers online, other than that they appear to be from New Zealand and this is their second release (following on from some collaborative pieces) on the Dungeon Taxis label out of Christchurch.

The twelve short pieces are loosely structured around central drones and decaying washes of static and tone. The highlight is track ‘04′ (no titles are listed on the CD-R), which is gentler than many of the other pieces. It takes some gorgeous notes and stretches them until they dissolve into vapor trails. Many of the tracks sound like they incorporate field recordings and manipulated turntable crackles but ‘04′ is very much in the vein of laptop constructed sounds of Fennesz and fellow New Zealander Rosy Parlane. There is a warm, yearning and nostalgic smear that makes the piece glow and pulse brilliantly.

Unfortunately the rest of the pieces don't have the same impact. ‘05′ is a thinly sliced glitch fest, stuttering and twitching, while ‘07′ stirs together those aforementioned field recordings of what sounds like water and kids playing. Elsewhere, ‘09′ is their most accessible moment of ambient shoegaze.

‘10′ and ‘11′ approach Part Timer territory with digitally manipulated guitar and some slight Fourtet-isms that betray some of La Lakers' influences. Combined, the half hour CD-R makes for a nice listen and shows that NZ continues to have a healthy experimental underground with new names coming through, especially in the experimental electronica realm.

Chris Familton

La Lakers – Silk Lettuce Whitney Houston (Dungeon Taxis) is a post from: Cyclic Defrost Magazine.

Brackles – LHC (Planet Mu/Inertia)

Posted: 06 Oct 2009 05:38 PM PDT

Brackles - LHC

Planet Mu has been consistent in releasing some serious bass pressure on 12" vinyl, and showcasing artists expanding the boundaries of dubstep.

Brackles is an artist doing something slightly different, yes, the trademarks of dubstep are still here, but with a retrospective glance to some of the greater moments in dance culture. The rolling bass is ever present, but more akin to drum 'n bass bass drops than the somewhat stale bass whomp of much dubstep. Detroit shines through in "LHC", could easily be mistaken for someone like Carl Craig trying out a future-step rhythm, machines glistening with icey synth melodies, or Black Dog/Plaid with the rhythmic sheen of bleeps and tones. "Sutorîto Faitâ" again digs deep into Detroit territory, touched by a rhythmic presence of Balil.

Brackles is a fresh approach to dubstep, encapsulating everything good in the genre, and utilising the sonic futurism of Detroit long past, but ever present. Sharp, slick and seductive.

Wayne Stronell

Brackles – LHC (Planet Mu/Inertia) is a post from: Cyclic Defrost Magazine.