Tag: Ireland

TRACK | King-Mob – Pendulum Days

5/5 golden merles

In an era defined by death, disease, and (gestures broadly), commiseration is the best thing a person can do. King-Mob’s “Pendulum Days” is a track of lush alt/noise rock that describes unease and routine over degraded percussive fractals, subsections merging and collapsing in precise heaps. The mastery it offers is that of ordered disorientation. And the feeling of its familiarity is an uneasy but nonetheless welcome revelation.

The complexity and calculated elaborations of the instrumental play are worthy of admiration. The soundscape is finely tuned in a delicate cacophony. All that careful attention paid to the sampling is successfully populating the undergirding of the song’s structure and acts to center some direct and cunning hooks, complementing and following the form.

The richness of the reversed cymbals and reverberated swells produces a nice, dense soil from which the lead guitar and vocal may flourish. The direction and warp of those segments both mimicking and reifying that titular swing forward, then later agreeably inverted by the tether.

If I am discerning it properly, my favorite line operates also as a top-tier toast for the times we labor under: “to gods who never listen.”

Most listeners will likely relate to the narrative of a life defined by what would have formerly passed for recurrent aberration and colonized exclusively by apparitions. In the end, the gears shift to what appears an escape or transition, symbolically lurching off perhaps out of the rut, away from those who would have you passive, idle, and obedient, and reminding that there is only justice in this world if we make it. The new Arabesque EP can be found on the bandcamp.

By way of exploring similar themes of ensnare/emancipation, maybe you can check out Mathieu Labaye’s “Orgesticulanismus.”

TRACK | Aoife Nessa Frances – Here in the Dark

5/5 golden merles

As a rule I don’t trust any song over 3 minutes. There are exceptions, many of them, but generally songwriters just don’t have that much to say on any given subject. Or at least not nearly as much as they think that they do… If I wanted to hear the chorus four times I’d loop the track.

But in this case, with Aoife Nessa France’s “Here in the Dark” running to 5:14, every second feels earned.

It works in concert with the void it fills, not so much against it. Minimal instrumentation is set to the task of accompanying the singer-songwriter substratum. Glacial and understated, spirals of synth and strings fittingly accent the core elements of voice and guitar.

The song/record has a different scope and pacing to most material in the genre, but without sacrificing some underlying mechanics or the appropriate measure of attention to detail. I don’t just mean BPM, there’s a kind of assurance to it. It doesn’t take the audience for granted but also does without pandering or indulging. There’s a recurring and really well realized construction.