Piety of Ashes

Turning Inconsolate

Turning Alone

The quiet after everything breaks — “it’s over now” by instagram.com/ambientcozy drifts through atmospheric ambient stillness, a gentle release wrapped in fading emotion.

listen now: https://go.ambiqo.nl/c-itsovernow

cØzY - it's over now

Headwater

Bersarin Quartett - Oktober

Argentinian musician Federico Durand returns with his 2nd full length album on 12k following 2016’s A Través Del Espejo (12k1085). Taking his already minimalist composition style Federico challenged himself by using only one synthesizer for this beautiful album of sparse, hypnotic dustiness. His talent for creating works of so much emotion out of so little attest to his concentration when working and his passion for the craft. La Niña Junco is a handwoven gem. Music with a humble origin and a deep resonating soul.  Famed Argentinian artist Lola Goldstein graciously illustrated the album cover, caputuring the idea of memory and object that is so infused with Federico’s work.

“Immersed in the beauty of the very moment, the songs for La Niña Junco were recorded in one take during two days, in a rush of inspiration. I used a small sound palette: one instrument, a Crumar Performer synthesizer along with two looping pedals and Roland Space Echo RE-201. The Crumar was my first synthesizer. I bought it many years ago and then gave it to a friend, who later lent it to my brother. After a very long time, I got it back when we moved to La Cumbre, a small town in the central mountain area of Argentina. As this instrument has a very limited but beautiful oscilator, it was rewarding to make small melodies using only its almost magical sound. I was enchanted to have the chance to play with my Crumar again: in many ways this album feels like returning to an early home. The electric noises of my old, broken keyboard, were an unexpected and musical gift and a humble proof of the passing of time.”

– Federico Durand, La Cumbre, 2017

La Niña Junco

Lluvia de estrellas

From the album The Kid out October 6, 2017 on Western Vinyl

Pre-Order The Kid
BLEEP https://bleep.com/release/86790-kaitlyn-aurelia-smith-the-kid
Norman Records https://www.normanrecords.com/records/166212
Bandcamp https://kaitlynaureliasmith.bandcamp.com/album/the-kid
iTunes hyperurl.co/8n4qa5
WV http://westernvinyl.com/shop/wv170

In 2017, the musical term “electronic” is nearly obsolete given the ubiquity of computerized processes in producing music.  Even so, the prevailing assumption is that musicians working under this broad umbrella must be inspired by concepts equally as electrified as their equipment.  Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith has demonstrated in her still-blooming discography that this notion couldn’t be further from the truth, and that more often than not, rich worlds of synthesized sound are born from deep reverence of the natural world.  Smith (who by no coincidence, cites naturalist David Attenborough as a contemporary muse) has embodied such an appreciation on The Kid in as direct and sincere a way as possible by sonically charting the phases of life itself.  The album, which punctually follows up her 2016 breakthrough EARS, chronicles four defining cognitive and emotional stages of the human lifespan across four sides of a double LP.

The first side takes us through the confused astonishment of a newborn, unaware of itself, existing in an unwitting nirvana.  Smith’s music has always woven a youthful thread befitting of the aforementioned subject. Here she articulates it in signature fashion on the track “An Intention,” which serves not only as a soaring spire on The Kid, but on her entire output.  There is playfulness here, but it's elevated by an undertone of gravity into something compelling and majestic that is fast becoming Smith’s watermark.  The emotional focus of side two is the vital but underreported moment in early youth when we cross the threshold into self awareness.  The subject is profound enough to fill an entire album, but rarely makes its way into a single track, indicating Smith’s ambition to broach subtler and deeper subjects than the average composer.  This side offers up another highlight in the form of “In The World But Not Of The World” which serves its subject well with epiphanic, climbing strings and decidedly noisy textures over a near-Bollywood low end pulse.

Side three emphasizes a feeling of being confirmed enough in one’s own identity to begin giving back to the formative forces of one’s upbringing, which is arguably the duty that all great artists aim to fulfill.  This side ends with the exploratory album cut “Who I Am & Why I Am Where I Am” recorded in a single take without overdubs on the rare EMS Synthi 100 synthesizer. This humble piece of sound design serves as a contrast to side four’s verdant orchestral moments, all written and arranged for the EU-based Stargaze quartet by Smith herself.  This final side represents a return to pure being, the kind of wisdom and peace that eludes most of us until the autumn of life.  On “To Feel Your Best” this concept is voiced in the bittersweet refrain “one day I’ll wake up and you won’t be there” which Smith intended to be a grateful acknowledgement of life rather than a melancholy resentment of loss. The song has both effects depending on the mood of the listener, and both interpretations are equally moving.

Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith belongs to an ilk of modern musicians who are defined by their commitment to creating experiential albums despite the singles-oriented habits of modern listeners, and here she represents her kind proudly.  The subjects on The Kid are not simple to convey, and yet through both emotional tone and lyrical content, Smith does just that. There is a similar gravity to both birth and death, and rarely is that correlation as accurately and enthusiastically mapped as it is here.  As Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith explores her existence through music, she guides us in gleefully contemplating our own.

The Kid

Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith - "To Feel Your Best"

Stabil

Sub.Res

Credits :
Cover design by nibo
mastered by - bo kondren
all tracks written and produced by david letellier
Tracks 5 & 7 contain keyboard samples
by Vincent Feuillet.

© 2006 Raster-Noton.
Archiv für Ton und Nichtton.


Turning Inconsolate

The Flashbulb

Related tracks